BlackBerry Thunder With Touchscreen

The Wall Street Journal, for all intents and purposes, is a pretty respectable publication so when they speak out about something, everyone is bound to turn their ears towards them.

We’ve heard a few inklings about the first touchscreen phone to come out of the Research in Motion camp, but we have yet to hear anything about a firm launch date surrounding the upcoming BlackBerry Thunder. The crew at the WSJ, however, seem to have unearthed a very juicy detail.

It turns out that the BlackBerry Thunder 9500, which will target the more business-minded in the iPhone market, is set to launch with Verizon Wireless in the United States some time in the third quarter of this year. This means that we will be unleashing the Thunder unto the masses by September at the latest. This is right around the same time that we expect to see the BlackBerry Bold 9000 as well.

The pre-September launch date isn’t quite as soon as the predicted June unveiling of the 3G iPhone, but it looks like Research in Motion is pretty serious about snatching up even more market share beyond “just” the corporate environment.

via: wsj.com

RIM BlackBerry Pearl Flip 8820

RIM has introduced its first clamshell BlackBerry, the Pearl Flip 8820 smartphone...and it's decidedly aimed at consumers.

Canada's Research in Motion has formally introduced its BlackBerry Peal Flip 8820 smartphone, a new addition to its popular BlackBerry line that leaves the stodgy confines of corporate connectivity behind and pushes the company further into making smartphones for everyday people.

"The popularity of BlackBerry smartphones has grown tremendously around the world and the introduction of this exciting new flip phone will help extend the reach of the BlackBerry platform even further," said RIM's president and CEO Mike Lazaridis, in a statement. "The BlackBerry Pearl Flip is a full-featured smartphone with a unique and friendly design and it is a natural choice for flip phone users who want to start doing more with their phone than just talk."

The quad-band EDGE-based Pearl Flip 8820 offers two high resolution displays—320 by 240 on the inside and a smaller display on the outside for status messages and utilities—along with a video-capable 2 megapixel camera, microSD storage, Wi-Fi and USB connectivity, and a "large" QWERTY keyboard for users' messaging needs. And, in a bid to make the Pearl Flip even more appealing to consumers, RIM is playing up the phone's multimedia capabilities, including video playback on the internal display (turn the phone sideways and it switches to landscape mode) and direct management of music playlists on the handset itself.

And, of course, the BlackBerry Flip features all of RIM's much-touted communications suite into its case, including email, messaging, an organizer (with calendar, contacts, and to-do list), an integrated Wb browser, and RTSP support for watching streaming video from things like YouTube's mobile site.

RIM didn't announce any carrier partners or pricing for the BlackBerry Pearl Flip, but promises the phone will be available around the world "this fall." In the United States, reports have T-Mobile landing an exclusive deal to launch the BlackBerry Pearl Flip.

via: Digital Point