Touchstone is Awesome. What's Next? 94
The Palm Touchstone is a great product, one of those "Why didn't I think of that" kinds of things that seems small and insignificant but actually changes the way you feel about everyday stuff - like charging your phone. It's in my own Top Five Pre Accessories and it should be in yours too.
It recently won Editor's Choice as "Peripheral of the Year" in the Engadget Awards (thanks to everybody who sent that in!). Congrats to the team at Palm for creating a great accessory that's well-thought-out all the way down to the micro-suction material on the bottom.
Were you aware than the Touchstone is also eco-friendly? PreCentral reader Otto plugged his into a Kill-A-Watt meter:
I always assumed that, like my induction charger on my electric toothbrush which draws 1W of power all the time, the Touchstone was an energy waster despite its convenience. Further, I assumed the induction charger to be inefficient and thus even more wasteful. Well, having tested it with a Kill-A-Watt meter, I've learned that it actually draws *zero* watts until a phone is placed on it, and then it only draws a mere 4 watts
Impressive, no? It has us wondering what's next for Touchstone. We've asked this once before but thought we'd bring it up again, especially now that we've seen what a little clever thinking can do - the Nexus One Dock has a nice dock mode and Bluetooth for audio. The Touchstone has some clever behavior when it comes to phone calls, but what else could it do?
So what are the top three things you'd like to see in the future of Touchstone?
94 Comments
You got my vote Touchstone - who loves ya baby!?!
And my axe!
and my bow
You carry the fate of us all, little one.
A LINE OF TOUCHSTONE ENABLED BLUETOOTH PRODUCTS WOULD BE PERFECT. NO NEED FOR MULTIPLE CHARGERS.
Must have accessory for the Pre.
Love ya touchstone. I used the Pre without one for a month when I first got it. The day I bought my touchstone, life got easier.
I'd love to see what the future of the touchstone will be?
Wireless File Transfer! Don't make me open up the USB Door anymore!
+1
Don't we already have this with ssh?
I took it to imply an official file transfer method. SSH is a little on the homebrew side of things. Unfortunately, the Touchstone trips a USB circuit breaker 9 out of 10 times so I'm afraid we'll need to hope for a USB3 device or deal with a 2 wire system.
Yuhp. And with nautilus's integrated SFTP VFS, all the draggy-droppy stuff works that way as well. No need for anything special. Focus instead on fixing A2DP quality, please.
Sounds very cool. Link please?
I have already got my touchstone installed in my car, I love it!
I was just working on a way to put it in my car and have a physical holder to hold the Pre in place. How did you do it with yours? The magnet isn't strong enough to hold it on while driving.
read down
Ok I will provide you some USEFUL information. The magnet is strong enough to hold the Pre on a flat surface. Mine is actually sitting on my dash and it is attached with a velcro patch. I have came to hard stops while the Pre is sitting there and I never have any problem with it. There are other solutions out there other than placing velcro on your dash board but I suggest you go here and check them out
http://forums.precentral.net/palm-pre-accessories/188412-palm-pre-using-...
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On a side note I wish people on here would just provide useful information instead of just being a dick!
They originally said at launch that the touchstone was one in a family of products.... Wonder what's taking them......???
probably the fact that they only have $560 Million on hand and are trying to get the Pre pushed out. Chances are they were probably looking to have sold more Pre and Pixi phones in order to bolster their liquid assets.
Dup
I want the pre to be able to recognize individual touchstones (IE by RFID or whatnot. Maybe by a combo of bluetooth/gps on current ones?) and have individual presets for each one. IE silent on one while at home (think sleeping) except for alarm, and always speakerphone on one at work.
Oh, and wireless file transfer.
For my Other vote: How about some level of home automation?
For the record, I don't own one and even if I did I wouldn't use it that much. Seriously.
I am not knocking it at all. I think the Pre's and Pixi's ability to charge without prying open that tiny door is fantastic. So this is entirely just me.
A big part of it is that I actually use my phone while charging while lying down and the Touchstone simply doesn't work in that scenario.
