For many of us (namely, we who have managed to avoid Crackberry addiction) the PDA wars have long been viewed as a battle between two camps: The Palm and the "dark side" (i.e., the Pocket PC and Windows Mobile camp). Palm has represented the last foothold on the long slippery slope towards the total domination of the PDA market by Microsoft.

Well, if we're going to start down the slippery slope, the $499 Treo 700w isn't a bad way to go. Palm's first foray into the Windows Mobile space is an impressive offering. It's the first smartphone I've ever used that doesn't sacrifice either PDA functionality to make the phone work, or phone capabilities for the PDA.

The Treo 700w represents less of a port of Windows Mobile 5 to the Palm than it does a Treofication of Windows Mobile 5.

Current users of the Palm OS Treo 600 and 650 may be interested to note some of the 700w's improvements, including "Photo Speed-Dialing," whereby you can click through pictures of contacts, and dial their number by clicking on the face or pressing the dial button – and also the superior, 1.3-megapixel camera.

The stated goal of the Palm development team was to let the user perform as much of his or her daily functions as possible without having to use the stylus. Did they succeed? Well, that depends on what applications you use most. Certainly, for most common applications (mail, calendar, contacts), you can get around pretty well using the 5-way, the keyboard, the 4 dedicated buttons and the two smart buttons.

The four dedicated buttons are Green Phone (Connect), Windows Start, OK and Red Phone (Disconnect). There is also a volume rocker on the side panel and a user-designated smart button. (My recommendation, by the way, is to assign this to launch the application that controls the built in camera, because the only other way to launch it is through a series of menus.) The interaction of the OK, Connect and 5-way select buttons can be quite confusing. For example, hitting Connect doesn't take you to a call log like most phones, it takes you to the Today Window, with a spot to dial names or numbers at the top, followed by buttons for voicemail and 411, then a mini-calendar and email status, then a spot to do a Google search.

If you then start to type in a phone number, it tries to use it as a search for a contact name. You have to shift into numbers mode first if you want to dial directly by number. Or you can hit Connect again, which will finally get you to a call log, and if you select "Dial Pad," you can dial a number.

You also have to resist the urge to hit Disconnect in place of close. For example, after you are finished with a call to a new number, you'll be offered a chance to save the contact info. If you instinctively press Disconnect again, you power down the PDA. And in most cases, confirmation screens need to be acknowledged with OK, not with 5-way select. The usual way to close a window is to hit OK, but sometimes you need to use a smart button instead, if you want to cancel rather than accept an action. I'm sure that given more than the three days that I've played with it, I'd get used to the conventions and not stumble as much.