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Update: Palm will hold a press conference on Monday with Microsoft (represented by Bill Gates) and Verizon Wireless. We suspect the purpose of the event is to annouce the long anticipated Windows Mobile Treo smartphone.

It's no secret that Palm, Inc. has plans to move beyond the Palm operating system (OS) by releasing its first Windows Mobile device, a Treo smartphone, sometime next year. This week, a reporter from Engadget received hands on confirmation of this upcoming new reality.

He got the chance to spend a few hours with what will be called the Treo 700w, which - by the way -is built on the Microsoft's latest handheld platform, Windows Mobile 5.0. The blog posted somewhat convincing video and pictures of this handset last month.

At about the same time, Taiwan's DigiTimes reported Chinese-language newspaper Commercial Times had written that the first Windows Mobile Treo would start shipping in volume during the first quarter of 2006. The report also said Taiwanese original equipment manufacturer High Tech Computer (HTC), a leading producer of PDAs and smartphones, would build and—most likely due to its extensive experience with Windows Mobile—take part in the design of the upcoming Treo.

Treo 700w
Pictures of the Windows Mobile Treo show a Verizon logo—which would make it a CDMA network phone (although a GSM/GPRS version is likely too)—among other details, including clearly picturing Windows Mobile on the device's display plus a flash, camera, keyboard and Bluetooth like a traditional Treo.

Most convincingly, the device had the same connector as the Palm-based Treo 650. The Treo 700w display can’t be same 320 x 320 pixel screen as the current Palm Treo model, however, because the Pocket PC edition of Windows Mobile doesn't support that resolution. Instead, it sports a lower-resolution 240 x 240 pixel type.

The upcoming smartphone has 64 MB of memory, twice as much as today's Palm-based Treo model, the Treo 650. In addition, the Treo 700w has the same non-volatile storage as the current model, which means your data won't be lost in the event of a complete power drain.


Treo 700w in Landscape Mode

Although the Treo 700w does not integrate Wi-Fi, like the Treo 650, it will, according to Engadget support Palm's Wi-Fi Secure Digital card.

Multiplatform Path
Palm traveling down the road towards a Windows Mobile device seems heretical. Yet Palm vendors can theoretically use the same hardware to support other mobile platforms because today's Palm OS PDAs and smartphones run on ARM processors. Also, since Palm split from PalmSource and is a hardware only vendor, the company is free to pursue alternative operating systems to create more appealing products, help the bottom line, and please shareholders.

With the mobile market rapidly moving from PDAs to smartphones, it may be in the company's interest to boost the number of platforms supported by its handsets to attract the widest range of consumers and (just as importantly) wireless carriers.