I use my Touchstone/Palm Pre as my alarm clock. Works wonderfully to awake me up in the morning.
AHHHH, SO I GET YOU HAVENT SEEN THE TOUCHSTONE WITH A RETRACTABLE CORD... press a button and the magnet stays on your cover , now tug the phone and the retractable cord will give you slack, leaving the stone behind, so you can play some Asphalt 5!!!
A Sedio style holster (phone would need to face out not in like on current style) with an inductive touchstone charger and battery pack built in. Each time the phone is in the holster the phone would get a charge. Some Blackberry phones have a similar holster. Difference being, they have contacts for charging on the back of the phone (similar to a cordless home phone) not wirless charging.
Love the Touchstone, but how about an actual wireless charger? Then, the wireless file transfer.
I would love a "dumb" tablet that's just a larger keyboard and screen that communicates wirelessly with my Pre. There would be a touchstone-like dock next to the keyboard that turns the phone's screen into a touch pad for moving a cursor on the larger screen.
Bought mine back in September; best accessory purchase I could have made. The best thing about the Touchstone is watching the expression on other peoples' face when I demonstrate it......price 49.95, reaction of others.....priceless
I've had a TS from day one, besides webOS UI, that was the other feature that sold me on the pre. A while back I was at a hardware store and saw a product called "Velcrose Extreme" and thought to myself that would be ideal for mounting a TS in my car and yep, it worked like a charm, now pre sits right next to my steering wheel charging, awesome! Last night I gave a friend of mine who has an iphone a ride to the airport and he was blown away by my TS.
touchslab for multiple devices
I would love one that works. I mean, one that doesn't require a soft reset before I use it. Also, it has to be able to charge to 100% and then just, you know, continue to keep it charged, instead of throwing a hissy fit ding charging all night and then freezing so my alarm doesn't go off.
Other than that yeah it's the product of the year....
I ended up in the same boat! I don't trust mine at all. I used the work around patch, but still have serious issues with it. Not worth being late. Sprint store employees are irritating, so I guess unless I deal with them, I'm stuck with the garbage I've had since aug. Once it's charged, it goes silly- on off and on and off. Looks like a time bomb. Sprint employee's say there is nothing wrong with it..
ohh well
kinda got bigger fish to fry
like removin' all my themes n' patches... 1.04 all in good time!
Work with larger batteries and back covers.
Amen to that. I've got a Seidio 2600 (which I love, especially working (12-15 hr days without the ability to plug in) and I would love to be able to use a TS.
That is what I was thinking. I have the extended battery to and I really wanted the touchstone but it doesn't work with the seido so I am SOL. Maybe palm will come out with an extended battery and make it touchstone compatible. Or maybe they will release a new webos phone with a 3000 mah battery, 4 inch screen, tegra 2, 5 megapixel camera, Wimax, webos 2.0, and of course touchstone compatibility.
I have 2 seido extended batteries that I use as backups to my standard that work fine with my Touchstone, You may want to have your TS checked out
I agree. I like my extended battery life more than the touchstone, but to get a touchstone back for the extended 2600 battery would be perfect!
What does "Wireless File Transfer" mean? If it's wireless, can't the Pre do it without an accessory?
And it's the second most popular choice! I think I know what people want in a future webOS upgrade...
I'd like to plug in the Touchstone and have it charge itself so that I could bring it with me in my car or to school and be able to just place my phone on it and charge, no plugging in required. I guess, think of it as an external battery.
Shouldn't be too hard to mod it to do that. At least not too hard for someone who knows that they're doing :D
IIRC the touchstone housing is mostly empty, so cracking it open and throwing in some batteries and hooking them up to the charging circuit shouldn't be hard.
