Few smartphones in recent memory have had as contentious a launch as the BlackBerry Storm. As you can see from just a few of the reviews, some have called the Storm “the best BlackBerry yet” while others have gone as far as saying it’s the “BlackBerry dud”.
With so many critics butting heads over the issue, it’s high time we stepped into the ring. While we can’t say much on the initial launch, RIM and carriers have had the time to squash bugs and really bring to bear the smartphone they were intending. The holiday season is the moment of truth for many companies, and RIM is no exception; despite a rocky start, they could avoid future returns and promote positive word of mouth if those Christmas presents really deliver a smooth, practical and enjoyable BlackBerry experience. On the other hand, if the trend of frustration continues, RIM’s risky foray into the touchscreen format could backfire dramatically. Some might argue that it already has.
Let’s get one thing straight: it’s still a BlackBerry. iPhone users will scoff at the Storm’s browser, diehard BlackBerry users will guffaw at anything without a physical keyboard, but at the end of the day, you still have essentially the same OS, layout, and functionality. The sole hurdle with the BlackBerry Storm is the form factor, and that alone makes nailing down a target audience very tricky.
Is it for coporate-types disgruntled that their stuffy IT department won’t let them use an iPhone? Is it for iPhone expatriates who got tired of the light saber and boob-jiggling apps which characterized their platform of choice? Is it for the undecided who have been reduced to lugging around both an iPhone and a BlackBerry, thus keeping business and pleasure distinctly (and inefficiently) separate? Maybe it’s unfair to even be comparing it to the iPhone - after all, Windows Mobile has been rocking touchscreens for way longer, and RIM could just be catching up. One way or the other, anyone who has used a BlackBerry before will easily make the transition to the Storm, while others might have a little bit more difficulty adapting to this newfangled clicking SurePress touchscreen and learning the BlackBerry operating system at the same time.
If you were considering transplanting to The Motherland in order to get a hold of the gorgeous WiMAX-enabled HTC MAX 4G, be warned, coverage may be an issue. Obviously WiMAX technology is still in its infancy, even over in the United States where Sprint (NYSE: S)’s XOHM is still gathering momentum. Still, it’s a worthy evolution of the Touch HD with a stunning 3.8 inch, 800×480 WVGA screen, GPS, Wi-Fi, TouchFLO 3D, and a 528 MHz processor. It’s a shame that the networks aren’t quite up to snuff yet, but maybe such awesome hardware will give carriers outside of Russia the impetus to get a move-on.
The promise of a streaming, wireless music discovery service on BlackBerry (NSDQ: RIMM) sounds nearly too good to be true. The platform isn’t exactly renown for its multimedia flashiness (although it’s no slouch), so when nuTsie released its BlackBerry application about a year ago, I was extremely intrigued. This was something I would expect from Windows Mobile, or even on the iPhone if Apple (NSDQ: AAPL) ever felt like expanding iTunes, expecially considering nuTsie worked so closely with iTunes to bring your playlists to your phone as well as play nuTsie picks in your iTunes.
The social element is really what caught my eye about nuTsie - a simple slider determined how much of your music was generated as suggestions, a Grab It button let you easily save new stuff for later, a wide variety of Top 100 lists helped you get your groove on in any genre right off the bat, and playlist sharing allowed you to see what your friends were listening to. Overall an impressive web service, but I really wanted to see how it translated to mobile.
Check out our full-on review of nuTsie for BlackBerry after the jump!
The world’s first GSM/WiMAX handset was launched not too long ago for use exclusively on Russia’s Scartel-owned Yota WiMAX network. The HTC MAX 4G sports GSM/EDGE and WiMAX hardware on top of the WiFi radio to ensure high-speed wireless connectivity, backing it all up with a beautiful 3.8-inch WVGA (480×800) touchscreen display, 8GB of onboard storage, microSD card slot, GPS, and Bluetooth.
