¡Buenas noticias, México! It is now possible for you to download paid apps from the App Catalog, they’ll even take your pesos at a very generous exchange rate. Bad news: you have to hack webOS 1.4.5 onto your phone to get it to work, because for reasons that we cannot fathom Telcel’s Palm Pre phones have yet to receive the update to enable the ecommerce App Catalog. They’re still stuck on webOS 1.4.0. Mind boggling, we know.

PreCentral reader Juan let us know that he had managed to get his Telcel Pre running 1.4.5, and up until last week he’d been able to view all sorts of apps in the App Catalog, but had never been able to complete a purchase. But now if he tries to download one of the paid apps that shows up in the Mexican version of the App Catalog, he’s prompted for credit card account information and then permitted to buy.

So far each app he’s tried to buy (iGPS, Internet Radio Pro) has gone through successfully. Additionally, the exchange rate for Mexican pesos to US dollars has been fairly generous, running at 1.00 USD = 10.00 MXN, whereas the current value is more like 1.00 USD = 12.40 MXN.

Is the Palm expanding the App Catalog to support more countries, even where App Catalog support is lacking (or where Palm technically doesn’t even have service), or just a glitch? We don’t know, but we’re glad to see more people getting access to the full App Catalog, even if they have to hack their phones to get there.

Thanks Juan!

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So, with the disclosure of FCC documents on the upcoming Palm P102UEU, it’s becoming clear that the next Palm device is going to be a spec-bumped Pre. The phone even uses the exact same Touchstone back as the current Pre phones and is confirmed to be a slider device, so it can’t be that different physically than what we already have. The only specs we’ve been able to confirm are a quad-band GSM radio (this one of the European variety, not AT&T), Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, a 1150 mAh battery (again, same as the current phones), and a 1 GHz processor that may or may not be the TI OMAP 3630. Apart from that, there’s not a whole lot we can deduce about the device, except to assume that it may come with increased storage space. We wouldn’t count on a bump in RAM, as the 512MB in the Pre Plus has been proven more than capable.

With the same form factor there’s only so much that can be shoehorned into a Pre-shaped package. The camera may receive a bump in megapixels, but we wouldn’t count on auto-focus or zoom or any fanciness like that. Additionally, we wouldn’t expect to see any significant additions that wouldn’t be plug-and-play with the current hardware (e.g. the software- and pinset-compatible OMAP 3630 processor), so forget about front-facing cameras, compasses, gyroscopes, 4G radios, a larger and/or higher-resolution screen (320×480 is still fairly dense for the size), or anything like that.

So the question stands asking: with only so much upgrade available to be packed into the P102-series (Pre 2?), how much incentive is there for you to make the jump with (hopefully) more impressive hardware down the road? It’s a question that’s going to be especially of interest to Sprint (plus Bell and Telcel) subscribers, who are stuck with the original Palm Pre with no option to upgrade to a more capable Pre Plus without any hardware hackery. So, here’s the question: do you want a spec-bumped P102UEU now, a tricked-out webOS super phone later, or both? 

Do you want a spec-bumped P102UEU now (Q4 2010) or a webOS super phone later (Q1 2011)?online surveys

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We all knew paid apps were headed to Europe. That was well announced by Palm and was well received by eager European users. As a Canadian, I was stuck, sitting there, and thinking "but what about me and other Canadians?" After all, Canada was the first international carrier to get the Palm Pre.

Good news! A few hours ago, arthurthornton posted a Palm email in our forums. The email basically described to developers what the international paid app expansion would mean for them. Interestingly, the email did include this brief key new bit of information:

We’d also like to inform you that in addition to the planned European launch, we will be launching e-commerce support in Canada and Mexico.

No date mentioned was, so it could mean that the Canada/Mexico expansion will occur at the same time as the European expansion (expected at the end of March), or possibly at some later unannounced date.

Regardless, it’s good to see progress is being made for Canadian and Mexican users wanting their paid app fix. Hopefully this announcement can help attract more developers with the expanded international user base.

Thanks to Arthur, Keith, and sketch42 for tips!

