The HP Veer is the first entry to come out of the partnership between Hewlett Packard and Palm, the creators of the webOS platform that powered the Palm Pre and Pre 2. Though the Veer is tiny, with a 2.6-inch screen, it's a fully featured smartphone. It has a physical QWERTY keyboard, it can download apps, and it can handle e-mails, messaging, and calendars.

While webOS remains a promising platform with many desirable features, we ultimately found that the Veer, both in terms of physique and power, is not sufficient for anyone performing more than very light and infrequent tasks on their smartphones. The inclusion of a physical keyboard makes the phone decent for messaging (though its keys are quite small) but the size of the screen and the underpowered processor can make moderate to heavy use a chore. The Veer is targeted at those who want latitude in the capabilities of their communication device, but have only a light reliance on the various functions a smartphone can perform.

A tinier smartphone than usual

The Veer has a rubberized exterior everywhere that isn't the screen, with a shiny plated volume rocker on the left and silent switch and sleep button on the top right corner. The placement of the switches is a little awkward and feels backwards—for instance, the sleep button should be along the top, since that's closer to the natural reach of an index finger when holding the phone with one hand.

The phone has media applications, but no built-in headphone jack. Instead, the Veer has a proprietary magnetic power port that can also function as a connector for an additional headphone jack dongle. The magnetic port's hold is firm, but the dongle couldn't be relied on to stay attached in a tight pants pocket. The dongle also only fits onto the phone with the port pointing downward.







The choice of a proprietary port over some variety of USB is definitely a weird one. The HP Pre 3 is projected to have a microUSB connector, so this isn't a move to revert to proprietary ports. More likely, this was an effort to save space.

A SIM slot is at the top of the phone and can be pried open with a fingernail, but the phone has no expandable storage whatsoever. This is a shame, since the Veer's listed storage capacity is a mere 8GB, cut down to a usable capacity of 6.1GB by the installed webOS operating system.







The phone slides open to reveals a tiny, backlit QWERTY keyboard with soft, slightly rubbery buttons. The sliding action feels very solid, though since the two sliding halves of the phone are very thin, only good way to do it is to push the screen up with a thumb. The capacitive screen isn't the greatest interpreter of a sloppy gesture, though, so doing this will jostle whatever is on the screen a bit.

The Veer's keys feel very tiny, but don't require much pressure. We suspect that with some deliberate practice it would be possible to type quickly and accurately with the pads of our thumbs. Still, we had an overwhelming urge to abandon practice of this good form and just use the very tips of our fingers, even though this forces you to crook your thumbs uncomfortably.

Because the keys are so small and packed close together, it's easy to hit multiple keys at once or the wrong one entirely. The phone is not very well-balanced when open, and this also makes typing a little awkward.