The Tungsten T5 arrives
By Peter Rojas 
posted October 4th 2004 12:16AM
posted October 4th 2004 12:16AM
Arriving right on schedule, palmOne officially introduced the Tungsten T5 just a few minutes ago. Completely skipping over the T4, their new flagship PDA has a massive 256MB of storage, a 320x480 pixel LCD screen, a 416MHz processor, and built-in Bluetooth. The big disappointment: it runs on Palm OS Garnet 5.4, not Palm OS 6 (aka Cobalt) like a lot of people had predicted/hoped. The even bigger disappointment: no built-in WiFi (we know, it's totally weak). Should go on sale November 3rd and retail for $399, but you know that by that point it's gonna be completely overshadowed by the Treo 650 announcement scheduled for the week before. Click to see a few more pics.
Hey ya'll they finally made a Pocket PC!
Without the WiFi!
And they are actually PAID to do this. Ugh.
I believe WiFi was not implemented in this version of the T5 because of security concerns. Palm is targeting healthcare professionals with this first unit, and the chance of a T5 with WiFi being hacked and health records becoming vunerable would be too great a sales risk. But a version with WiFi for other market segments is probable, especially if marketing shows it would be a hot seller.
i would only agree to have it if it were offered for free. palmone is going down. i'm waiting for my nokia 9500 *love*
so how much did they save by not paying for a new design anyway?
I like the design. I am ok with the lack of PalmOS6 of wifi as long as I can add with a card (can you I haven't found it in the store and it never appears on the website).
Boils down to: I would have bought it for about $250.
As a loyal Palm fan, I'm going back into the closet. What an embarassment after a year of development.
If PalmOne were shipping the T5 with Garnet and a promise an upgrade (for free) to Cobalt, I'd buy this unit. If PalmOne were shipping the T5 with Cobalt, but without Voice Memoing, I'd buy one to replace my T/T.
Without either? Forget it. This unit is what I thought an E2 would be. It'd be a fair package for $199.
I'm not just going to not buy a Palm T5, I'm going to stop using a PDA at all when my T/T's weakening battery finally dies.
The $400 I've set aside for a T5 will go to buy an Apple iPod, which will carry my addresses and my Excel files.
I expected the following to be in the new Palm T5:
1) Wireless (as mentioned by many of you guys)
2) camera of at least 1 Mega pixel bundled with photo management software (like the Sony TH-55)
3) Palm OS6
Without the above, the T5 is basically a T3 with more memory and faster processor. Absolutely nothing more...
This is only slightly thinner and shorter than the T3, the processor speed is negligable...what do you get more RAM? thats what the T3 has an expansion slot for...I love Palm, but seriously, this is ridiculous.
I dont know if the speaker on the back is a good idea. How will you hear from it if its in a case?
And it's plastic, like the Tungsten E.
I have no idea what PalmOne was thinking. This is suicide.
T3 is shorter when slider is closed.
Can i ask why everybody here is so excited about Cobalt? I mean, it looks good on paper with all the bells and whistles.. but it's bloated and _extremely_ slow. If you want all that crap, you might as well just get a pocketpc.
It's not PalmOne that's committing suicide.. it's PalmSource.
selling Tungsten-E-on-steroids for double price is just plain wrong. too sad palm chose an extensive way of doing things. a sign of crisis, probably.
Any word on battery capacity? My T3 isn't exactly having good mileage... With more memory & faster processor, they had better put more juice in this battery.
They better release something better, real soon!! This one's gonna get smoked in all reviews!!
Laz
Disappointing. If the Treo 650 has 64mb and this same USB connection / mountable drive, the T5 is toast. I have used a Palm since the Pilot days . . .this is the must disappointing update yet. I'll stick with the T3 or finally make the jump to a single piece of equipment to carry on my belt; the Treo 650 -- even though I will miss the bigger screen on the T3.
This is really depressing. With Sony (essentially) out of the Palm market I was really hoping the T5 would be my next pda but this is nothing more than a T3.5. I just hope Tapwave makes something incredible b/c I don't think I could ever switch to ppc.
I really don't like that design, but now they've kept it and used it on their flagship model?
Perhaps if they just removed that line which runs near the buttons and move all the buttons up slightly it wouldn't be so bad.
And if what another poster said--that it's plastic--is true, then that's even worse.
Remember when the Palm V came out? I wanted one almost for the design alone. No other PDA at the time looked so slick.
