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When Palm and Microsoft announced the first non-Palm OS smartphone from Palm, Inc., for some reason they refused to reveal this device's name.

This happened despite the fact that widely available rumors disclosed that this device will be called the Treo 700.

Thankfully, Palm has given this charade up.

This week, Palm's CEO made a clear reference to the Treo 700w. That's the name for the Verizon Wireless version of this smartphone, the first wireless carrier that will offer it.

Verizon itself has a page on its web site that refers to this model as the treo 700w.

Both companies have said that the first Treo running Windows Mobile will be released early next year.

As it was designed for Verizon, this version will be for CDMA devices. A GSM/GPRS version of the Treo 700 won't be available until next summer at the earliest.

More About the Windows Mobile Treo

The Treo 700w will have 64 MB of storage. Because it runs the latest version of Windows Mobile, this behaves similarly to the NVFS Storage in the Treo 650, and won't be erased if the device's battery runs down completely.

This model will have Bluetooth short-range wireless networking, but not built-in WiFi. Still, users will have option of using a WiFi SD card.

It will be a CDMA-based smartphone that supports EV-DO, so it will offer typical download speeds of 400-700 kilobits per second (kbps).

The 700w's design is similar to the Treo 650's, but is curvier on the bottom. It is also slightly narrower.

This Pocket PC will have a 240-by-240-pixel display, like HP's most recent smartphones.

Palm hasn't yet revealed every detail on this smartphone. The speed of its Intel processor is not known, nor the capacity of its swappable battery.

Related Links

• Four New Smartphones Coming from Palm Next Year