What did you Leave for webOS? 60
Wed, 22 Jul 2009 11:35 am EDT 
Clearly anybody who bought a Palm Pre was migrating from some other OS. So from whom did Palm poach the most users? If you were to ask the members of the PreCentral forum, a full 39% of them would say that they left behind a Windows Mobile handset. That’s more than any other mobile OS, even Palm’s own old-school Palm OS, which 28% of Pre owners used to use. Rounding it out was BlackBerry OS at 15%, iPhone OS at 6%, and Android, Symbian, and Sidekick each registering less than 1% on the meter. Ten percent of Pre owners used a different operating system, with most of those switching from non-smartphone handsets.
We're guessing a healthy portion of that WinMo segment include Windows Mobile Treos. Even so, it does look like, at least amongst our users, the Pre is managing to convert a sizable number of people to the platform.
A pretty graph and a chance for you blog-reading folks to chime in, after the break!
60 Comments
Not everyone using a Windows Mobile device needed to integrate with the enterprise. Some just have very "on-line" personal lives. My wife switched and said that using her phone is no longer like pulling teeth.
Left me Treo 800W for something better. Pre definately needs improvement but I'm betting big bucks on it. We'll see how Palm will ramp up the OTA updates and expand features on the device. Time will tell if I made a smart move.
Me and my fiance both moved from the Palm OS. I the 700p, and her the 755p. We both loved the phones. Plenty of user friendly apps. And made life so simple. Being able to share schedules with a push of a button. I am ready for the Pre to set up that blue tooth beaming or email sharing of schedules. I have all confidence that Palm is bout to Ramp up the phone beyond what we have thought it could do. I think they rushed the phone on the market to catch the market before Iphone. So they left some features in their pockets. But with OTA updates and new apps coming. It will be all we dreamed it to be...
You could share your schedules by sharing Google Calendars...
I left my HTC Touch (WM) and the wife left her RAZR.
I left behind my Treo 800w. There are some things I definitely miss from my old phone. One of the things I miss are the smiley faces, my kids love the faces. I also miss how you could set the txt msgs not show the person's name when receiving a txt. There are some other minor things that I miss from the treo 755 and 800, I hope Palm brings them back on the Pre.
Technically my last phone was the LG Rumor but that was only because my HTC Mogul (WM) wasn't able to survive long enough. It died near the beginning of the year. After I saw the CES demo of the Pre, I couldn't wait to drop kick the Mogul. It was a frustrating POS! The Pre was well worth waiting for (although the Rumor ended up filling the gap quite nicely.)
Left the Samsung Instinct. I do miss my voice commands for dialing and search and the visual voicemail, but generally I am very very happy with the Pre and look forward to its continued growth and to see what its future devices will bring us.
Wasn't disappointed with my original iPhone, but wanted faster data and GPS, plus the battery was getting old and would need replacing soon. Sticking with iPhone would mean even higher AT&T cost--Sprint is a much better deal for me for both cost and coverage. Haven't had a dropped call with Sprint in three weeks ownership whereas with AT&T it happened nearly every call. Very pleased so far.
I wonder how many of those WM users were previously PalmOS users who could no longer wait for Palm to release Nova (as it was then known).
I can't wait for this phone to cracksome heads. I love it. I want to
Get the touchstone and new covers. Once the new os comes we pre addicts will
Be rocking and rolling in goodness. I have seen some of homebrews and other treats that are coming. I am just living for this thing to download!
I am surprised that more WinMo users moved over than PalmOS (I coming from the HTC Diamond) but I am guessing that most of those are still Palm devices. The big lures for me were the capitative touch-screen (WinMo has touch resistant screen, horrible for fingers), multi-tasking, and the keyboard. I love how the screen is very responsive and precise. I would have killed for a screen like this back when I was on WinMo! I also love how awesome WebOS brings great multi-tasking, which has been a great life and time saver! It has now become such a necessity I now expect all smartphones to be able to. When I take a iPhone and use it, it's a horrible experience because you have to close app and every time I watch a review on it and they have to I shutter that it could have been me doing that! Finally, I love the keyboard! Many say it's to small but I'm 6-4 and it is VERY easy for me to type. I can type 3 times as faster that on my itouch (plane to sell soon)! The rubberized feel of the keys make it really easy to type because the have a nice grip to it. I am also using rhong's Beta 'AutoCorrect Edit' app and that just makes it all the better. Finally, I am a complete computer nerd and love a OS that is very hackable. I can change almost anything to my preference. Overall, the Palm Pre is the phone for me!!
I switched over from the Blackberry 8830, but before that I had the Treo 600, 650, and 700. I really liked my Treo, but it became painfully slow and I would have a number of issues, freezes, dropped calls, no emails. Ultimately that caused me to switch to the blackberry. I really liked the Blackberry, I still miss the keyboard. Some of the Blackberry features are really great, but the Pre just flat out wow'ed me. I'm hoping that some more basic features are added and the Pre will continue to gain on the current smartphone market.
Came from the Treo 700p.
Pros for the Pre
1) Much prettier
2) Web browsing experience is so much better
3) Camera is nicer w/ flash too!
