Just a few short weeks ago, Verizon Wireless released both the Palm Pre Plus and the Palm Pixi Plus into their growing lineup of smartphones. This move brought Palm’s most powerful products to the CDMA provider and its users while providing them with the flexibility of having two different options; both of which offer touch screen capabilities combined with a full QWERTY keypad. However, the Palm Pre Plus has its keypad neatly hidden under a slide up display while still delivering a relatively compact design.

Powered by Palm’s webOS platform, these devices have been marketed for their ease of use and ability to make multi-tasking more efficient and intuitive with features such as Palm Synergy and a gestures area. This is coupled with the ability to run multiple applications simultaneously along with a very popular multi-touch capability for the touch screen. Users will be able to download these applications via the Palm Application Catalog; currently offering over one thousand available applications and that number is growing rapidly.

While these two are very similar in comparison, there are a few things worth considering before determining which would be the right fit for you. The most important thing to note is that the Palm Pre Plus sports a 320×480 HGVA display and is stacked with 16GB of flash memory and 512MB RAM. The Palm Pixi Plus is equipped with a slightly smaller display at 320×400 and offers only 8GB of flash memory and 256MB RAM. There is a distinct benefit with the Palm Pre Plus for the user who wishes to run more applications at a much smoother pace. Also, the Palm Pre Plus weighs in at 138.5 grams and is equipped with a 3MP camera while the Palm Pixi Plus is only 92.5 grams and has a 2MP camera. So to each their own.

It will be interesting to see how sales progress in comparison to Sprint as Verizon’s “Plus”  versions of the Palm handsets one-up their CDMA competitor right out of the box. As noted earlier, the Palm Pre Plus with Verizon offers 16GB of flash memory and 512MB RAM. Sprint’s version, the Palm Pre offers only half that; likely resulting in a slower performance for the user. In addition to this, WiFi is a feature available on both “Plus” handsets with Verizon. Sprint only has the WiFi capability offered on their Palm Pre; leaving their Palm Pixi at a disadvantage without it.

The Palm Pre Plus is currently available with Verizon Wireless for $149.99 after mail-in-rebate (with new 2-year service plan and data pack $29.99 or higher) while the Palm Pixi Plus is $99.99 after mail-in-rebate (with new 2-year service plan and data pack $29.99 or higher).

For more information head over to www.verizonwireless.com to purchase and take advantage of their current “buy one get one free” promotion with these handsets.

To learn more about the features and specifications and to compare all four CDMA models visit www.palm.com