Palm tweaking Pre for better quality 39
As Palm has done in the past with most of their devices, they're making subtle, small hardware tweaks in newer revisions of the Palm Pre. As PreThinking posted in a mini-survey of sorts and as much-discussed in our forums, it appears that Palm has taken some steps to correct the physical maladies that affected earlier Pre phones.
The most notable correction comes in the battery compartment, where Palm has affixed a small foam pad opposite the power connection points to provide a more snug fit for the battery. This seemingly inconsequential addition is to combat the slider-related crashes that plagued many early units, including this blogger’s own phone. In fact, I recently picked up a newly refurbished Pre to replace mine after a bizarre failure, and it too has a foam pad inside. The foam pad is a more elegant (and less flammable) variation on the tiny paper inserts some users were resorting to.
Newer Pre phones also have a more silvery center button instead of the somewhat pearlescent button that early models had. There is also considerably less wobble to the slider and none of the surveyed new owners had experienced the maddeningly mysterious spider web cracking that so many others saw. There also seems to be a slightly modified battery in newer phones (the pegs on the rounded end are hollow), though the reasoning behind the change is not known.
So we at least know that Palm heard our cries for help and set out to correct the problems that some early adopters faced. And those of you who have gotten a replacement Pre and are curious if it’s a refurbished device can open the phone app, type in ##786# to bring up the Reverse Logistics Support card. This is full of useful information, including your phone’s configuration, initial activation date, MSID, recondition status (yes or no) and the date on which your phone was reconditioned. As Dieter noted in our PalmCast podcast, it’s not necessarily a sad thing if you get a refurbished phone, as that means somebody has taken the time to go over it and make sure it’s in good working order.
39 Comments
I have this version of the phone, with the "new" little foam pad on the battery compartment and I've had 0 (zero) issues with the slider wiggling, cracked screen, oreo effect...etc. Though, I have had the headset/microphone issue...which is ridiculous...
You have figured out the solution to that as well, right? Just plug then unplug some headphones. Next time you pull your headphones, make sure your Pre isn't shut off or "sleeping."
:)
Current Palm Pre tweaking reminds me of both the good and ugly side of being European:
- Ugly: You always have to wait for new shiny gadgets...
- Good: You always have Rev 2 gadgets...
But the Worst side is that you're a Eurotrash.
I guess it's better not to respond...
Oops I just did replied to him.
Following your advice would be the wisest thing, but doing what I did is... the best-feeling thing.
I feel relieved.
you are ignorant arrogant animal. Definitely not American!
Well, You're part of United Sanitary Association (USA, aka United Sh*t of America).
Feeling proud?
I was wondering whether or not to buy the Palm Pre especially after all the harsh criticism about the build such as screens cracking, black/white/colored spots on the screen, loose slider, heatness from the battery, low battery life.. etc etc.. this article somehow relieves a little bit of my frustrations with the Pre but I'm still undecisive. I'm one of those people who buys phones every two years to get $150 off upgrade and I've been a Sprint customer for the past 9 years. Are you guys satisfied with the Pre? Do you think the phone will last long-term, 2 years at most?
However with the recent rumors of a Sprint Hero, I'm considering going with that and waiting for the 2nd/3rd generation of the Palm Pre. Albeit, I'm also concerned with the build of the Sprint Hero, hopefully it doesn't look like a fisher toy.
One difference between the Pre and the Hero is that the Hero is being sold in Europe now. Buy the time the Hero is sold in the USA any hardware and software problems will be fixed.
There is a software fix that is going to be released soon that will fix the small lag problem when switching home between home screens and adding Java support.
I just picked up a refurbished phone on 8/19/09. My phone says its refirb date is 7/20/09.....does anyone know what date Palm began using new batteries & the foam pad?
I'm confused where you go to check the refurb state of the phone. How do I get to the phone app? : O )
Thanks!
Jen
You see that little button with the phone on it? The one that you use to make calls? That's the phone app.
Just type ##786# into the number pad and a menu will pop up.
PreThinking.com covered this a little over a week ago.
http://www.prethinking.com/home/2009/8/11/newer-palm-pres-are-better-bui...
Still, good coverage of the changes. Thanks for all your hard work!
OMG! Another blog got something faster! Please tell me more!
Glad to see Palm is doing something about all these build problems. I'm tempted to call up Palm and see if they can replace my phone cause it's under warranty. I guess I should be happy that my phone is pretty good overall, but I would love for this wiggle/oreo effect to go away. Maybe I'll wait it out another few months, and then give 'em a call. Would be awesome if they could replace the plastic casing with a light weight metal to make it a truly solid phone.
