With the PDA market suffering, cellular-wireless handhelds and smartphones like the Treo 650 are rightfully viewed as a source of growth for the industry. The top-selling 'smart device' platform is Symbian—built from the ground up for handsets—and the manufacturer with the largest market share by far is Nokia, a company practically synonymous with mobile handsets, for example.

Adding Verizon's 45.5 million subscribers to its pool of potential customers can only help palmOne, as its financial results have suffered of late in part due to slow adoption of the handset by operators. Verizon arrived late to the smartphone's predecessor, the Treo 600—a little over a year ago—as well.

The Data Exchange
The smartphone supports the carrier's standard 1xRTT data network, branded NationalAccess. It delivers data transmission rates between 60 and 80 Kbps with bursts up to 144 Kbps. Unlimited data access to the network goes for $59.99.

Verizon equips the Treo 650 with Wireless Sync (built by Intellisync Corporation), an always-on 'push' synchronization service for e-mail, calendar, contact, tasks, etc. Wireless Sync for the Treo 650 includes inbox synchronization and the integration of up to three additional POP3 or IMAP e-mail accounts. The service is compatible with Microsoft Outlook and IBM Lotus Notes.

(The mobile operator announced the expansion of Wireless Sync to two new product offerings this morning, Wireless Sync Workgroup and Wireless Sync Enterprise Server. These services are branded versions of Intellisync's software for workgroups and large enterprises.)

Verizon sells the Treo 650 for $399 with a 2-year service agreement and $519 sans contract.

Recent Results
Although palmOne reported slightly better than expected pro forma earnings in March, it slashed forward guidance way bellow expectations—sending its stock into a tailspin. A month earlier, Gartner revealed that palmOne's 2004 revenue declined by 9.4 percent and its market share slipped to 19.3 percent, down from 24.9 percent the previous year.

The decline of PalmSource's top licensee’s shipments also contributed to the Palm platform losing its crown as the leading PDA operating system. Its share of the handheld market dropped to only 36.3 percent in 2004 from 50 percent in 2003.

Treo 650
Although not a reinvention of Verizon's aging Treo 600, the Treo 650 fixes some weaknesses of the earlier model while adding some nice new features, including an improved keyboard and high-resolution screen.

The smartphone measures 4.4 x 2.3 x 0.9 inches, weighs about 6.3 ounces, and has an overall appearance similar to the earlier model. Treo 650's QWERTY thumb-keyboard has a backlight and a more user-friendly design than the previous model, however. Like the earlier model, there is a Secure Digital slot for peripheral and memory expansion.

Unlike the Treo 600 and its 160 x 160 screen the Treo 650 implements a high-resolution 320 x 320 display, which makes it easier to read documents and Web pages. The Treo 650 also integrates Bluetooth—a glaring omission in the Treo 600

As with the Treo 600, the Treo 650 includes a VGA camera for 640 x 480 pixel or 352 x 288 pixel resolution images. The Treo 650's camera is better, however, with improved picture and video taking in low-light situations. With the Treo 650, you also get a 312 MHz Intel XScale PXA270 processor and twice the memory, 32MB, of the Treo 600. As with palmOne's Tungsten T5 and new Tungsten E2, the memory is non-volatile, which means you won't lose your data in the event of a power drain.

Unlike the Treo 600's battery, the Treo 650's is removable. So you can carry an extra battery (sold separately), and swap it out for additional power on the fly.

For more on the CDMA version of the Treo 650, see Review: palmOne Treo 650 - A Near Perfect Hybrid, where we review the Sprint edition of the smartphone.