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Blackberry Storm closes in on the iPhone, but still a long ways to go

Blackberry Storm closes in on the iPhone, but still a long ways to go

The release of the Blackberry Storm is Research in Motion’s entry into the touchscreen phone market. It is also considered by many to be Verizon’s answer to the insanely popular iPhone. The Storm comes extremely close to meeting the iPhone feature-wise but some nagging issues may prevent it from overtaking it completely.

I’ve had the opportunity to play around with the Blackberry Storm to get a feel for the device. My previous Blackberry device was the 8330 Curve which was a fantastic device. The Storm definitely one-ups the Curve with improved features that makes it much more accessible to the casual consumer.

The 3G capability makes browsing on the Web a breeze. It almost feels like I am surfing on the Internet from the wireless connection at home. The only downside is that there is no wifi capability built into the Storm. However, the 3G definitely makes up for the lack of wifi.

From a multimedia and ease-of-use standpoint, the Storm almost goes toe-to-toe with the iPhone. Similarly to the iPhone, the Storm has the capability to run apps, play music and video. However, the unique clicking touchscreen does take some time to getting used to.

The touchscreen can detect light touching movements like the iPhone, but the Storm also requires you to press into the screen to execute a command. This behavior is similar to how one would use the mouse to browse around and click to execute on a computer.

The biggest complaint about the Storm is the QWERTY keyboard on the touchscreen. It has a steep learning curve as users will have to learn to type ‘differently.’ Typing on the touchscreen does make it more error prone than typing on the button keyboard when banging out a lengthy email. The Storm’s touchscreen also has difficultly interpreting angles properly. Users should not use their thumbs beyond
the third column of keys from each side.

Without question RIM’s email push technology is legendary compared to what’s out on the market. For those wanting email reliability along with the functionality of the iPhone, the Blackberry Storm is the
answer. However, for those wanting just a multimedia and Web browsing device, the iPhone is still the king.

[Thanks: http://tech.blorge.com]