I'm not sure what happened to the Palm V designers. But either way, Palm's design department needs a real kick in the ass.
well it does have the 256 memory, but not all of it is the flash based memory that can withstand a hard reset, they just have the 160 flash drive built in, but normal ram is 64 megs with 55 useable, just like the t3, so basically its the t3 with a built in flash drive, no slider, newer buttons cheaper case, and no voice recording
No Slider, no voice recording . . . . The new memory set up is great, but I have that with my 1.O GB SD Card and a card reader. I have been a user since the Pilot days but this update leaves me uninspired. Should have had WiFi and a better processor . . . .
The only thing holding from going Pocket PC is my library of Palm OS software and that won't hold me forever . . . .
Gave away my beautiful PalmV, bought a baby palm zire until something decent was on the market (didnt like the slidy T3 thing, sony th55 didnt have landscape mode). Now still have to wait. What's the point buying this now, when in 6mths they will upgrade it to have wi-fi and hopefully voice recording (if enough people complain). Design ok, but too dated. PalmOne I love you, but our affair is on rocky grounds now.
I hope this POS makes the T3 come in cheaper. I'd rather have the slider design and get the same ol' OS for less. What an anticlimax this turned out to be.
According to palmone's web site...it's built in! Where?
http://store.palmone.com/product/index.jsp?productId=1865331
PalmOne is the last player in the PalmOS market now, so they've (naively) lost focus on being the best handheld, and are now merely content to be the best Palm handheld by default.
I need to see a handheld with a microDrive in it before I jump back into the PDA waters. I'm sticking with my TJ-35 and not happily, either, considering the lack of wireless onnectivity...
Very very very dissapointed with the T5. My birthday just around the corner, I was going to get myself the new T5... but everything PalmOne's done is wrong on this one. I hate M$, but might have to switch to it.
I was hoping IBM would have better Java support for Cobalt... but wait, T5 comes with Garnet... :(
Article begins with "right on schedule". Actually the device is not even "available" until November! This is turning the other cheek and get wacked on the other side. Something went badly wrong in 2004 for PalmOne.
For comments about the case material: I don't really see how that's an issue as much as lack of features, I mean pdas have been plastic since inception. I think that fact that there's no incentive to upgrade from a T|E or later model is the real problem at hand.
I have heard a couple "plastic" comments - how do people know this? If you are guessing by looking at the picture, it is simply the same color as the original T|T - probably to distinguish itself from the T|E. If you are positive that it is plastic, what's the proof?
I want to upgrade my T|T soon and a plastic case would convince me to switch to something else.
In all fairness the unit is much better than the T|3 as it supports mini usb, charging without that universal cable, a better battery, etc. Likely the slow processor is for battery life (I hope) so that you can go for more than a couple days without plugging in. So why was the release so anti-climactic? Rumors. It was rumored to have Cobalt, a 600MHz X-Scale, maybe WiFi, etc. Bad rumors kill product launches.
Its like a T (three out of five stars) ... Why is palmOne crazy about having THICK bezel around the screen?? Tungsten T3 had nice thin bezel ... and suddenly T5 has a HUGE bezel at the bottom. For that matter, Sony has the thinnest bezels. SLEEK!
If you put T|E and T|5 side-by-side, what do you see? Yes, they are almost truly IDENTICAL in their exterior shape!!! How could PalmOne do this?! Is this the biggest blunder in Palm history or what? I mean, if T|E was a handsome looking PDA then one could understand (but still not agree to) this identical crisis...but come onnnnn Palm...look at that thing its awful! And this is supposed to be the "top of the line" PDA from PalmOne? I am sorry to say this, but if PalmOne comes out with another one of these blunders after this one, then I am officially switching out from Palm brand...As sad as that may be...but this is just so so so so so so so so soooo disappointing!!!!
Someone on this forum said it right when they said that "Palm needs some heavy ass kicking" for this horrible product! FIRE THEM ALL!
I had just switched to Pocket PC two days before because I wanted better multimedia/video.
The only reliable movie player/encoder I had found for Palm in the past was Kinoma who advertises crystal clear video but never came close to crystal clear. (I tweaked all the settings and processed my own video.) NOW I read in the specs on the T5 that there is a new media application for it. (Windows Media Player 9 and DirectX is required for video encoding.) Maybe I'll keep one of each... both of them still take up a lot less room in my work bag than my old Franklin Planner.
Palm still seems to process things like text searches through databases faster but perhaps up until now, PPC had the video side covered better. Plastic case on the T5? If it's solid, I'm all right with it. The extra memory? Cool by me. Lack of WiFi? SERIOUSLY disappointing. Maybe I'm the minority but I haven't found any practical application for bluetooth in my life. A Paradigm shift might be in order for me but I just don't hear/read enough about bluetooth to think it's still useful.
I will probably buy the T5 to test out the new media capabilities since my AX30 PPC will handle my WiFi needs. Always excited about a new Palm release no matter how critical I am of it.
