Much like the original Touchstone for the Palm Pre, the one for the HP TouchPad follows in the same premise by allowing you to lay the tablet on top of it. Naturally, the kickstand that supports the weight of the tablet is adjustable to almost any angle – thus, allowing us to view the tablet’s display comfortably. Luckily, it functions both ways as the Touchstone accommodates it in either portrait or landscape orientations. Included with the Touchstone is the regular looking wall adapter, which houses a standard USB port – however, we’re rather thrown back by the fact that it doesn’t use an ordinary microUSB cable to bridge the connection. Meaning, if the cable gets damaged or becomes defective, you’ll need to replace the entire Touchstone as opposed to just the microUSB cable that’s in use with the original one…

Read the full story at PhoneArena.com!

If HP’s pride and joy isn’t enough to satisfy your itching fingers, then you’ll more than likely find some relief picking up a number of accessories made specifically for the tablet. Although they’re all branded with the “coming soon” tag, we’re fairly confident that these accompanying accessories will no doubt make their presence known in time for the tablet’s release.

First up, the same old looking USB wall charger is priced at $29.99, but in reality, it’s the same exact charger that we find packaged along with past webOS smartphones – albeit, there’s no branding with it this time around. Secondly, the HP TouchPad Case retails for $49.99, and is essentially a slip-on case that allows you to prop up the tablet for the most enjoyable video watching experience. Thirdly, the slim looking Bluetooth keyboard retails at $69.99 and uses two AA batteries that are estimated to offer 12 months of life. Finally, early adopters might take notice with this one since it offers that cool looking way of charging up the TouchPad. The HP Touchstone Charging Dock works similarly with the previous Touchstone, but the adjustable stand allows you to perfectly view the tablet horizontally or vertically, while charging the tablet normally – all for the price of $79.99.

So if you’re planning to pick up the TouchPad on launch day, are any of these accessories worthy enough to warrant an accompanying purchase?

source: HP via PreCentral

While HP may be the biggest consumer PC seller out there, they’re also tops when it comes to business purchases. We’re talking both big corporate and small shop buys - this is what we in the business refer to as “diversification” and “scale,” wherein HP is capable of selling their products to large and small groups across multiple industries and revenue levels.

With such scale, we’re pleased to see HP using their multitudinous business contacts to push webOS. In fact, not that long ago the HP’s “Small Business Education Series” email newsletter heavily and exclusively featured Palm smartphones. Very smartly, the email focused on the benefits of webOS, noting:

• webOS multi-tasks like no other. HP was sure to put emphasis on flicking between “apps & docs,” as business users don’t just care about multi-tasking with browsers and games.
• You can add up to sixteen email accounts. Yeah, we didn’t think about that either, but we can see how some small businesses can have multiple accounts (sales@, support@, admin@, etc) with one person managing them all.
• Touchstone!
• Wireless cloud syncing magics, otherwise known as Synergy. No need to plug in, unless you want to transfer files, that is.
• “Zero-touch IT support,” as in Palm manages for you the security “from the server, to the cloud, to your phone. Simple.” Granted, that’s a big of an over-simplification, but we’ll allow it.

And then there’s noting that every Palm phone, be it a Pre, and Pixi, or a Plus variant of either, is available for free on your choice of major American cellular carriers (excepting T-Mobile, of course). And the oh so lucrative accessories too, like the above mentioned Touchstone charger, fancy colorful backs for the Pixi, and the requisite cables, batteries, and Palm-branded cases. Though we’ll take the opportunity here to point you to our own PreCentral accessory store for that - we’ve got a bit more diversity and scale in that department.

Source: HP

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As Annie notes over at sister-site TreoCentral, Palm has let loose that they're going to be roving the country, handing out Pre and Pixi accessories, Palm stickers, and who knows what to people they see using webOS devices out in public spaces. In other words - be a little flamboyant when you use your phone, it just might get you noticed and get you swag.

Palm says that these roving bands of accessory-gifters could appear in any country. We suppose these 'random acts of wow' could be pretty sparse, given the wide net.  If only Palm had a way of tracking down webOS users in the wild to help improve those odds (We KID! We joke!).

Thanks to everybody who sent this in!

