We weren’t expecting it until tomorrow, but the BlackBerry Curve 8900 has been listed on AT&T’s website as available to buy. Priced at $199.99 following a $100 mail-in rebate, the phone has a full QWERTY keyboard, EDGE data connection and WiFi.
His co-CEO at RIM, Mike Lazaridis, may have described the company’s BlackBerry smartphones as “netbooks … just smaller“, but according to Jim Balsillie we shouldn’t expect to see anything more traditionally netbook-shaped bearing the BlackBerry logo. While industry rivals such as Nokia are tipped to be looking to netbooks as the next wave of cellular-enabled devices, Balsillie says RIM are focusing on devices “you can hold up to your ear and clip onto your belt.”
The BlackBerry Tour 9630 has made an appearance in Verizon’s internal inventory systems, although according to the tipster the smartphones themselves are not yet in stock. Expected to go on sale as of July 13th, the BlackBerry Tour is believed to sit underneath the BlackBerry Bold in terms of range position, with a price tag of $199 with a two-year contract
As for specifications, RIM are yet to make anything official but the Tour 9630 is believed to be a cross between their Curve and Bold handsets. It will have EVDO Rev.A connectivity, together with quadband GSM for global roaming, a 480 x 320 display and a 3.2-megapixel camera with video recording capabilities.
Another day, another phone roundup, so let’s dive right into it, shall we? First up, is the latest in the land of the iPhone. It seems a new rumor is floating around about an iPhone with a unibody and one with nano-like color options, which we’re pretty excited about if it turns out to be true at WWDC09 this year.
Live images of an upcoming BlackBerry smartphone have leaked, believed to be the BlackBerry Onyx first tipped back in April. Full specifications for the handset are unknown, but it’s believed to be a 3G device which will slot into AT&T’s line-up.
RIM are preparing a number of new Bluetooth accessories, including a new headset codenamed “Alpha 1″, an in-car handsfree kit and, possibly, a Bluetooth watch and video-capable remote gateway. BlackBerry accessories VP Antoine Boucher sat down with the BGR at WES to discuss his department’s latest wares, and they couldn’t help but notice that he was wearing a Sony Ericsson Bluetooth watch; after some prompting, Boucher admitted that his team had modified the timepiece to display BlackBerry alerts.
These included alerts when new emails, BlackBerry Messenger messages, texts, IMs, tweets and Facebook messages are received. When pressed on whether RIM was developing their own Bluetooth watch, the VP would only say that his team “are exploring many accessories that would surprise people.”
It seems like every new smartphone has a big leak these days and the BlackBerry Tour from RIM is no different. In fact Kevin Byrne, an insider from Verizon, told The Boy Genius Report that this smartphone will be launching on July 13th.
We first heard about the PrimeTime2Go mobile TV service back at CTIA, but now you can officially sign up from Quickplay. The service works on BlackBerry smartphones (except the Storm) and offers access to all sorts of TV shows across numerous networks.
Some of the channels you can access include NBC, ABC and SciFi. The subscription provides for unlimited access to TV shows and works by downloading the episodes you choose in the background while you’re connected via Wi-Fi. Simple as that.
Another option is to select to receive new episodes as soon as their released, so you don’t even have to seek out the new material–it comes to you. The service costs $8 a month and is available through BlackBerry App World now.
According to Jim Balsillie, co-chief of Research in Motion, more BlackBerry devices that feature touchscreens are on the way in the near future. In fact, the newer phones are set to be very much like the BlackBerry Storm–a second version of the BlackBerry Storm (which we tipped as the BlackBerry Storm 2) seems imminent–and feature next-gen tech.
Well, it looks like AT&T is the next carrier in line to get their hands on the BlackBerry Curve 8900. This latest offering will be a serious update from the 8300 model with improved specs and performance expected.
T-Mobile and Rogers already have the latest Curve, which features a 3.2-megapixel camera, Wi-Fi, GPS and a 480 x 360 display. It also has the newest BlackBerry operating system. The AT&T version of the BlackBerry 8900 will be a tad different, however.
Specifically, it won’t feature Unlicensed Mobile Access (UMA) support for VoIP. However, it will have AT&T Navigator, XM Radio Mobile and Yellow Pages. We don’t know how much the phone will cost on AT&T, but they are likely to keep it competitive with T-Mobile, which is currently priced at $149.99 with a two-year contract. The release date is also unknown, though expected to fall within the early summer months.
JP
