It's simple math, they need the sales, and the people don't have the money to buy it at full price. Supply and demand baby, supply and demand! It's a nice phone, feature rich, better then the Tilt (sorry to say it Tom from the previous post) But at full price, it's not even a concideration for most of the market.

I can't stand the iphone, but i'd take a subsidized phone like this if it's rightly priced. Would i prefer a market like in Europe where you buy a phone then get a plan at a lower rate after as opposed to picking a plan and being locked into for 2 yrs and then selecting a phone, sure would! is that an option? heck no. So, we're stuck with it, and again, it's SIMPLE economics, supply and demand. Palm wants to survive, so they gotta sell it to a carrier like ATT.

Personally, the sooner this comes out, the sooner i'd buy it. it's a slick looking phone that i'd much rather have over the iphone.

It's obvious that they're doing it because $550 is way too much money to pay for what the Treo Pro is... a year old PPC in a slightly updated and thinner package. Really, the system specs match my old AT&T Tilt exactly except for size. So they're hoping that they'll get some customers with a lower price. I for one would be willing to pay no more than $350 unsubsidized for it, and about $199 with a 2 year contract. It's simply not worth any more than that.

@Pissed Off Customer - This phone was based on GSM from the start, so it was never going to be on Verizon Wireless anyway, even if they hadn't chosen a carrier. The only choices for GSM service in the US are AT&T and TMobile, and TMobile doesn't even have a 3G network out yet.

Well that does it, hello BlackBerry what do ya have for me?

Been in the market for new phone(s), was going to get 800w's but then I heard all the ground swelling about the Pro. Can't use any of the carrier solution because the service is the WORST!!! Where I am and my users are Verizon is the only carrier that can provide the service.

Sure it's a cool phone has all the features we need. We've been a Treo 700w shop for years now but if Palm goes with AT&T that can't provide the service what's the use? You think Palm would have learned from Apple mistakes with AT&T.

Go for the unlocked version so I can deal with more networks that can't provide the service where I need it.

No I don't work for Verizon it's just simple there network works at the speed a QoS as advertised.

I'm going with "they need the price to be subsidized so ordinary people will consider buying it at what they think is a reasonable price".

I think that's reasonable - given the choice between a subsidized price over a two year contract and a full priced phone, there are many who will go with the one that costs them least out of pocket when they are in the AT&T store.