Smartphone rivals PDAs

Handspring's Treo offers useful applications for companies with the skills and patience to configure the integrated GSM phone and PDA, according to IT Week tests.

Available next month only on the BT Cellnet GSM network, the Palm OS-based Treo is a 16-shade monochrome device that comes with either microkeyboard or stylus input. Colour versions are due this summer.

We tested the keyboard model, using a dial-up ISP to access the Internet.

This took time to set up, and required changes to the default settings for the Treo to use its internal wireless modem. The browser displayed pages in a readable, though cut-down format.

The Treo can send and receive emails, but the keys are smaller than those of a mobile phone. It took us some time to find characters such as the pound sign and underscore.

Palm users can sync data with the Treo, and will find many familiar Palm OS applications, including expenses and calendar software.

Handspring is banking heavily on the success of the Treo after announcing that it will eventually stop supporting PDAs without wireless connectivity.

Although a date has not been set for this move, the decision is likely to annoy customers who have invested in Handspring Visor devices and Springboard add-on modules. The Treo does not include a Springboard slot and future models are also likely to omit this expansion feature due to size constraints.