Palm Introduces First Windows Mobile-based Treo 750 Smartphone in Australia, on Telstra Next G

Adam Turner
Thursday, 15 February 2007 11:32

Your IT - Mobility

Windows Mobile-based Palm smartphones have finally reached Australia, with Palm announcing the Treo 750 - available on Telstra's Next G high speed HDSPA network.

The Treo 750 has been customised for Telstra customers to take advantage of the Next G services such as Foxtel, BigPond Music, Telstra Business, Yellow Search and Whereis Maps.

Palm's Windows Mobile 5.0-powered Treo 750 was introduced in Europe last year as the 750v and has just become available in the US from Cingular Wireless. As well as supporting quad band GSM (850/900/1800/1900 MHz), the 750 also supports high speed UMTS (850/1900/2100 MHz). Palm expects to offer a free upgrade later this year from UMTS to Cingular's higher speed HSDPA technology - offering DSL-compatible data speeds.

Palm released the Treo 680 in Australia before Christmas, an update to the Treo 650 but still not HSDPA compatible. The Treo 680 is compatible with 2.5G EDGE networks -- offering download speeds of around 120Kbps. Telstra began upgrading its GSM network to EDGE late last year, but it was over-shadowed by Telstra's Next G network -- offering download speeds of 500 to 1500Kbps.

In Australia new Treo 750 joins the i-mate JasJam (a rebadged HTC Hermes) in Telstra's Next G smartphone offering, both running Windows Mobile 5.0 and sporting a QWERTY keyboard. Palm is reportedly releasing a Windows Mobile 6.0 update for some Treo 750s.

The Palm Treo 750 smartphone is available from 26 February 2007 for $0 upfront on a new $80 Telstra Business phone plan for 24 months or $AU1199.