According to Bloomberg, the first stores in the US to open their doors to customers looking for the new Palm Pre sold out within a couple of hours, and are already taking names for a waiting list.

It was a bold and potentially disastrous move on Palm's behalf to cross swords with Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference over the Pre's launch, which could yet find itself in the shadow of a new iPhone model. But initial reports are very encouraging for Palm's rebirth.

The sales began early last Friday night, when carrier Sprint held Palm parties (that's probably not what you think it is), with drinks, appetisers and the first opportunity for tech-heads to pick up a Pre.

More deliveries are expected this week, however, so there's no immediate launch sell out problem, and analysts are predicting the weekend's sales to be in the region of 100,000 units.

And despite the fierce competition between Apple and Palm this week, the manager of the Sprint store in San Francisco, Daniel Chan, told Bloomberg that "about half the people who bought the Pre already owned an iPhone".

Perhaps the two will exist happily side by side? Our trousers have two pockets, after all.