Palm Treo 680 Newbie Questions...

[umleo23]

Hi guys, I just got my palm treo 680 yesterday. I picked 680 since it is highly recommended to me for beginners, and alot cheaper than the 750. Though I have some newbie questions that I want to know. Can anyone help me then, here are my questions:

1.) Is it true that I dont need the Camera Patch to stop battery drainage? From palm's official site, I have checked using my serial number and it says no need to install. Should I follow it?

2.) How do you close applications in treo? What I do is just press one key from the other to close the application. But I am not sure whether the application got closed or still running in the background. Because when I paused the Bejeweled App and click on HOME button and go back to bejeweled app it is still in pause.

3.) To treo have the option to save my contacts and inbox in my memory card? I think treos doesn't have this option right?


Anyway I still love my treo! I just wish I had more knowledge about it. Hope you could help me guys! Thanks in advance!

[Khris]

1) Depending on the ROM version, Palm may have already included the camera patch. If you notice your battery drains after using the camera, install it, otherwise don't.

2) The Palm OS is not a multi-tasking environment. Essentially when you open a new program the previous running program is closed. Bejeweled and other games save the "state" that they're in, nothing more.

3) Contacts are stored in main memroy. Depending on what program you're using for email, you may or may not have the option to save messages on a memory card.

Seach the forums as 99% of all new user questions have already been asked and answered.

[LotusLord]

Thanks Khris, I was just about to post almost the same thing.

[forgot]

Just to add a few things:

2) Khris is right, however there are a FEW applications that can activly run in the background. The included pTunes is an example. This is a setting, and most applications close or "save state" upon exit.

3) Contacts can also still be saved to the SIM card. If you swap GSM phones a lot, this can be a handy feature.

[Khris]

2) Forgot about that point.......ironic that "Forgot" remembered! LOL

3) Forgot is correct again. Contacts when stored on the Treo are in a .pdb file which can not reside on the SD Card. You can transfer your contacts to your SIM card however, but you will lose the formatting.

EX: On the palm you can assign multiple numbers to a single contact. When you transfer that contact to the SIM card, you will get an entry for each number.

[forgot]

One more thing:

3) Khris brings up a good point as the contacts are saved as a Palm Database, or .pdb, file. It is still possible to copy this, and other .pdb files, to an SD card using a program like FileZ, and use them to restore with in a pinch. You cannot use you contacts that are copied to the card, they would just be there as an emergency backup. If your going to do that, you may as well get a good 3rd party backup application and not have to worry about it.

[umleo23]

Hey Guys!
Thanks alot! These will help me alot then.

One more thing, I charged my 680 this afternoon, when I unplug the charger it became 98% (dropped 2%) is this normal?

And from 6pm it was 98% until 12:00am it was 85%
I am not frequently using it, beam is turned off, on-silent mode,vibrate is turned off as well and keypad is locked.

I think that is a bit fast right? To discharge that amount???.

[LotusLord]

Did you have Bluetooth turned on over those 6 hours?

[lmw]

some would say that is actually good...

[umleo23]

no my bluetooth is turned off.
i am doing the one suggested like plug charger/removebat & sim/charge it 4-6 hrs

hopefully this will help.. if not ILL STILL LOVE MY TREO ehehehe