BlackBerry throws its touchscreen in the ring

A number of new smartphones are coming out in the next while, and the latest is the touchscreen BlackBerry Storm. It’s set to be released around Christmas time through Telus.

Without the new touchscreen option, the BlackBerry potentially faced a decline in popularity since smartphones with touchscreens can do so much more than those without and the consumer doesn’t have to worry about their touchscreen crapping out on them like the roller balls on previous models. The old BlackBerry devices mainly appealed to businesspeople and emailaholics that like to be able to check their e-mail on the fly.

Now the iPhone has set a higher standard for smartphones, and companies that want to release competing products have to think outside of the box a bit. The T-Mobile G1 with Google boasts the Android operating system and a slide-out QWERTY keyboard. Nokia has recently released the Tube, which looks nice, and its main feature is the ability to access millions of songs. The downside is that it only has an 8-GB option, so you wouldn’t be able to fit as many songs as it says you can access. It also supports a handwriting feature and allows you to use a stylus on the touchscreen.

What the BlackBerry Storm is offering is an intuitive touchscreen. That’s a touchscreen that can be pushed down like buttons on a keyboard. This allows easier typing of e-mails and text messages without making as many errors. The Storm looks sleek and stylish but is a bit heavier than other smartphones. It offers fast Internet, GPS, music, and video downloading, a built-in 3.2-megapixel camera. The Storm comes with 1GB of storage out of the box but also offers a microSD/SDHD memory card slot to support up to 16 GB of extra storage. Finally, the Blackberry offers what it is best known for of course, which is its great e-mail capabilities. The contract rates are still unknown but if you go to the Telus Web site you can sign up for updates on when the BlackBerry Storm will be released and how much the rates will be.

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