Edit: Actually it takes a 5V source, so the batteries could just be hooked into the USB port, along with some circuitry to prevent overcharging the batteries and a boost converter to make sure that the touchstone circuitry is always getting 5V from the batteries. With this in place, when the touchstone is plugged in the batteries should charge, and when unplugged the batteries should continue to provide power so that when the phone is put on it it starts charging from the batteries. I worry that the batteries wouldn't last long at all though. With two voltage conversions the energy would have to go through (from whatever the batteries are at to 5V, and then from 5V to 3.7V*), this process would be really inefficient, not to mention the inefficiency of inductive charging to begin with... I'll think about it some more and post in the forums sometime :P
* I'm assuming that the touchstone is putting 3.7V through the coils. That's the same as the battery in the Pre and Pixi, and would make the most sense. But idklol. If someone has a multimeter and is willing to crack open their touchstone and test it that would be awesome
I didn't want to bust the Touchstone open a risk breaking the thing but i found something odd. My muli-meter showed 6v no load off the back of the Pre cover when it's mounted onto the touchstone(I tested the contacts on the inside of the cover). 6v seems too high since the battery is only rated at 3.7v. Also the 120v to USB adapter i used was OEM for the Pre. Also i tested the voltage when the cover was spaced away from the touchstone (i used pieces of paper to shim it farther and farther away). It put out a consistent 6v up to about .100" when it dropped to 0(i'm guessing internal circuitry cut it off).
Long story short it look like aftermarket covers can be used as long as they are less than .1 inches thick. Many covers appear to be thinner than that. If anyone has any experience with this let me know.
i'm confused. doesn't the Pre already have bluetooth audio?
I think people mean for it to have a speaker built into it and only activate via bluetooth when a Pre/Pixi is placed on it.
It does. And in my experience with 2 different car head units, quality is horrible. This is only for streaming, granted, but it's all I use the phone for. For mp3s, the collection is already attached to the car.
So, if there was a touchstone that meshed with the phone's A2DP WITHOUT distortion, that could then be connected to aux in the car (or home stereo, or wherever), I'd definitely be all for that accessory. It removes one of my biggest problems with the phone.
Better, though, if they just fixed A2DP in the phone. I have friends with iphones and the same front-end equipment that do not have these problems.
I voted for "Other" -- it would be nice to allow a backup solution ala desktop sync if the touchstone where also connected to a computer, or perhaps install wireless on it and allow backup across a local wifi network.
I would love to see a light inicator...green ready. Red charging..that kinda stuff. Solar powered..hmmm
a useful idea would be if it was possible to install 2 SIM cards. For example: one private and one from work. And if Palm could give the user an opportunity to change (Webos) in between these two, or simultaneously with user choice.
I think it should have a built in battery so you can use it to charge your phone no matter where you are
How 'bout the ability to charge a back-up battery on it...? That was the only good accessory that came with the Instinct.
YESSSS!!!
"How 'bout the ability to charge a back-up battery on it...? "
Great idea - I wish I thought of it!
I did, but I still think the SD card slots on it would be WAY better!
I think data backup would be huge, If you could use it as a external hard drive with swappable SD Cards! OMG how could no one have thought of that!!!
I want it to be able to charge the batteries directly - so I can just place a spare battery on the TS rather than using an external charger.
You should be able to do that now. The trick, I think (again, I don't own one), is to engage the magnets.
A simple enough test is to lay the Touchstone-ified back to the Touchstone with the battery in the approximate position. If the battery level rose after ten minutes of sitting there alone then it works.
All that's needed then is to craft a sleeve out of cardboard or something to 1) secure the battery and 2) attach four magnets of similar strength.
Heck, if that works I will be buying a TS as my previous spare battery charger -- my old Centro -- is kaput.
If you look at the Touchstone-ified back and the bare back of the phone, you'll notice the back has contacts through which it provides power. You'd need a Touchstone-ified back and a way to connect its contacts to the battery. Also a way to prevent overcharging...
Wireless file transfer, my wifi network is significantly faster than USB, let me use it.
It just makes sense with the touchstone, get rid of the cables entirely.
Just came up with this a couple days ago: The perfect touchstone accessory would be an attachment that lets you charge a spare battery. It'd be an induction coil, heat sensor, voltage monitor, and some plastic to keep the battery in place. It's simple and I'm amazed as to why Palm doesn't have it yet.