My top five Palm Pre Accessories are very straightforward - I like to cover the basics first. Our Palm Pre Accessories forum have been very active with accessory talk and I figured I'd chime in with my top picks. Far be it from me to dictate what you should get for your Pre, but what I'm listing here are the five things that, for me, are essential for my Pre experience.

Let's see what we've got, shall we?

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The Touchstone charges the Pre’s battery wirelessly, just by popping the Pre onto the Touchstone. The wireless charging feature requires a special back on the phone that enables the magnetic inductive charging. That’s now a thing of the past, according to the people at Seidio, makers of phone accessories. Their new Innocase Surface for the Palm Pre is out, and works with the Touchstone charger.

The Innocase Surface is a two-piece case that protects the Pre from the daily bumps that all phones experience. It’s only 1 mm thick, so it adds very little bulk to the Pre. What sets it apart from other cases is the ability to drop the Pre on the Touchstone charger while still in the Innocase. According to Seidio, the Innocase Surface allows the phone to charge as it normally does, without the hassle of removing it from the case. The case is available in four colors for the fashion conscious; black, blue, burgundy, and pink model, and the price is $29.95, not high if you ask me, considering the benefit of using it with the Touchstone.

[Via SEIDIO and jkOnTheRun]

At 1,350mAh, the new battery has just under 20-percent more capacity than the standard, 1,150mAh battery that Palm provide.  Unlike its double-capacity sibling, however, the new Seidio is the same size as the original, meaning you don’t need an extended battery cover and it should work just fine with the special Touchstone battery cover.

Estimates for the new Seidio battery tip around 7.25 to 9.5hrs on a single charge, based on the assumption that you’re getting between 6-8hrs from the standard pack.  That’s not bad for $44.95; now the question is why Palm themselves didn’t pick this battery in the first place.

[via jkOnTheRun]

In my Review of the Palm Pre, I said that the Pre's battery gets me through a day of moderate use, but with heavy use cuts out rather quickly. If some of what I'm hearing on Twitter and in the forums is any indication, I've been lucky with my results.

So yes, let's come out and say it: battery life isn't good on the Pre and hopefully Palm will be able to alleviate it with some software fixes (we know some are in the works). In the meantime, here are some tips and tricks for improving your battery life. We'll start with the most important, end with one tip that may surprise you, and then offer a few accessory suggestions.

A huge thanks go out to the PreCentral.net Members who have been on this case like Columbo.

It's all after the break!

Palm Pre Battery-Saving Tweaks

Log out of IM

The Messaging apps keeps you logged into both AIM and Google Talk even after you dismiss the card. The IM protocol on the Palm Pre is currently afflicted with a bug that makes is suck the life out of your battery. The bug is aggravated if you have a lot of buddies. For now, unless you expect you'll be actively using it, click the green circle at the top of your buddy list and select Offline.

Turn Bluetooth off

I've not seen the Pre do anything particularly nefarious with Bluetooth and battery life (seems to not make much of a dent to me), but better safe than sorry.

Move your phone

I have to admit that despite my complaints about poor coverage, there are places around with slightly worse coverage (I'm in one now). The Pre drains quickly in areas of marginal coverage -- so if there's a spot in the room with better signal, it wouldn't kill you to be sitting there. (see below for more options).

Change your Fetch Interval for Email

I still have Gmail set to "As Items Arrive" because I'm stubborn and push Gmail is too nice to give up. Still, if push email isn't critical to you, consider setting your fetch interval (in email preferences, under your account info) to 30 minutes or a half hour. Heck, depending on how often you get email, setting your interval to "As Items Arrive" may help your battery life. It's something you need to play around with.

Check your screen settings

Does your brightness really need to be maxed out? Do you really think the screen needs to be on for 3 minutes before it turns off?

Hotmail? May be an issue

Folks in our forums are identifying Hotmail as a particularly nasty culprit for heat and battery issues. To be fair, this one could be as much Microsoft's bug as Palm's. But if hotmail isn't essential for you, shut'er down.

Turn off GPS

If you're not using (and not fixing to use) GPS, you can head into your location preferences and turn it off. In my testing this hasn't made a huge ding because the Pre doesn't have GPS on all the time, but if you're using Google Maps a lot, it could help you.

