Best Buy lists unsubsidized "regular price" for Palm Pre at $850; punch in the face is no extra charge
By Paul Miller 
posted May 25th 2009 7:43PM
posted May 25th 2009 7:43PM
[Thanks, Fredrick C]
posted May 25th 2009 7:43PM
A look back on popular stories from today in a specific year.
Now that we've thrown 'em off the trail, use the form below to get in touch with the people at Engadget. Please fill in all of the required fields because they're required.
I don't get it - why when Sprint isn't charging that much for a contract-free purchase? Someone please enlighten me.
It's to discourage people from just buying it out-right so they can make the commission on the act, they've been doing this for a while. Buncha jerks!
Becasue that's not really the contract-free market price. It is a bogus list price to make the "savings" look large.
@James Yeah, good luck with that unlock code through 100% legal means for your iPhone too. Stupid iTroll...
the pre` will be sub $400 in 6 months, right?
Best Buy is 850 because they worked out a deal with sprint/palm to make sure that there stores are constantly stocked with the Palm Pre. In order for them to do that, sprint/palm is charging Best Buy a much higher price for the phones. I have a friend that works in Best Buy Mobile and that is what they were getting told last week when the deal was still in negotiation.
LOL.....looks like I will not be buying an unlocked GSM version any time soon if this price holds overseas. The Centro I use is not that bad any way....
Who cares? GIMME TEH PHEUNZ RAIT NAO
Thanks palm!
What is that, 400% Profit?
Always looking out for the little guy (:
palm IS the little guy... and I think most of that profit is going to Best Buy.
Not true, most likely it was sold to best buy for $750 or so.
The whole point is they don't want anyone to buy it that way.
I blame Sprint, personally.
I blame the LHC
Ballmer thought the iPhone would be too expensive to catch on, look how wrong he was.
Except the iPhone cost $599 on contract, this costs $199.
@Lando Calrissian
Are you gonna compare the palm pre to iphone software v 1.0.0 as well?
@ShirkPower
He compared it to iPhone 1.0 because Ballmer was talking about iPhone 1.0
But then he compared it to the pre...
meh who cares,
this convo just got real confusing lol
I wouldn't say Ballmer was wrong, because the price dropped significantly before the iPhone becamse popular and he didn't know Apple would cave. ;) haha
http://arstechnica.com/apple/news/2008/01/the-truth-about-the-iphones-sales-numbers.ars
http://www.engadget.com/2007/09/05/apple-cuts-iphone-price-to-399/
Honestly, I cannot remember when the pricing took effect and when subsequent pricing adjustments were made, to correlate them to the sales charts, but I go by my theory that the $200 drop led to the linear growth seen on the chart. Maybe it was the good reports from the early adopters.
That $849 is not only off contract, but unlocked. That's the reason it's more than Sprints off contract price.
@ShirkPower
Where is the comparison between the software, I'm sure the Pre has Copy/Paste.
I'll be the first to say it, enough with the Pre. The way you guys have spooged yourselves over this phone since CES is embarrassing. Is this the new Jesus phone or something? I never thought I'd say this but I now miss your iPhone spooging. There's such a thing as too much "hype," and you guys crossed that line months ago. I don't get what you see in this phone that is so damn special. Personally, I think it's one ugly looking phone. And buying unlocked phones is dumb if you still have to use the Service it's exclusive to.
Agreed,
this phone is fail.
+1 .. Thanks for saying it..
This phone is the pioneer that is leading us into the era of "the cloud". THAT is why most of us who love technology also love this phone.
+1 malexandria agreed
this phone is nothing special it has a 3.0 touchscreen (G1=3.2 Iphone=3.5, Storm=3.5), it only comes with 8gb of memory that can't be upgraded (Iphone=16 Storm&G1= upgradeable to 32gb when 32gb microsdhc cards are available). lastly it's kind of fugly and this is coming from a guy who uses a g1. the only thing this phone has that i wish my g1 has is the sprint network and a 3.5mm headphone jack. i can't believe sprint is making this there flagship phone when they're going to release the touch pro2 in a couple months which is WAY better than the Pre, G1, Iphone, and storm. they should be pulling all the stops for the touch pro not this.