Unfortunately for WiMAX fans with a hankering for a handset with clean lines and a touchscreen UI, the HTC MAX 4G is only available in Russia for use on the Yota GSM and WiMAX networks. Good thing for us, Thoughts and Technology imported a unit into Malaysia and has posted a thorough review on the world’s first GSM/WiMAX handset.
Despite being language-locked to Russian, the HTC MAX 4G was praised as being something of a “beefed up HTC [Touch] Diamond.” With the HTC TouchFLO 3D interface covering up all of Windows Mobile 6.1 Professional’s downfalls, it makes sense that the MAX 4G resembles the Touch Diamond. And, the soft-touch rubber finish makes the handset a joy to use and hold.
In concluding the review, Thoughts and Technology states:
The phone is a little large for most people’s preference, but the big screen certainly is better than the tiny Diamond. But this device certainly sets a benchmark for all WiMAX devices to come.
Now, if only HTC could see it in their hearts to release the HTC MAX 4G with US-compatible frequency support.
Has it really been two years since Meizu announced their iPhone clone? If any other mobile phone manufacturer had taken two years to go from product announcement to actual product launch, we’d have written them off as a non-player in a mobile space that’s becoming fast saturated with touchscreen smartphone options. But, lucky for the infamous iPhone copy-cats at Meizu, we’re still intrigued by the Chinese-made Meizu M8.
The Meizu M8 has been reviewed by IT168.com and they’ve apparently come away impressed. The Meizu M8 sports a strong feature set and even boasts a finger-friendly user interface that does a good job of covering up the handset’s Windows CE roots. Add to that a high-resolution 3.4-inch touchscreen (480 x 720), a decent 3 megapixel camera, removable battery, and an iPhone-inspired piano-black casing, and the Meizu M8 starts to sound like a capable yet sleek smartphone.
RIM’s first touchscreen BlackBerry (NSDQ: RIMM) is proving to be one heck of a media-darling, the likes of which the iPhone would be proud. Some shower the BlackBerry Storm with praise, while others belittle the BlackBerry’s SurePress click-able touchscreen. Needless to say, it’s been a stormy ride (excuse the pun) for the Storm.
The latest pundit to sound off on the polarizing BlackBerry Storm is the New York Times‘ David Pogue. His take on the Storm? Disappointing, at best. A downright failure, at worst.
Pogue highlights his frustrations with RIM’s seemingly unpolished touch-based BlackBerry interface. He says the SurePress touchscreen, while innovative (and definitely interesting), is more awkward than intuitive. If you don’t know, the SurePress touchscreen uses light finger touches to scroll, zoom, and highlight keyboard keys. A harder press on the touchscreen yields a tactile click that registers a keypress. But, rather than exploit the touchscreen’s two-stage touch input setup, the SurePress touchscreen seems tailored for keyboard use only.
Mr. Pogue accuses RIM of over-extending themselves with multiple headlining handset launches over a few short months, leaving the company with fewer resources that might have more fully developed the Storm’s touch interface. Using a virtual keyboard opened up the possibility for the Storm’s keyboard to be more flexible than a physical keyboard - serving up all kinds of characters and “hot keys” like “.com” or the “@” symbol.
Continuing his Storm bashing, Pogue cites major bugs with the touch-based BlackBerry OS. Storm-plaguing bugs range from issues like the camera application spontaneously starting up in the middle of an email to excruciatingly long screen rotations and application launches.
Perhaps Pogue’s stance on the BlackBerry Storm can be summed up with his statement:
“I haven’t found a soul who tried this machine who wasn’t appalled, baffled or both.”
Agree? Disagree? Sound off in the comments section!
Ah yes. The hotly anticipated Sony Ericsson (NYSE: SNE) XPERIA X1 is just a few days away, and we’ve got the down-low on the unreleased goods.
Sony Ericsson is launching their new flagship smartphone brand with the XPERIA X1. The Sony Ericsson XPERIA brand is the creme de la creme of the handset maker’s smartphone, and XPERIA X1 is the inaugural flagship handset.
The Sony Ericsson XPERIA X1 uses the Swedish-Japanese company’s new Panel UI to mask its Windows Mobile downfalls. Each Sony Ericsson “Panel” represents a customizable homescreen that can be configured to show various personal data (email, calendar, etc.) as well as application shortcuts. Different homescreens serve different functions. At work, you’ll want to use a work-oriented homescreen - email, calendar, contacts, etc. For play, a more casual homescreen might be appropriate - applications, music, games, etc. Hitting the gym? Fire up the media Panel - you get the picture.
But, the new Sony Ericsson Panel UI isn’t all there is to the XPERIA X1. With integrated GPS, WiFi, 3G data connection, and a 3.2 megapixel camera, the XPERIA X1 is chock full of the latest smartphone features that you’d expect from a high-end smartphone. And, the slide-out QWERTY keyboard ensures that this touchscreen smartphone isn’t limited to just touch-inputs.
I also had my hands on a C905 the other day for five minutes, and below you can also find out what I thought of it. The point of these comments are to give you a flavour of what might enamour or disappoint you if were to have same time to play with the device – and thus get a view on whether it’s buy-worthy!
build quality – superb – I am impressed. Only reservation is on the slide mechanism for the camera, as these have a history of opening in peoples pockets, and draining the battery!
key layout – very good indeed – good response too
slide mechanism – clunky, in a very good way
User interface – not really changed at all from K800i – nice, but you could argue needs an update
Camera – simply stunning!
option-finding complexity – very high – lots of layers of menus again
Speed – quick to use, nice
media handling – this is an odd one – images are excellent, videos are really not good at all!!
So in summary, would I buy one? The major problem I have with this device is that the UI really isn’t evolved much, if any, from the three year old K800i. Come on SE, you have to keep wowing us, sitting on laurels does not make me buy a phone! But but but, the camera is back to being a revelation. I suspect a proper 8MP camera would take better pics, but the pics on here are still VERY good!
Overall rating: positive – I like!
Grade: A- (a few tweaks and it would be an A or A+!)
Well look what the delivery man dropped off today. HTC’s flagship QWERTY smartphone is now available as the Sprint HTC Touch Pro, and we’ve got hands on the goods.
HTC has given Sprint (NYSE: S) first-dibs on the branded HTC Touch Pro, allowing Sprint to offer their customers the best that HTC has to offer in the Windows Mobile-powered QWERTY smartphone. The Sprint Touch Pro takes the Sprint Touch Diamond (a re-branded HTC Touch Diamond) to a whole new level by slapping on a slide-out QWERTY keyboard to the back of the full-VGA touchscreen display. RAM and ROM are upgraded from the Touch Diamond, as is the 3.2 megapixel camera that now sports a “flashlight.”
The microSD card slot is a little hard to get at, and requires the removal of the battery cover. But, despite their many similarities, the Sprint Touch Pro does indeed feel like a completely different animal from the HTC Touch Diamond. The addition of the slide-out QWERTY keyboard (with the slickest slide-mechanism on the market that gives off a satisfying “snick” as it opens) gives the handset an entirely different experience - surfing the web with the simple knowledge that a full keyboard is ready at your beck and call changes the experience altogether. The VGA touchscreen even feels more responsive and less “squishy.”
Does the QWERTY keyboard make that much of a difference? We’ll see…
Full review to follow, for now enjoy the unboxing pics!
The T-Mobile G1 is made by HTC. We’ve been closely following HTC’s rise to fame as the premier Windows Mobile smartphone manufacturer on the planet. HTC makes some seriously high-quality hardware that never fails to impress us - with solid build quality and a penchant for the high-tech, HTC devices deliver on sensory and practical aspects. As such, we expected the HTC-made T-Mobile G1 to be a robust handset packed with the latest mobile technology.
Did the T-Mobile G1 live up to the high standards that we’ve set for HTC smartphones?
The promise of a streaming, wireless music discovery service on BlackBerry (
RIM’s first touchscreen BlackBerry (
Ah yes. The hotly anticipated Sony Ericsson (
