There are reports all around that the BIS is down across North America. Personally, I never notice these things when they happen because I’m on a BES, but I feel for everyone affected. The outages are reported with AT&T, Verizon, and T-Mobile. Again, there are so many reasons why the BIS might be down that it’s impossible to speculate, but if multiple carriers are affected, it’s probably a node somewhere in RIM’s network.
Are you experiencing an outage? Where are you and who is your network provider?
BlackBerry Cool readers are very familiar with the application Beyon160. It allows you to use more than the 160 character limit, imposed on BlackBerry users by Verizon, Sprint, Alltel, U.S. Cellular, Bell, Telus, and all other CDMA carriers.
ED NOTE: Apologies, you actually do need a monthly plan for a netbook. I figured you could get WiFi on the device and avoid the data plan but that’s not the case.
In our first series of posts comparing the BlackBerry Storm 2 (Storm2) and the Storm 9530, we’re going to compare the relative typing experience.
I have been using a BlackBerry Storm for some time now, and while the typing experience is incredibly slow compared to something like the Bold, it’s not a fair comparison. A more fair comparison would be with the other touchscreen devices on the market.
Today is the first day of owning a BlackBerry Storm 2 and as with every BlackBerry, you can get apps preloaded, from App World, and from third party stores such as ours.
In general, carriers do a fairly bad job at preloading your device with applications that are useful. Alternatively, there are a ton of great apps in App World and elsewhere that anyone can download. So let’s take a look at the state of the apps for the Storm2 at launch. Click through to see what is available for the Storm2
Former BlackBerry Cool EIC Douglas Soltys sat down with BlackBerry Storm2 Product Manager Yasser Mirza, to talk about the device and what went into it.
It must have been a nerve racking experience to be the manager in charge of developing the follow-up to the Storm 1. Even though many users liked the device, it got some really bad Internet mojo and RIM really needed a good followup.
My favorite part of the interview is where Yasser talks about how fast he can type on his Storm2. “I can actually type faster than a QWERTY keypad BlackBerry smartphone. No joke! I’ve clocked in typing “the quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog” at 10 seconds, which is 60wpm.” Apparently RIM employees are always doing speed trials.
I have to say, Verizon made my day/weekend with their official BlackBerry Storm 9530 OS 5.0.0.328 update. While I am not using the latest OS build on a Verizon 9530 (actually TELUS), installing it on any 9530 is very easy.
Just before the BlackBerry Storm 9530 was officially launched, Verizon rolled out the official OS 5.0.0.328 for all their Storm users.
The software is a much needed upgrade for 9530 users and it will be great to see it launched across all devices, not just the Storm 2, 9530 and 9700. RIM has officially committed to launching OS 5 other devices (likely only ones launched with 4.7+), before 2010.
Verizon has finally announced the BlackBerry Storm 2. The device will be available beginning October 28th, and it will run you $179.99 after a $100 mail-in rebate and a 2 year contract.
The BlackBerry Storm2 was rumored to be promoted with a Buy One Get One Free campaign but there is no mention of this in the press release. It’s possible that whoever put the marketing materials for the campaign, confused the 9550 and the 9530.
There are a couple of reasons why this launch may have been delayed. The BlackBerry Storm2 is rumored to have not passed technical acceptance at Verizon, as well as they have just released OS 5.0 for the Storm 9530 users. This means all Storm users, old and new, will at least be running the latest software.