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@palm and PreCentral reader dantex both let us know that Palm webOS devices on Telcel’s network in Mexico can now get webOS 1.4.  In just under a week Palm has managed to release webOS 1.4 for all devices on all networks – a significant feat given all the complications of carrier testing and given that there are technically five different webOS hardware types out there (CDMA Pre, CDMA Pre Plus, CDMA Pixi, CDMA Pixi Plus, GSM Pre). Palm has also released the webOS 1.4 SDK and the webOS doctor for 1.4 in the same span.

The wait is now on for the next revision of webOS – many are hoping for a small ‘point’ upgrade to fix some bugs that appear to have cropped up in 1.4 – including phone freezes, bluetooth compatibility (especially with cars), email bugs (setup screen popping up), Luna crashes, mysterious battery drain, volume pop-ups, and more. Yeah, that’s a long list of bugs and it’s tough to say which are universal and which are per-user flukes – but our official webOS 1.4 issues thread is up to 83 pages and we’ve gotten emails aplenty on the above, so we’re sure some of them are real.

So kudos to Palm for getting 1.4 through all the carriers, now let’s kill some bugs.

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So we know that Mexico, the Land of the Aztecs, will receive the Palm Pre on this Friday on the GSM carrier Telcel. But, what got many people blindsided is that IUSACELL, which is a CDMA carrier in Mexico will be getting the Pre also, according to their webpage.

IUSACELL is the largest CDMA carrier in [...]

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While the Palm Pre may be launching on Friday on Telcel (Mexico’s largest cellular network), other networks in the nation are snapping up the Pre as well. In fact, if you go to Iusacell’s website you’ll see the Pre displayed front and center with a “cómpralo aquí” (buy here) link that opens a pop-up where you can sign up for more information and to be contacted by a Iusacell representative.

Unlike GSM carrier Telcel and #2 Telefonica, Iusacell is a CDMA network. Regardless of the network, it’s good to see Palm still making headway in expanding the footprint of webOS outside the US. As for when we’ll actually see the Pre on Iusacell is anyone’s guess…

Thanks to Akitayo for the tip!

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As you might remember, back at the beginning of October, we wondered if Telcel Mexico was going to carry the Palm Pre in that country. Our Mexican Compadres are happy to say YES, the Pre will arrive to the Aztec Land on November 27th.

Mexico will be the third country in America to have the Palm [...]

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It would seem that the entire FBI Los Angeles Field Office in FlashForward has been issued Pre phones. This week’s episode of FlashForward had the Pre in the hands of Agents Mark Benford (played by Joseph Fiennes), Demetri Noh (John Cho), and Janis Hawk (Christine Woods), as well as Director Stanford Wedeck (Courtney B. Vance). Who says the Pre lacks enterprise support? Everyone in the FBI has one, and they even seem to know how to use them!

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Many have wonder if Palm would launch the Pre all over the world. We allready know the Pre is in Canada on the Bell network, and in just a few more days the Pre will hit Germany, Spain, Ireland and the UK. How about the rest of the world? Well, it appears Mexico is next [...]

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[ youtube link ]

While our Spanish is admittedly quite rusty, we can see what’s going on here: it’s a Palm Pre running on GSM carrier Telcel in Mexico. The conversation indicates that Telcel will be the exclusive carrier of the Pre in Mexico, which runs up against Telefonica’s Movistar brand that spans much of Latin America. And just to show us it’s not some variety of trickery, the phone is shown to have both no Sprint apps and a SIM card slot, and with the QWERTY keyboard we know it’s also not an unlocked Pre stolen from O2 Germany.

Strangely, the video also makes a mention of expandable storage, though it is not demonstrated or shown on the video, nor are any specifics discussed. Our money’s on the speaker mistaking USB Drive Mode for expandable storage. One more video after the break.

Update: EBPMAN in the comments, who is much more fluent en Español than yours truly, says that the video specifically says micro SD, but when talking about it he’s pointing at the instructions on how to remove/insert the SIM card. Confusion continues to reign supreme.

Update 2: Apparently the videos have been pulled. Take our word for it, they speak Spanish and have a Pre.

[via: PreThinking]

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