First, it's a TE2.
Second, TE is a budget pda.
Third, with budget pda, goodlooking design is never on top of priority.
If PalmOne decide to use TE form when designing T5, what in the hell they were thinking? As mention above, how many do they save by not having a new and more attractive design?
I'm a T3 user and still proud of it. Slider design is not my favourite option, but the T5 is totaly a NO-NO!
PS, I buy a few TE for my staff. It's no way I use the "SAME" pda. I'm the BOSS and for many reason, I must have a distinguish style.
Shame on you, PalmOne!
I was curious about T5 vs T3 for new purchase. I scoured the Palmone Page for info. Got some conflicting info (Power Point can on one page be viewed, and on the other it cant be - see comparison chart foot note 18 vs whats in the box).
I had some questions and emailed tech support - got an email saying they changed their system and my email did not arrive. So I try the updated email and get an error that says call tech support. That number jumped me past switchboard and hold waits to THE BEST EVER support person.
BUT THEN I hung up and found a problem.
I scoured the Palmone Page for info. Got some conflicting info (Power Point can on one page be viewed, and on the other it cant be - see comparison chart foot note 18 vs whats in the box).
I called a number that the nice support person gave me (an update) and I got a push button switch board (press 1 for sales, 2 for frustrations...)
Then I got an opperator who basicly told me that the Palmone site is updated more quickly but has errors in it. I should go to the palm store site (the only site they tech support) and that the 3 sites are different (Palm1, USA & Canada stores). SO I get different info.
Cant they at least update thier info in unison and create autoforwarding while they phase out commuications channels?
WHat a night mare - conflicting info about such an expensive product that you cant yet see on demo at the stores... Grrr....
Guess it looks like T3 will have company with my Flash drive key chain....
I am happy on my T3 and don't think there is a good reason for change. My memory needs are all greatly covered on SD cards.
I am thinking that maybe I will have to wait a little longer to have something appealing to me. I am not on the PPC side, because I find it a complicated device to use, though it is a great Solitaire machine... :)
I am also waiting essentially to see WiFi incorporated, as well as a Flash Player (supporting Macromedia version 6 at least). I believe this 2 things would make a really interesting device.
I currently own the T3, so-so product. I'm not using the full boat of utilities built in the T3... So far the memory is fine in the T3, however the battery life "stinks". I'm hoping the T5 will have the battery life of my Vx...one week between charges...Still want the color screen, don't need the slider, don't need the USB key function, want cheaper price.
Bought it !!! LOVE IT !
Why oh why not MP-3 capable voice? Crummy T-1 screen sync problems...lasted about 6 months then it barely holds a sync. I've messed up my hot-sync's and can't recover old file entries in desktop so I'm scared to hot-sync...already lost files...backups seem inaccessible. Can't figure how to recover bak. dat. etc. My T-1 and M-3 both went blank so often I won't use them again. I'm tired of Palm. I loved it until I hot-sync'd my T-1 the wrong way when I upgraded from the M-3 and deleted my database. I can't figure out how to recover backup database files. Why bother to get a PDA. I'm about to go back to paper...
PALM!...WHAT HAVE YOU DONE? JUST CONTIUNE DEVELOPING LIKE THE T5 AND YOU WILL NOT SURVIVE IN THE PDA BUSINESS! PACK YOUR BAGS AND HIDE GUYS. :(
This website of comments should be send to palmone.com
I have no problem with it. You shold try it before you complain. The plastic chassis is fine. Sure it's not as fancy as metal, but it was done to save weight. It is already ~5oz. The bezel could look better too... I've also heard complaints of no dust cover on the SD Slot (like on the Zire 71/72). It does come with a plastic placeholder.
I do wish it had a voice recorder. Cobalt is nothing to miss... Garnet works just fine. The repetitive design from the Tungsten|E is not something to fuss about; it looks decent and doesn't affect performance. It has no camera and there was NEVER any claim by PalmOne that it had one. To this date, the tungsten series never had any camera. The only [Docs to Go compatible] Palm devices that can only read documents are the Treo phones. ALL others can view and edit. HOWEVER you cannot edit native PowerPoints. You must use DataViz's SlideShowToGo and convert.
WiFi would be nice as well, but you can purchase the T5 online and get a free WiFi Card.
The Tungsten|T3 houses a 900 mAh battery which is quite small for the processor that it carries, but the T5 has a 1300 mAh battery which seems to last pretty long. The non-sliding screen is more convenient but less impressive to people passing by your shoulder.
If one is interested in a Palm PDA with a MicroDrive, go for the LifeDrive.