Turn ON WiFi. No, seriously

Palm told us that the Pre was very efficient at WiFi and that we might just see better battery life with WiFi on. I haven't done extensive testing yet, but yesterday I spent all day in a spot with absolutely terrible Sprint signal. In the morning, WiFi off and the battery drained rather quickly, down to 50% in three hours of moderate use. In the afternoon I turned WiFi on and with the same usage, it managed to keep it up to 25% four hours later. Still not great, but surprisingly better!

So: poor signal but good WiFi? Turn on WiFi. No WiFi around, turn it off.

Close apps, especially 3rd party apps

Can't hurt! In fact, you may even want to consider deleting them (Opt + Tap in your launcher). We haven't confirmed yet, but it's possible some 3rd party apps may be failing to close cleanly and killing battery.

Reset the device

You never know, even built-in apps sometimes behave badly on the best of platforms.

Battery-Friendly Accessories

Spare Pre battery

Don't be tempted by your old Centro's battery either -- we don't recommend it. Our very own PreCentral.net Accessory Store will have the official Palm Pre battery in soon, for $39.95

Touchstone

Having a Touchstone around means you can top off more conveniently, so battery life isn't as much of an issue. Again, our pals at the still will have them in stock within a week or two and for cheap! Touchstone Charging Kit clocks in at $49.95 and the Touchstone by it's lonesome is $39.95.

One thing to keep in mind: the Touchstone doesn't come with a microUSB cable or a wall charger and in my testing it does not charge when you plug it into a computer -- so you'll need a wall charger to go with it.  The kind folks at the store have created a Touchstone + Battery Cover + Wall Charger Bundle for $71.90 and if you're looking for a second setup for your office, they have a Touchstone + Wall Charger Bundle for $66.40.

Travel Charger / USB Charger

Sometimes you just need to plug in - here's a list of chargers and cables that have been tested to work with the Palm Pre.

Vehicle Charger

Yeah, having a way to charge the Pre in the car is going to be important.

Emergency Charger

I'm a gearhead, so there's always something in my bag that needs charging. My favorite new addition to my bag is the Freedom Mobile Power Emergency Charger. It's just a little 1800mAh battery pack that gets charged by mini-USB and charges via mini-USB. So it's important to note that by itself it is not compatible with the Palm Pre. But I also carry a mini-USB to micro-USB adapter which, combined with the Freedom emergency charger, charges up the Pre just fine.

Signal booster

Before I get to step 4 (which involves a monthly fee and a compromise), I'm currently testing out a signal booster from our store, the Wilson Electronics SIGNALBOOST DT Dual-Band 800/1900 MHz Desktop Amplifier Kit. It's essentially a repeater - you put an antenna outside your building and run a coaxial cable to a box in your office. Given that I have lots of bars outside my steel box of an office and none inside, it seems like a good solution. It's expensive, however, so we'll have a full review for you next week to help decide between this and the...

Airave

Sprint sells something called the Airave, which essentially is a miniature cell tower in your house that runs off your high speed internet. In theory, it's the perfect solution. In practice, it works but not for everybody.

The reason I'm not putting an Airave at the top of this (at least above the Wilson solution) is that it just has too many compromises:

• it costs $5 a month to use
• it only works for 5 users
• it does not provide high speed EVDO data, only 1xRTT signal for voice calls.
• it comes with a GPS puck whose sole purpose is to make sure you're only using the device in approved areas. (and yes, there are legitimate E911 reasons for this, but it still grates me)

It's only $100 bucks initially, though, so despite all those compromises I may break down and get one for the office.

What are YOUR battery saving tips?

According to the feedback coming from early shoppers, there seem to be a reasonable number of Pre handsets to go around - however the Touchstone is in short supply.  Our friend Kevin Tofel over at jkOnTheRun found that his local Sprint store had around 30 Pre handsets in stock, but he was fourth in line and got the last Touchstone.  Unless the people ahead of him were stocking up, it sounds like Palm’s accessory department have really underestimated the demand for the nifty inductive charger.

Still, the Pre itself is the star of the show today, and we’re keen to hear whether your hands-on impressions match up to our Palm Pre review.  Let us know in the forum!