I have two touchstones (work & home) best charging system ever.
I'm not an engineer but it would be great to have a small thin external 'touchstone' battery (would look like a small thin disc) that could magnetically attach to the back of the Pre/Pixi and inductively supply the phone with additional power and then 'sit' on the touchstone to recharge.
Touchstone probably has a magnetically operated power switch that shuts it completely off when there's no phone on it. Easy enough to implement. :)
I want an improved docked mode. It should show us battery charge state, signal strength, and be able to display a wallpaper! Maybe through patches.
Car version please.
I'm with H-Cubed.
Additional memory accessed via TS would go some way to appease folks who meed more storage....
I have two touchstones one for home one for my car I would like to see a touchstone that can tilt & swivel giving me more options for my car mounted stone. So I would be able to use the gps & other features. As for my home stone I would be able to watch tv on it at a better angle (yes I do watch tv on the small screen). Other then that it's the best charger ever!!! Go PALM!
I did the same exact thing with my kill-a-watt the day i got my touchstone because I had the same thoughts about it. I can also confirm the results above. It draws no more measurable power than plugging your pre in normally.
The Touchstone's awesome, no doubt, but does anyone else occasionally get a horrible but barely-audible buzzing noise after a while when they leave a Pre Plus on the Touchstone? Does the normal Pre (as opposed to Plus) do this on a Touchstone as well?
All of the above!! Plus USB 3.0 Palm can do it!
A 10-inch Pre-slab and TouchPodium.
yeah a bigger battery thats touchstone compatible.
How does a Touchstone work? I heard you plug it in... Is it really a wireless charger?
I don't think it's really the Touchstone that is the 'eco' friendly bit - the AC adapter is. Also, typical energy meters have difficulty measuring very low loads, I doubt it really draws zero watts when not charging. Sure, it's probably
How about a battery that holds a charge for a few days of normal usage, so one doesnt need to invest 50 dollars for a new back and touchstone, and then 40 dollars for each additional one, so their brand new phone doesnt die. Just a thought.
Wireless file transfer is good, but I also want wireless media sync!
Unfortunately, the Torch...er...TouchStone does not work via a USB port (or car adapter). You have to plug the cable into the wall. If you could charge via USB, you could also provide all kinds of nifty things like BlueTooth and allow the phone to sync, transfer, or play files on your PC, or vice-versa. Of course, this also presumes the phone will allow wireless file access.
Who told you Touchstone does not work on a car adapter??? I will be sure to take that into account when I looking at mine beside my steering wheel (charging) when I get off...
You know what would make the touchstone *REALLY* great? A2DP support that doesn't blow goats.
Love the convenience in the car of just putting my pre on the touchstone, turning the receiver to the bluetooth source, and streaming away.
Except that it SOUNDS HORRIBLE. So, I now have to fumble with an AUX cable anyway. This sucks!
*sigh*
I would love an "autoforward" feature such that whenever I place the Pre on the touchstone, calls are forwarded to whatever number I specify. So, when my Pre is charging in the office, calls forward to the office, when it's charging at home, calls forward to home, etc.
Awesome idea. But sprint will charge you $.20 per minute to do that. Friggin' sucks.
I want one of these with touchstone features built in so that I can use the GPS on the phone more easily.
http://store.precentral.net/igrip-custom-fit-sturdy-swivel-mount/3A78A59...
I use my pre at work all the time and charge it on the touchstone. That's really convenient and very elegant.
I would LIKE to be able to plug the touchstone into the USB port and have it work.
Why? Because my desktop is hardwired to a network. I cannot sync my per with my desktop because it isn't wireless.
In addition, if I want to sync or to mess with the pre using something other than filecoaster (I use echo to sync) I have to crawl under my desk, unplug the cable, and plug it into the pre port. I don't do it.
If the touchstone plugged into the usb port, I could just unplug the cable from the touchstone and plug it into the pre.