4) 3mm head phone jack
5) GPS (even though it's very flaky for me)
6) Youtube
7) Capacitive screen
Pros for the Treo
1) So much faster
2) Battery life lasted so much longer
Those are the main two things (they're very important tho) but there's other minor advantages of the Treo like:
3) Didn't feel like I was going to drop the phone all the time (I kinda feel like I'm gonna drop the Pre every time I slide it open)
4) Easier access to charging / synching. (Ie the cover is nice, but annoying to have to open and close all the time)
5) LACK of synergy and forced additions to your contact list (yes, this is a positive for me because I hate things added to my contact list when I don't want them to ESPECIALLY when they're not eraseable).
6) Customizable tones (not that important, but c'mon it's a nice feature)
Left the LG rumor. Having an evdo phone Rocks. Having Pandora and all the web access is incredible. Just miss the ability to have my employees in a folder so i can send group text messages, but will never go back. Palm Rules!!
I do believe you can send group text messages? SMS app-new message icon- add contacts. I guess you can't have folders of contacts though...
Thank You!!
left kajeet with the LG rumor :P
HTC Touch...WinMo. Miss copy/paste. but otherwise I'm very happy.
I had my eye on Niagara, (now known as The Tour", but PRE having so much to offer and being released first was my deciding factor. I don not regret it, I'm not one of the "where's the apps?" crowd. I remember when iPhone had none, once gate is opened for apps we will have more than our share.
I left the samsung Instinct and there are things I'm going to miss but it just never lived up to the hype/plans Sprint said it would. Really happy with the Pre though. Homebrew alone will make this one exceed my expectations.
i left the instink too.. The greatest feature it owned was visual Voice mail...
I left behind a 5-year-old Sanyo MM8300 that could still do many things the Pre can't, like take movies and do voice dialing (features I didn't use that often.) While I missed some features when I first got my Pre, just having a nearly desktop-equivalent browser that I can use anywhere there's Sprint service has more than made up for it.
But I've also been doing development work for the iPod Touch, so I do have extensive experience with that. I can't really come up with much that it has and the Pre doesn't, except the sheer number of apps and games. Even on the iTouch, though, games are still not as comfortable to me as they are on the Nintendo DS, and I don't really expect them to be much better on the Pre (though at least it has buttons.)
Palm IIIx --> Treo 300 --> 600 --> 650 --> 700p --> Pre. webOS is still very much a 1.0 product but I see so much potential. I just hope Palm and 3rd party developers deliver on that potential over the coming year.
I left the iPhone for the Pre. Multitasking and non-intrusive notifications did it for me. However, I'm starting to grow restless for more meaningful OTA updates and a substantial influx of new apps into the catalog.
I left the iPhone for the Pre. Multitasking and non-intrusive notifications did it for me. However, I'm starting to grow restless for more meaningful OTA updates and a substantial influx of new apps into the catalog.
Left my Treo 650 for the PRE. This article is so wrong into thinking that just because we moved from something else to the PRE we are jumping for joy for it. WRONG! We are stuck with Sprint for 2 years, remember, hello?! The PRE is nothing what I expected from PALM. It was suppose to be better than all previous Palm devices. Yeah it is better than the Centro (so what, anything is better than the Centro), but compared to any Treo from 600 up, to any competitors it is a sorry, frustrating piece of crap. Slow, buggy, no video, no sound/ringtone controls and features, no camera controls and features, not able to bluetooth info, not able to use password to secure contacts, and Notes, not able to categorize contacts and notes, GPS that can't send the voice/directions to your earpiece so you can drive? It is as if the PRE was not designed by Palm but by Microsoft. All these features were common sense on previous Palms. Can't forward text messages? Can't add little faces, so needed when short texting. Don't give me some new features but take away the normal stuff. Dumb! Don't make me wait for it with "maybe" future releases, when you already have them, WTF? Did Microsoft buy Palm? And, I don't want to hear some geek telling some work-around. Shut up! It should have worked right from the beginning, from the best TREO plus the new PRE features. Period.
I switched to the Pre from a MotoQ win 5.0. Its pretty self explanatory why. However after going through 2 Pres, mainly due to hardware issues, I have made another switch to the Blackberry Tour. The first Pre had the yellowish discoloration on the dislay. The second one had a loose, squekky keyboard and black dots inside of the display that Sprint said was dust trapped inside of the display. I was very sad because I stalked the Pre for 6 months waiting for release. The OS is the best but i would rather have a phone with better battery life, a solid physical build, voice dailing and a better keyboard. The Tour is not a fun as the Pre but its more reliable, in my opionion. I will be waiting for the Pre 2 or whatever they decide to call it. WebOS is the best.
had oridinal iphone then the iphone 3g. After 2 years of the iphone it just became boring. So frustrating having to close pandora to open the text app, make a reply, then close that and reopen pandora. Just stupid. When OS 3.0 failed to bring multitasking i went out and bought a pre. I love it. Not just multitasking but sweet texting app and notifications are a HUGE improvement over the ihphone.
Had an *ancient* LG which was my second hand-me-down phone in a row from The Husband. :) My original carrier was Alltel/Verizon. I just couldn't wait for the maybe-in-January rumor to get the Pre. The Husband also bought a Pre. He was using a 4 year old Blackberry until yesterday.