Adding a plus makes Pre, Pixi better

GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. (LIN) - Call me old-fashioned, but I tend to think that when you release a sequel that makes it the second version. Some examples, the sequel to "Ghostbusters" was "Ghostbusters 2"; the sequel to the Playstation was the Playstation 2. When they decided to make a sequel for "The Godfather", they called it "Part 2". It makes sense. But here I am in a technological world where some people have decided to throw off the easy naming scheme to go with something else. For instance, the second Xbox was called the Xbox 360 and the second iPhone received the moniker iPhone 3G (Now, to me there's definitely something weird tossing a "3" into a second generation of a product, but they both Microsoft and Apple claimed the names anyway).

Now, that brings us to the review units at hand. Verizon gave me two phones to test out that bear the "Plus" suffix. The Palm Pre Plus and Palm Pixi Plus are upgrades on the original phones released on the Sprint network. Now, maybe Palm wanted to target the people who loved getting an "A+" instead of just an "A", but the labeling still throws me off a bit. The phones may be a carbon copy of the originals on the outside, but on the inside there's a lot there.

Full disclosure, I've reviewed the original Pre and Pixi before. You can find the three part Pre review here , here and here . Meanwhile, you can read the original Pixi review here.

I don't want to overlap too much on the original reviews, because the primary aspect of the phones, Palm's WebOS, is the same. There have been some very nice tweaks and upgrades that Palm has made to the operating system that users of the original Pre and Pixi have also received but some problems still persist.

Before we get into the subtle differences, I want to point out the big one. These phones are magical. That's right. With the push of a button your phone becomes a WiFi hotspot. The utility of being able to turn your phone into a WiFi hotspot is amazing.

No other phone has ever had this capability offered at retail. You can tether other phones to your laptop via a USB cable or Bluetooth, but the software on the Pre Plus and Pixi Plus turns your phone into a WiFi network.

I tested it out in the food court in the middle of one of the local malls. Where there was not other WiFi network present, I connected to the Pixi Plus' network without a hitch and was able to check email and do some light browsing. I had two friends with me, who were also able to browse without an issue.

Now, you're not going to want to do any "heavy lifting" with it, and I wouldn't recommend downloading huge files, but it's definitely an amazing feature and one that works with simplicity. You can choose your network name and security features. Making things even nicer, the software lets you know everytime a connection is made, so you can keep track of the people using your hotspot.

This utility does not come cheap though. You'll have to add a $40/month charge to your bill on top of whatever voice and data services you're already paying for. Also, you can't talk on your phone and use it as a hotspot at the same time, but the process of switching between the two is seamless. The 3G speeds I got where pretty nice, you can see the screenshots I took of the various tests in the pictures.

The WiFi hotspot is a big addition, but both phones also got some more subtle tweaks and improvements.

The keyboard on the Pre Plus is slightly different, and to me is an upgrade over the Pre. There's a more plastic feel to them, which to me made it a bit quicker for typing. They also changed the color on the keys from orange to a gray. I still prefer the Pixi and Pixi Plus for typing on to the Pre and Pre Plus, because there is no lip edge for your thumbs to hit. Both the Pre Plus and Pixi Plus offer quick typing solutions though for messaging and emailing.

Just like on the original Pre and Pixi, the Plus versions also have great audio quality for calls. I connected to Sync via Bluetooth and had no problems. I had great coverage the whole time while in the Metro Grand Rapids area. But as I usually try to note, your coverage will dictate the audio quality on calls. Make sure that you get good coverage at the places you'll spend the most time. (Chances are, since both Pixi Plus and Pre Plus are Verizon phones, you're going to get great 3G coverage, but it's better to make sure then get somewhere and be disappointed.)

On the Pre Plus, the included memory was doubled from 8 gigabytes to 16. While that's a decent bump, I still wish that Palm would have given users the option for adding a MicroSD memory card of their own. I can buy memory cards for cheaper and then can use them the way I see fit.

Answering my only major gripe with the original Pixi, Palm added WiFi to the Pixi Plus. Originally I wrote "not everyone needs WiFi, but a greater number of smartphones than ever are coming with WiFi. For me, if I’m sitting on my couch watching TV and I want to check something quick on the Internet,