Thursday, January 22, 2009

BlackBerry Storm

By Matt Ryan

The BlackBerry Storm is the most recent introduction - to the smart phone market - by BlackBerry. This is their first ever phone with a touch screen! As a matter-of-fact, it is a full screen smart phone, meaning the keyboard is accessible only on the LCD display. The BlackBerry Storm offers a multitude of application and functions for consumers around the world!

As with any other smart phone, the Storm has a wide variety of features, already available upon shipment. Some of these features are a 3.2 megapixel camera, built-in GPS, media player, video recording, email, organizer, phone, browser, corporate data access, and SMS / MMS. Upon receiving you new phone, you will also find a travel charger with an assortment of adapters, a USB cable, an 8GB microSD card, a SIM card, a wired headset, a software CD, and user manual inside the box.

BlackBerry OS 4.7 is the brains of the Smartphone. This version, of the operating system, gives users a new and exciting look to their interface. The Storm also comes with DataViz Documents - Standard Edition. This gives users the ability to edit documents right from their phone. However, there is no ability to create new documents without upgrading to Premium Edition.

The BlackBerry Storm is one of the first touch screen phones to utilized SurePress technology. This technology forces users to click on the screen, making for a more realistic experience. For example, when you are typing on the keyboard, you actually have to click in order for the letter to type; this is a much more realistic experience than just tapping your fingertip on the key.

The Storms 3.25-inch TFT LCD 480 x 360 resolution 65,000 color display is one of the most beautifully crisp displays available on a smart phone.

The BlackBerry Storm has an accelerometer, which allows the display to switch from portrait to landscape based on how the phone is being held. Consumers also have the option to adjust backlight settings, font size, and font type. All of which provide users with a personalized experience.

There is no physical keyboard, on this phone, as it is a full touch screen phone. The keyboards are accessed through the display. If you are in portrait mode, you will have access to the SureType board, and if you are in landscape mode, you will use the QWERTY board.

Both keyboards are functional, yet small. The size does make it a bit difficult to type long messages and makes for numerous typos.

Even thought the Storm is a bit wider than the average smart phone, it still fits comfortably in the palm of your hand. It weighs in around 5.5 ounces, making it an average weight.

One of the advantages, to the BlackBerry Storm, is the battery life - with 15 days of standby time and 6 hours of talk time - this smart phone lasts longer than many others do. On the other hand, overall performance, from this unit, has been disappointing. Firmware upgrades have not even been able to fix all of the performance issues.

The BlackBerry Storm is another BlackBerry product and is as good as its name. While there are admitted performance issues, BlackBerry is working on fixing those. If you can overlook a bit of lag time, this is a great phone. Otherwise, wait until the next release. - 16928

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