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The Palm Pre is buzzing hard right now. There have been many stories lately with leaks in info, more speculated launch info, etc… I too am quite excited to see what the Pre can bring to the table. All I want is a quicker release onto a GSM carrier in the US though. :)

The 1st item I want to discuss is a stupid prediction/claim by an analyst recently. John Paczkowski of AllThingsD (Via) shared info about a Collins Stewart analyst named Ashok Kumar. Before sharing what Kumar has to say, I wanted to point out that this John fellow has been known to throw out some unsubstantiated, harsh words at WinMo and such in the past. So what is it that Kumar has to say that has everyone up in arms?

“In our opinion, it is highly unlikely customers of AT&T or Verizon will switch to Sprint. Across the pond, carriers are taking a wait and see attitude given the high platform cost and lack of conviction on sell through. If Sprint does not match or beat AT&T’s subsidized iPhone price of $199, which translates to a subsidy in excess of $200, the Pre is DOA.”

OK, so the Pre is DOA eh? Oh ok. Thanks for that prediction.

The rest of the info I wanted to share today is regarding info coming out about the Sprint launch of the Palm Pre.

Let’s start out with a prelaunch FAQ that Engadget shared a couple days ago. This includes support for Office 2007 and the disappointing news that the Pre will no do video at launch time.

Office 2007 – Any issues?

Nope. Go ahead, tell your boss about it, and bring it to work. Welcome to life with the Pre – it just works!

Go ahead and take a look at this prelaunch FAQ. This is info from the author that says he’s a Sprint employee. If you need more Pre fix, head on over. Also, Greg over at Mobile Crunch posted this list of info about the Pre.

• No video recording at launch, though they seem to think such a thing will be added via update.
• MMS support is confirmed
• They imply that Office 2007 documents work fine on Pre, though they don’t specify if it’s read-only
• Custom ringtones are a go, as are ringback tones
• When in USB mode, all calls will be automatically routed to voicemail.
• IM Services: Google Talk and AIM at launch.
• The color for calendar events can be chosen manually on the Pre, or sync’ed with the colors you’ve got set up in Exchange
• Cookies can be disabled in the browser
• No pictbridge profile yet, so no wireless photo printing

Lastly, here is one from the BGR camp. Zach has one of these “Ninja” reports for us…

This one isn’t 100% confirmed just yet but a ninja hit us up with what could be some pretty juicy launch details for the rumor mill’s favorite handset du jour, the Palm Pre. Here we go — according to our ninja, Best Buy will be getting its hands on a limited inventory of Pre handsets for a trial launch on June 7th. Sprint will be direct-shipping the lot to arrive on the 6th and in total, about 4,500 units will be spread throughout Best Buy Mobile locations across the country.

Hmm. Pretty interesting.

Well, that’s it for the Pre today. The rumors on this thing are coming in so fast that it’s really hard to keep up. Are you planning on trying out the Palm Pre?

Chris Leckness (3560 Posts) - Website | Twitter | Facebook

Chris Leckness is the Owner/Administrator of Mobilitysite. He is a Microsoft MVP, Mobile Devices and a member of the exclusive focus group, Mobius. Chris runs a Mobilitysite, GotZune, and a few other smaller sites and blogs. His personal blog is chris.leckness.com.