PALM HAS finally took the virtual wrapping off its Centro smartphone, displaying the gizmo at the Digital Life expo in New York. However, Palmists on this side of the pond won’t be able to get their hands on it yet.

The Palm OS-based Centro looks like a slightly wider version of a standard mobile phone but crams in a QWERTY keyboard, large screen, media player and push email support. However, there’s no Wi-Fi. If it has a killer feature it’s the price -- $99 in the US, meaning that it will be given away with cornflakes over here. Not literally, obviously.

As the price suggests, Palm is gunning for ordinary folk who might want to try this new smartphone thing after having stuck with standard cellphones for the last several years.

But if you’re British, tight, have a hankering for devices in black or scarlet cases, and are ready to get a new smartphone, wait just a cotton-picking moment. Palm’s UK PR tells us that there is no news on when the Centro will be available over here, although it will come at “some time in the future”.

The Centro doesn’t appear to do much to overturn the view that Palm is yesterday’s company but at least it has stopped everybody talking about the Foleo. Analysts liked it anyway, and shares spiked over six per cent on the announcement. µ