Palm’s Treo 500 launched in September last year as an exclusive to the Vodafone network, the 500v, and managed to perform reasonably in reviews.  Running Windows Mobile 6 Standard, with tri-band GSM and 3G, Bluetooth 2.0 but no WiFi, it did what has become the usual for Palm of offering a solid choice but failing to set the world alight in any sense.  Well, now Vodafone’s exclusivity has lapsed, and Palm Europe are selling the handset SIM-free for £269 ($526).

The Treo 500 has a relatively compact, 320 x 240 65k colour display, 256MB of memory and a microSD slot to augment it, a 2-megapixel camera and full QWERTY keyboard for messaging and push-email.

Weighing just 120g, I’d wager that several European carriers will be picking it up and so, if that unlocked price still sounds too tall for your liking, wait a while and it’ll probably be available for free with a new contract.

[via Reg Hardware]