I'm just relieved they're giving it at least as much coverage as the iPhone seems to get.
And why? Well partly to placate the apple haters on the site, and partly because the Pre was Josh's ticket on to TV with his best bud Jimmy Fallon.
I'm sure Palm asked for a little help from as many prominent tech blogs as possible. It's not like Engadget is, or has ever called themselves, the shining beacon of journalistic integrity and in today's market the extra compensation Palm coughed up for a little bit of extra coverage was most likely very much welcomed. Don't forget that if this phone doesn't take off at LEAST as well as the first iPhone, Palm is financially screwed beyond repair. Massive amounts of cash had to be raised just to get the Pre off the ground and if any signs appear that getting paid back might be a problem, Palm is gonna have quite a few knocks at the door with baseball bats. People are like sheep and if a little bit of argumentum ad nauseam is enough to keep a potentially very competitive company churning out more reasons for every other manufacturer to raise the bar, then so be it.
I'm personally waiting for the next iPhone but I think I, or any other Apple fan, would be an absolute fool to think that it won't be a little bit better just because of the Pre's existence. Competition breeds excellence and technology is no exception.
$849 isn't bad. A mere bag of shells for a fancy man like me. I'll gladly pay that, and I'm hoping it's too pricey for the rest of the unwashed masses.
+ for "fancy man"
Anthony Cumia?
Well you could get 2 new computers instead
Yeah, two new shit computers. Why would he want that?
Lol the only people who leave those I'm so rich comments are the ones who still live with their parents who work part time at a fast food place to pay for community college.
@ James: You don't think it might have possibly been tongue in cheek? That's how I read it.
@James
Sarcasm is such a new concept, not surprising you aren't familiar with it.
@: jpollock: Lol, are you kidding? Sarcasm has been around even before Biblical tim-- ah, I see what you did there...
Why so expensive?! Has no app market, no community, no nothing... just for that GUI that lets you move all those 9-10 apps that comes with... cool
Ignorant.
Hey cmon, no need to bash.
It has... the uh.. it has.. well it has a developer.
And a cool app... written in html... you have to know html to use it but uhh its fun learning new stuff.
Ignorance is bliss, especially when it crushes the competition in terms of features.
I agree with dcoaster,
you just cant beat iphone when it comes to features
"Why so expensive?! Has no app market, no community, no nothing... just for that GUI that lets you move all those 9-10 apps that comes with... cool"
And when the iPhone debut it started from the same point.
But of course no one else is allowed to to the same.
Very funny Shirk. You misinterpreted my smackdown of the iPhone. The Pre has MANY more features than the iPhone could even dream of with its limited OS capabilities.
anyway...?
You forgot the "/s"
...?
They tried hiding it.. look how small the font is.. :O
And yes, that's what she said.
The thing I completely don't agree with is that when you compare these things to other computers, they are extremely overpriced for the power. Now, of course you are paying a premium for the far smaller form factor than a notebook or netbook, and these things make calls too, but they are still underpowered drastically in comparison, and Tracfone (etc) have proven that the tech used to make these devices send and receive calls is vastly cheap at this point.
Plus, didn't we see that Apple were selling the iPhone for more than double of the manufacturing costs when they first came out at $500 and $600? I understand that there is overhead on top of the straight manufacturing costs, such as R&D and advertising, but give me a break. $850 for a phone, even the Palm Pre, or any iPhone, Android, or WinMo powered device is just too much money.
lol best buy
What are you supposed to do with an unlocked CDMA phone anyway?
I mean, anyone who hasn't run out their Sprint contracts but still wants the Pre will just buy them from Sprint at their cheaper retail, right?
I know, wha? Please enlighten me. Does this mean that you could walk out of the store and then somehow contact sprint and get them to activate it with any sprint plan?