The voice of the BlackBerry community.
TELUS has officially launched the BlackBerry Tour 9630 for $229.99 on a three-year contract or $599.99 without a contract. This is the latest World Phone for TELUS users and it’s going to be a nice addition to their BlackBerry line up.
What do you guys think of the price?
Read the BlackBerry Cool review of the BlackBerry Tour 9630 from TELUS.
On 1st April 2009, RIM started the Application Store AppWorld, following the lead of the already extremely successful AppStore Apple brought up about a year ago.
RIM announced the fact that they will start an Application Store at the Developer Conference in Santa Clara in October 2008. Since then a lot of Developers and Consumers were waiting for the day they would launch AppWorld. Finally on the 1st April 2009 it got released – but the name ‘AppWorld’ is already quite misleading: The word ‘World’ is not true since it only launched in UK, Canada and the USA at the beginning. Rumors float around that AppWorld will finally start in some countries of Europe in July 2009.
The fact that RIM has launched AppWorld is pleasant – but it leaks some serious functions. When compared to other on-device Application Stores you find that they are much superior then AppWorld.
Here is a list of functions RIM should include in a new Version of AppWorld:
I know RIM can do that! Let’s hope they bring out a new version with some of these features! RIM normally does a great job with their products. Why did you not work on a perfect version of AppWorld prior launching it?
Steve just posted about the most recent Etisalat update having some strange code but there’s more to this update. UAE customers are upset because apparently this official Etisalat upgrade significantly reduces the battery life of the device.
“The problem came up when they sent a new batch to enhance the performance but instead they have killed all blackberry batteries by activating a process inside the phone which empties the battery in less than an hour if not charged,” complained a frustrated BlackBerry customer in the country who wished to remain anonymous.
“All our company employees who installed this batch file has been affected. They claim they are working on it, and the time frame to send a fix is said to be 7 days,” our source added.
So far, the only solution Etisalat is offering involves some basic battery maintenance. This means powering off your device, fully charging the battery, and powering on the device. In general, you should be draining the battery fully and charging fully at least once per month. There’s no word yet if another upgrade will be issued to solve the battery drainage.
[Via]
Etisalat, the carrier responsible for bringing the BlackBerry solution to the United Arab Emirates, released a very suspect official update. A member on the official support forums did some detective work, and found some suspicious code in the update. According to the user:
“Blackberry subscribers for Etisalat (one of the official service providers in the UAE) received a WAP Push to download a JAR named “registration”
The description of the “update” was as follows:
“Etisalat network upgrade for Blackberry service. Please download to ensure continuous service quality.”
I called the operator’s hotline inquiring about the update, and they confirmed it’s an “official” update that’s meant to enhance network stability which users experienced last few weeks, causing email and BBM delays. But anyone with two functional braincells would imagine such an update/fix would be done at the network side, rather than with an obscure piece of code pushed to client handsets as a WAP Push, rather than a service book.
Out of curiosity, I downloaded, unpacked and decoded the file, and can’t help but feel something is fishy here.
Following is a list of the class files within registration.jar:
/Interceptor.class
/Registration.cod
/Registration.csl
/Registration.cso
/META-INF/MANIFEST.MF
/com/ss8/interceptor/app/Commands.class
/com/ss8/interceptor/app/Transmit.class
/com/ss8/interceptor/app/MsgOut.class
/com/ss8/interceptor/app/Log.class
/com/ss8/interceptor/app/Main$1.class
/com/ss8/interceptor/app/StatusChange.class
/com/ss8/interceptor/app/Send.class
/com/ss8/interceptor/app/Main.class
/com/ss8/interceptor/app/Recv.class
/com/ss8/interceptor/app/Constants.class
/com/ss8/interceptor/tcp/smtp/SMTPHeader.class
/com/ss8/interceptor/tcp/smtp/SMTP.class
com/ss8/interceptor/tcp/HTTPDeliver.class
com/ss8/interceptor/tcp/SocketBase.class
I put up the original JAD/JAR/COD File along with the unpacked classes and decoded ones in one zip file at http://iihs.net/registration.zip and attached it here for those interested in having a look.
There are interesting references in the software to alternate APN, as well as some BB PINs to relay certain messages through. The whole thing seems VERY fishy.
Any JAVA Developers out there willing to take a look as well and help me make sense out of this?”
The T-Mobile BlackBerry Gemini 8520 is slated as a low-end BlackBerry Curve, and it will definitely suit the intended market. While Power Users are going to yawn, early Pearl owners are going to want to upgrade to this device, especially because we’ve heard it’s going to come in some beautiful colors.
Before reading this review, as usual it’s not a commercially available device and therefore may not be the device you pick up from T-Mobile.
The 85xx Series Devices
The BlackBerry 8520 is a new-generation Curve and while the xx20 is the only device in the series so far, it surely won’t be the last. In the coming months (year), we can expect a rollout similar to that of other BlackBerry devices. The BlackBerry 8510 will have GPS and the 8530 will be CDMA.
About the OS
The 8520 that I’m using is running OS 4.6.1.227, which seems to be the consensus around other sites who have got their hands on the device. While OS 4.6.1 is decent, it isn’t the OS 5 that we’ve all been waiting to use. Because this is a pre-release device, it could possibly ship with OS 5, which would be a dream come true.
Click through to continue reading a review of the BlackBerry Gemini 8520
This video isn’t the most definitive comparison of the speakers on the most recent BlackBerry devices, but it does give you an idea of the subtle differences between them.
The Bold seems to have the best sound, while the 8900 seemed the loudest. The Storm seemed to be very treble-intensive, but it is a YouTube video which tends to distort sound considerably.
The Tour’s speakers gave the music a deeper, more bass-heavy sound, comparable to that of the Bold. Overall, I would give the Bold the best rating, with the Tour a close second. After that the 8900 and then the Storm.
What do you think?
[Via BerryReview]
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