The Palm P850 or Palm Treo P850, is a

Palm OS Palm OS (also known as Garnet OS) is a discontinued mobile operating system initially developed by Palm, Inc., for personal digital assistants (PDAs) in 1996. Palm OS was designed for ease of use with a touchscreen-based graphical user interface. ...

-based smartphone released in 2010. This device was a minor update of the

Treo 650 The Palm Treo 650 is a Palm OS-based smartphone, the successor to Palm's Treo 600. It began shipping in November 2004, and was discontinued in 2008. Specifications Carriers The following GSM and CDMA2000 mobile phone operators currently or ...

, tailored specifically for the Chinese market and sold as a low-cost smartphone option.

Device Release

In early 2009 Palm CEO Ed Colligan declared that there would be no new

devices released following the

Palm Centro The Palm Centro is a smartphone marketed by Palm, Inc. beginning its release on October 14, 2007, offering the functionality of the larger Treo 755p in a smaller size. The Centro is one of the last devices to run the Palm OS operating system. ...

, and that the company was reportedly working hard on their next-generation operating system. However, at the start of 2010 the Palm P850 was quietly released in China as a low-cost smartphone option, selling for 560-700CNY outright, and was selling for as low as 200CNY by late 2011. Available exclusively with Chinese localization, the existence of this device was not broadly discussed outside of Asia; it is speculated that the device is an unofficial "

Shanzhai ''Shanzhai'' () is a Chinese term literally meaning "mountain fortress" or "mountain camp", whose contemporary use usually encompasses counterfeit, imitation, or parody products and events and the subculture surrounding them. ''Shanzhai'' produc ...

", and that these devices are originally Treo 650 units that have been locally refurbished and modified.

Hardware & Design

The styling of the device has some similarities to other Treo devices, such as the call and end buttons on the

Palm Treo Pro The Palm Treo Pro is a combination PDA/cell phone offered in both GSM and CDMA. It is Palm's fourth Windows Mobile Treo. It replaced the short-lived Sprint Treo 800w. Specifications The phone originally was released in an unlocked GSM format ...

. The device construction is plastic, with a touchscreen that is flush with the bezels, unlike other Treo models with a raised bezel. There is an SD expansion slot on the top of the device, which allows the use of SD cards for expanding storage, or SDIO cards for adding extra capabilities such as Wi-Fi. The rear housing is conspicuously marked with "smart phone" in white silk-screened text. The device internal hardware is essentially identical to a CDMA

which was notably released over five years prior, but now with an added SIM card slot to support the requirements of Chinese mobile networks, and a marginally improved camera. The markings on the device's regulatory label (located under the battery) correspond exactly with the CDMA

model, featuring an identical FCC ID (O8FMADECA) and UPC (805931014801). During start-up, the device also displays the PalmOne logo; this logo was used on the Treo 650 at its release, but was depreciated following the merger of PalmOne and PalmSource in 2005. The Palm P850 also runs the 5.2H version of Palm OS, which was outdated at the time of device release. Palm-P850-FCC

References

{{Palm Devices Palm mobile phones Palm OS devices Smartphones Mobile phones introduced in 2010

Device Release

Hardware & Design

See also

References