How about the ability to charge my Pre in the Touchstone with the screen off. I don't really care at work, but I hate having to cover it up when it is on the touchstone on my nightstand. I know that homebrew software "brightness unlinked" allows us to do this now, but it seems like it might have a memory leak, so I've been covering it up with the little felt case it came with nightly... Like a very expensive nightlight that you don't want or need.
+1
I've submitted this feature request to PALM a dozen times.
about the survey top of the list a touchstone for the car!
I've been using my touchstone in my car since june. Just take the cig car charger and connect it to the touchstone. A little double sided tape to hold the touchstone in place.
It works great.
The pre already has blue tooth audio, I was just using it to link to my car less then an hour ago, it does hands free calling and music + the forward backward controls worked with music player remix! The stereo is made by Dual for those interested, I just put it in a week ago.
One that is hand friendly-like a rounded candybar that I can slap on and hold while reading or playing games in bed. Then just put the phone on my nightstand. A slot for extra battery. High capacity battery support.
The repeated bing bong, bing bong,... Is a recognized defect. My first did that. Replacement is perfect.
ok, I always thought this wouldbe awesome, but never made. How about a Palm Deck for your car? It would be a deck that has a built in touchstone, works through bluetooth operation, and your pre would act as a faceplate that embeds seamlessly into the deck. Once inserted,it goes into landscape mode and opens up a radio app that lets you access the CD player, GPS tracking, Pandora or Slacker radio, and basic clock operation in locked mode. Tell me that wouldn't look freakin sick!
1) Car Version 2) Car Version 3) Car Version
I already have a Touchstone installed in my car, so I can't get too excited about a car version. (And as an aside: I had Best Buy do it. So this is an option even for the lazy.) But I guess it would be exciting if I didn't have one. Touchstone in the car = awesome.
I could see some refinements in the touchstone mode, though. Just to brainstorm:
* Don't lock the screen. Yes, there is a patch for this, but I can't imagine any circumstance where you would need the screen to lock while on the Touchstone.
* Option to turn off the screen, or dim it. (Especially useful if you have it charging on the Touchstone by your bed.)
* Make obvious what will happen. For example, if the phone rings while it's on the Touchstone, picking up will answer and touching answer will go to speakerphone. I think. I can never remember. Why not display that on the screen?
* If the screen isn't locked, option to have the notifications appear expanded. Currently you can get them displayed if the screen is locked (extra step to do anything), or minimized if the screen is unlocked.
* If you go to speakerphone while on the Touchstone and with external speakers plugged in, the internal microphone gets disabled. (At least for me.) Kind of frustrating when using it in the car.
Well the Palm Touchstone is a stunning little device in its own right that deserves a further look for anyone who is traditionally fond of desktop charging cradle solutions.Its the kind of cool product design that has made that other smartphone manufacturer so famous.
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The Palm Touchstone's multitasking capabilities and notifications system are unparalleled which i like most.This smartphone features a vibrant display with multitouch functionality as well as a solid Web browser and good multimedia integration with good call quality and wireless options including 3G,Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and GPS.
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Touchstone issues:
1. It only seems to work with certain USB power supplies, e.g. the palm power adaptor. Not with other, smaller, aftermarket USB power supplies. (The Palm one is quite bulky with the cable coming out of the back.)
2. It only seems to occasionaly work, i.e. charge my Palm Pre (v1.4.1 of webOS). I have noticed that if I have used the Pre in USB mode, then it won't work, and I need to reboot it to get it to work. This is despite being able to charge via the micro USB slot, so it really is a Pre issue of it not recognising the touchstone.
So at the mo', the Touchstone is a pricey desk stand.
Just to add to my last comment. Apparently when I use the Touchstone, occasionally it stops my Palm Pre from charging at all, even via the mini-USB socket, which is only fixed by a reboot. So using the Touchstone could cause me to loose all power, if I was incautious, given how battery-hungry the Palm is.
So, sadly, I'd have to downgrade my initial response about the Touchstone to a level that is: "the Touchstone is a waste of money, and a pile of crap". :(
im in NY.. just bought the touchstone for my brother at a bestbuy for $19.99.. bunch of pre stuff for sale!!