Roger's Wireless today became the second North American mobile operator to deliver Palm's newest smartphone, the Treo 680. Today's announcement follows Cingular's introduction of the follow-up to the Treo 650 last week.

Although Cingular and Rogers continue to sell the Treo 650 (for now) the older GSM model is undoubtedly on its way out. Palm even says the two-year old Treo is no longer available on its U.S. Web site; although it can be found on some international Palm sites, including the ones for the U.K. and Australia.

During the summer, Palm already pulled what had been its only smartphone in Europe at the time due to the European Union's Reduction of Hazardous Substances (RoHS) pollution law, which sets limits on the amount of hazardous substances (lead, cadmium, mercury, hexavalent chromium, PBB and PBDE flame retardants) contained within electronic equipment. .

Since then, the company - in partnership with carrier-giant Vodafone - started offering its first Windows Mobile model in Europe, the Treo 750v. Expect the Palm OS Treo 680 to land on that continent as well. Palm promised 20 carriers worldwide would deliver the new smartphone by June of 2007.

Meanwhile, Roger's is offering the new Treo for $299.99 CDN with a 3-year contract - after rebate and with certain voice and data plans. Otherwise, the Treo costs $499.99 CDN for Roger's customers.

For push-style mob-e-mail there's Rogers Visto-powered MyMail service, which delivers POP3, IMAP, Microsoft Exchange, and Lotus Domino e-mail to the smartphone wirelessly in real time.

As with Cingular, Rogers is shipping the silver version of the Treo 680. Palm, on the other hand, is selling an unlocked edition of the smartphone directly from its Web site in red, orange and white as well. This unlocked version should be usable with any GSM carrier: Simply pop in your SIM card and you're ready to go.

Like Treo 750v, the Palm OS Treo 680 loses the Treo's signature external antenna, making it decidedly sleeker-looking than the Treo 650, which it replaces. Its GSM/GPRS/EDGE radio is a quad-band (850/900/1800/1900) type for global compatibility.

The Treo 680 also sports a VGA camera, a 320 x 320 pixel resolution touch screen, 64 MB of user-available memory, a 312 MHz Intel PXA270 processor, and Bluetooth. Its 1200 mAH lithium-ion battery is supposed to last up to 4 hours talk and 300 hours standby time.

The device measures 4.4 x 2.3 x 0.8 inches and 5.28 ounces and is the smallest Treo yet.

Palm has upgraded the user interface and introduced a new simplified five tab phone application with the Treo 680. In addition, the Address Book and contacts are now built directly into the phone application.

DataViz Documents To Go is bundled for Microsoft Office document viewing and editing, the VersaMail e-mail application has been upgraded, and Pocket Tunes (upgradeable for DRM protected content) will plays music files.

Google Maps delivers directions, local search, moveable/scalable maps, location satellite imagery and live traffic updates. And a threaded chat application tracks SMS conversations as if they were an instant messaging exchange, so you can view everything in one place. Palm has also updated the Web browser for faster performance and more accurate delivery of content, the company said.

Over the course of this year Palm has delivered a new Palm OS Treo, the Treo 700p, and Windows Mobile models, the Treo 700w and its update the Treo700wx, to CDMA carriers Verizon and Sprint in the U.S. The Palm-based Treo 680 is the first new GSM Treo in two years.

So what about a Microsoft-based GSM model for the U.S. market?

That device will be a variation on the Treo 750v for, most likely, Cingular. Palm has apparently run into snag gaining carrier approval for the new Treo, however, delaying availability until its third fiscal quarter: it was supposed to ship this quarter. This delay, in addition to being a major disappointment to many, has taken a toll on Palm’s projected earnings for its second fiscal quarter, which its in now, and, as a result, the company’s stock price.