Go to your phone dialer app on your Palm Pre, and dial "##786#" without the quotations of course. The Reverse Logistics Support information will then be displayed. You may check the refurb state of your phone under the "RECONDATE" section. As for when palm started to implement these changes... the information under my "WARRANTYDATECODE" is 07/07/2009 and this is my third Pre. It has no wobble or oreo effect, it does have the small foam piece in the battery compartment and the button is more of a silverish color rather than the white pearl color that the first batch Pre's had. My first Pre had the silver colored button as opposed to the more white pearl button and had a small oreo effect, but it did not have the foam pad int he battery compartment, it's WARRANTYDATECODE was 07/02/2009. My second Pre is exactly like my current Pre, foam pad in the battery compartment and everything. I took it back for the one I have now due to dead pixels. I hope this answers some questions.
This is a nice update but it would be nice to confirm. Seems like plenty of people on precentral have later build dates (e.g. Late July) and still report problems.
It would be nice for confirmation.
Does anybody know under what conditions palm will replace your current pre with a new refurb. model? Mine wobbles a bit and gets really hot during calls.
That foam sticker looks a bit ghetto coming from Palm.
LOL what would you prefer? A diamond-coated pad? It's a simple solution for a simple problem! :)
...which is something we haven't seen from Palm in about a decade....
It would look a bit ghetto coming from any *other* company
I got my refurb yesterday. So far it's OK.
Didn't notice the foam in the battery area.
My warranty date code is: 6/19/2009, the refurb date it 07192009.
The original date make it newer that the Pre I exchanged.
Little gap and little twist and seems faster(?), my 2nd Pre was a dog for some reason.
How can I get one of those?
Where can I get these refurbished Pre?
Where can I get these refurbished Pre?
Where can I get these refurbished Pre?
papla wants to know...
where to get these refurbished pre
My screen cracked and I sent it to Palm to be repaired. I just checked and they also added the foam pad to the battery compartment. Hopefully they made some kind of adjustment that will stop the screen from cracking again!
This "news" story hasn't been "new" for a couple weeks. PreThinking posted a story about the foam pad in the battery compartment some time ago (it's been discussed to death in the forums too). Besides, a tiny little piece of foam that costs Palm practically nothing doesn't mean they're fixing the Pre in any way :/
I'm not here to Pre bash, in fact I own a Pre. But lets get real here people. Palm will likely never address any of the real issues people are having with the Pre. Palm probably had hundreds of Pre's sent back for the battery looseness issue. They added this piece of foam and VOILA! the phones are now perfectly good refurbs.
And this is why you don't rush out to buy a phone in its first month
Try at least *SIX* months. No way I'm even considering the WebOS for at least a year from launch. WebOS/Pre: New incompatible OS, major hardware issues, etc. No thanks, I'm done with being a self-financed beta tester for Palm.
Palm's Treo 600 was miserably buggy, but the 650 wasn't half bad if you totally discount the fact Palm screwed the pooch on RAM. The 700p went toward fixing that, and by the time Palm released the Treo 755 the phone had matured into nearly rock solid as it could be - though Palm still screwed up on the RAM specs. Instead of seeking continual improvement and coming out with a 256MB Treo with increased cache and some OS tweaks, they went off and started making all sorts of different bad phones and slapping the "Treo" name on them.
Maybe it was a scam to make the Pre look good by comparison, but if someone would pour a some Ritalin into the water cooler of the product planning team at Palm that would be appreciated.
I have my Pre a week now, I figured I'd try it (and Sprint) for 30 days. So far I love WebOS and the size of the Pre so I will probably keep it. I do plan return it to Best Buy before my 30 days for a new device because of the way it twists (oreo). My question is how do I know if I am getting the newer revision? Should I just open the battery and check for the foam or is there something on the box that I can see?
I have an early production model used for training and testing that was manufactured on 4/25/2009, around 6 weeks before release. Other than a few resets from general (over)usage, no problems. So what I'm saying is not EVERY early pre is defective.
I feel kinda bad saying this but I have this version of the phone with the new battery pad and the sunset box but mine still has the oreo effect. I went to exchange it for another and i opened up 3 different pres, all the new version, and all of them still had the oreo effect just as bad. I dont know why they would still have it but they did. Luckily I have until Sept 8th for my first 30 days to continue going back and exchanging for a new one, hopefully by the 7th they will have ones which have no oreo at all. I absolutely love my pre and its easily the best phone ive ever owned but my pre (the second one ive had) has the oreo bas enough where its always covering up my power switch unless i push it out of the way. (ive already tried the method of pushing on the rails behind the battery, no luck, no change). I just want a solid pre with no oreo then it will be perfect.
I feel as though the "oreo" comments are fairly general. My pre has a little wiggle to the right when closed (maybe a mm) but a lot of slider phones I have seen have that. When it is open, it is solid as a rock.
Are these new phones with no "oreo" any more stable that they have no wiggle whatsoever?
can you have sprint install it in your pre if you already have one
I tried to get a new PalmPre and checked 3 Sprint stores in LA; none of them have a Pre with the foam pad mentioned in this thread. The sales guys either did not knew about this or claimed that Palm started making the batteries bigger to solve it. How true is this? Or are they just trying to sell what they have in stock?