Bell Mobility

Bell Palm Pre Review #3: Battery Life and Touchstone

The Palm Pre is fun. Easily switching between applications has gotten a bit more exciting! You can tell Palm has thought about how the user would actually want to interact and experience a device. Switching back and forth between an iPhone and a Pre, I found myself doing the “gesture area” action of the Pre with the home button area of the iPhone.

Depending on how many applications you have running at the same time will be an indicator of how long your battery life will be. I’ve been using this for the past few days getting my e-mail, calendar, messaging, surfing the web, using the camera, sharing my photos, using Google Maps, getting/using apps, watching YouTube videos… and it drains a great deal faster than similar devices we’ve reviewed. I had to remember that the Pre uses the web to continually do real-time updates. With using all these applications it just gets me through a full day of use.

To help you get the most out of your battery you can change the settings of your e-mail to check every 5-10 minutes rather than every minute. Even your IM settings, change it to Busy or Offline when your not available. To charge the Pre you can use the microUSB that’s given to you when you buy it. Or you can get the Palm Touchstone. An accessory that uses “inductive technology” that somehow charges your Pre wirelessly. I don’t know how this works as I’m not a science guy, but all I now is that it works well.

The Touchstone has a sticky bottom to which Palm also designed from scratch. They mimicked the feet of a Gecco and how it can climb anywhere. The same is with the Touchstone as this can literally be placed anywhere and keep it’s position.

Once it’s plugged into the wall you put the microUSD into the Touchstone. You’ll also get a new backing for the Pre, one that has a matte feel and look to it. You’ll see there are magnets inside the new backing that make it possible for the Pre and the Touchstone to essentially speak to each other. By placing your Pre on the Touchstone (Palm logo to Palm logo) you activate the charging to start. This can be done in portrait or landscape mode and still give you the ability to use the Pre and all it features.

The Touchstone basically saves you a step in the “charging your device” process. You only will need to plug it in once and then charge and go. This will help you keep your battery at full power. But ease and convenience will have a price to it… this accessory will cost you a bit more money – from what we hear Bell is going to retail this for $79.95.

Check it out here in the video: