The mid-October ballpark release for the Verizon BlackBerry Thunder has been narrowed down to the 8th., but as with any rumour, take it with a grain of salt… What’s true now might not be in two months. The same sources are also claiming that the Thunder will be packing a 3.2 megapixel camera and over-the-air Rhapsody downloads. We had heard about carrier music stores integrated with the BlackBerry 9500’s music player, and now we’ve got a name to look forward to. Rhapsody is pretty popular, second to iTunes and maybe Amazon… how many more online music outlets will plug into the BlackBerry Thunder? As for the camera, I expressed plenty of concern about its quality in last week’s podcast, so colour me relieved.
What would you pay to have the inside and outside of your device coated in a nonconductive polymer to make it impervious to water, oil, dirt and pretty much any other synthetic liquids? $50-$75? Yeah that sounds about right. Meet the Golden Shellback. While it might not be ready for another 4-6 months until distribution methods are in place, I am rip-rearing to give this a shot. Go figure a bunch of maritimers sponsored a project like this - totally awesome, and combined with an OtterBox, it could easily turn your BlackBerry into one helluva rugged handheld.
The aptly-named Cram launched recently, offering customizable, shareable tests on your BlackBerry. Cram allows for students to keep on studying on the go, even when feverishly going over last-minute notes outside the exam room. Studying on your BlackBerry would be especially handy for the bus, when having a bunch of books out isn’t exactly practical. Cram can import text files which are then translated into multiple choice or fill-in-the-blank tests, and using some web functions those tests can be easily shared with fellow crammers. For the BlackBerry-packing academic, Cram would pair up nicely with StudentDocket (previously known as StudentBerry).
Pink BlackBerrys have been increasingly popular these days, but we haven’t seen much of the elusive Sunset colour. Well, here’s a live shot of the T-Mobile BlackBerry 8320 packing the newest paint job, and it’s pretty dashing. Not quite as somber a sanguine as AT&T’s crimson Curve. If the BlackBerry Bold is a bit too rich for your blood, keep your eye out for this beauty on August 4th.
While Austria usually tends to get stuff shortly after Germany, it looks like they’ll be getting it right on time with everyone else when it comes to the BlackBerry Bold. A1 will shortly be offering the BlackBerry 9000 for € 249,00 ($US 399), presumably with a contract considering the T-Mobile Germany price was clocking in at €550 ($US 880). T-Mobile will also be offering the BlackBerry Bold in Austra, if this Ebay auction is any indication. While we’ve heard about a lot of the larger countries (Australia, Canada, United States, Germany, etc.) getting the BlackBerry Bold lovin’, it’s good to see that the launch is reaching as far and wide as possible.
The Bold hype is truly coming to a boil, what with launch parties, enterprise offers, rumored release dates, and now that Tiger Direct is offering the BlackBerry 9000 for preorder with a reasonably chunky $649.99 pricetag. Unlocked and unbranded, of course, so the price isn’t exactly uncalled for. The real downer here is that Tiger Direct’s ETA for the BlackBerry Bold is September. Aw, c’mon. Hopefully carriers will have better luck offering it sooner, but Tiger Direct is a solid option for folks who haven’t heard anything about a release in their area.
Both Telstra and Vodafone will be offering the BlackBerry Bold to Australian enterprise customers for $0 up front. That in and of itself is a bold statement, and definitely a bargain for enterprises still packing older models. It’ll be hard for CIOs to turn down a deal like that, regardless of any growing enterprise interest in the iPhone. Maybe companies here in North America and elsewhere can look forward to equally aggressive moves from carriers, especially if they think they can coast on plans alone.
One of the bigger upgrades with the BlackBerry Bold is the browsing experience, which you can see clearly in this video from Boy Genius. You get a look at the general rendering capability of OS 4.6, as well as speed differences between EDGE and Wi-Fi. I’d be curious to see how 3G compares… On the whole this is a much needed update - the poor BlackBerry browser has been a point of contention for plenty of users for a good long time. You guys happy to see the problem fixed? What’s the next biggest issue RIM needs to tackle?
Not one to be taken out back just yet, the BlackBerry 8700 can now get in on all of the OS 4.5 fun that the Curve, Pearl and 8800 have recently received. The guts didn’t change too much from the BlackBerry 8700 to the BlackBerry 8100, so you’ll likely see them both supported until they’re kicked to the curb. Do you guys think the 8700 will make the OS 4.6 cut? 4.7? You can grab the latest handheld software for the BlackBerry 8700 from Orange Romania here. They’ve also got the software for a bunch of other devices if you haven’t upgraded yet.
Opera’s monthly report for June took a look at the popular handsets that folks are using with their mobile browser all around the world and BlackBerry got all kinds of gold stars – being one of the top most popular handsets to feature Opera. Commenter mikedoan said:
“…Do the results that you speak of really point to the BB’s popularity as a handset or is it just another indication/reinforcement of the fact that most BB user’s receive a substandard browsing experience (using the native BB Browser).“
That leaves us to wonder about all the other stuff that has been left out of the BlackBerry experience, like, say, HTML e-mail viewing and how much of an opportunity stuff like that presents for BlackBerry developers. Are third-party developers just being clever in finding the gaps they can fill, or is RIM just doing a poor job of loading up BlackBerrys with all the functionality they have? What are your baseline expectations for a smartphone, and is RIM meeting them? How much does RIM depend on developers to pick up where they left off? Give us your take on what the BlackBerry has to offer and where software developers fit and win five device skins from Decalgirl and six months of service from SugarSync.
Not one to be taken out back just yet, the BlackBerry 8700 can now get in on all of the OS 4.5 fun that the Curve, Pearl and 8800 have recently received. The guts didn’t change too much from the BlackBerry 8700 to the BlackBerry 8100, so you’ll likely see them both supported until they’re kicked to the curb. Do you guys think the 8700 will make the OS 4.6 cut? 4.7? You can grab the latest 
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