Sprint smartphone comparison; HTC EVO 4G vs. Palm Pre

I bought the Palm Pre Plus in February and was pleased with the webOS 1.4 update, but then in March at CTIA the Sprint HTC EVO 4G was announced and I posted that my Verizon Palm Pre Plus was likely headed back to the Verizon store. However, with the EVO 4G not coming out for a few months and my mobile device history starting with Palm in 1997 I just couldn't return the Pre Plus and ended up keeping it.

I have now come to another decision time after purchasing my own Sprint HTC EVO 4G and considering the Pre Plus, EVO 4G, or new Apple iPhone 4. I was able to knock out the Palm Pre Plus this weekend and just paid the extremely high Verizon ETF to end that contract. I also just read an excellent article on Android Central that compares the Sprint EVO 4G and Palm Pre from a couple of long time Palm users, Craig Froehle and Don Ferguson.

They go into quite a few details about the various aspects of the devices from a users point of view and the comparison just confirmed that my decision to cancel my Palm Pre Plus contract was the right choice. I do think that Palm's webOS is very intuitive and user friendly, but going head-to-head with Android showed me that I prefer a more customizable and feature packed operating system.

I still have a few more days before the iPhone 4 is available and I do have a reservation at my local Apple store. At this time I am leaning heavily towards sticking with Sprint and the HTC EVO 4G. I already have an iPhone 3GS and can eventually load it up with iOS 4 so the need for the iPhone 4 is not as great. I know the hardware of the new iPhone will be excellent and pretty compelling, but I think I will miss the customizable home screens with glanceable information, easy WiFi tethering, superb Gmail support, included Sprint services, outstanding free GPS navigation solutions, and more found in Android.

I will continue to consider the EVO 4G and iPhone 4 this week and we will see what happens on Thursday.