General thoughts regarding the Instinct

Hello fellow Instinct users. I have been lurking on this site for some time now and appreciate the knowledge and expertise that most everyone brings to this forum. There is an awful lot of discussion relating to the shortcomings of the Instinct and I have to disagree.

I have had Sprint service for well more than a decade now and have always been on the “cutting edge” of phone equipment, dating back to having the first Motorola Star-Tac that anyone had ever seen. I have had 4 different Treos, 2 “Pocket PC’s”, Motorola Q, Nokia’s, Sanyo’s, Samsung’s, Blackberry’s with my most recent phone having been a Treo 755p. I was watching and waiting for the most recent Instinct update and saw the price of the phone plunge to $79 so I thought I’d give it a try.

My options were the Instinct and the HTC Touch Pro. I was thinking of waiting until the Treo Pro was available but they pushed the introduction back to the first quarter of ’09 and I needed a phone now.

So, I opted for the Instinct and have some thoughts about the phone, the functions and the software.

Having just recently ended using a Treo, and a Blackberry before that I really like the form of the Instinct. Having held a phone to my head that is bigger than my garage door opener for the last couple of years, the form of the Instinct is very nice.

VVM is about the best function on the phone. I figure that not having to call voice mail many times a day will save me almost 10 hours of call time on my monthly bill, plus the convenience is beyond my expectations. I also really like the call announce feature. GPS is very cool but the novelty will wear off shortly. Over all the phone has several unique functions and features that really do set it apart from the other offerings.

One of the best parts of the phone is that it’s NOT WinMo. I have never been exceptionally impressed with WinMo and have spent some time working with the Treo 800w which is WinMo 6.1. It has some nice features but really does not compare to the unique features of the Instinct.

Where I see the Instinct lacking is really based on a few hardware tweaks and a requirement for a broad approach to third-party application developers. First, the Instinct needs a larger screen, using more of the “real estate” on the front. Second, an accelerometer. And third, a larger, better battery. I find no use for Wi-Fi so that just isn’t important to me.

A decent amount of third-party applications would solve all the software problems with the Instinct. The mere fact that I can plug it directly into my computer and it doesn’t “actually” sync is ridiculous. The calendar is the worst I’ve ever seen and the phone function “screens” look like a black and white TV.

So, all in all, from an outsider that has used Palm, RIM, Windows Mobile and a wide offering of other proprietary phone software, I must say that the Instinct is a surprisingly interesting phone with enough uniqueness to make it worth overlooking its shortcomings.

Now, if I could only figure out how to put in an all day event, like a birthday, I’d be a happy man!

Jon