HP Veer hands-on and first impressions

Just a day after we found of the HP Veer would be available on the 15^th of May on AT&T, we have our hands on our review unit. And while we’re busy getting down to the business of a thorough review of this tiny little webOS smartphone, we thought we’d go ahead and give you a detailed look over the phone and our first impressions.

The Veer HP sent us is the white variety (it’s actually more of an egg shell than pure white), and it’s strikingly less “panda-like” than the press images would suggest. All of the surfaces that look black are actually either a dark gray (in the case of the charging adapter) or dark chrome (all the buttons). It’s an attractive little phone. And little it is. Unlike the Pre-series phones, I have no problem with slipping this sucker into a pants pocket, and it’s light enough that I don’t even notice it’s there. The Veer is just deceptively small – it literally fits in the palm of my hand. The slider is robust – it snaps into place when both opening and closing.

As you might expect for a phone this size, the buttons are small, but they’re still perfectly usable. As a Pre owner, it’s taking some getting used to with the power button more on the side than the top, but it works. The keyboard is obviously small (about a full key narrower than the Pre), but in the brief time we’ve had the phone it hasn’t caused any problems.

What might cause problems is that little charging port. The magnetically-latching port was created so HP could still have this tiny thin slider phone and still be able to charge it. The USB cable and headphone adapter snap on with nary a problem and only work in one orientation: silver dot up on the cable, and port down on the headphone adapter. It takes some force to separate the phone from the cable-adapter, though we’ll have to give it more real world use before we judge that it will be able to hold-up to daily headphone use.

So the Veer is tiny and fits super well in the hand and the pocket. Is it the phone for you? We’re not sure yet, but our full review will be coming soon. In the meantime, head on past the break for a full gallery of the HP Veer.

ON SEMICONDUCTOR NVIDIA NUANCE COMMUNICATIONS