The Blackberry P9981 by Porsche Design officially unveiled

At a special event held in Dubai, Blackberry with cooperation with Porsche Design unveiled the Blackberry Porsche Design P9981. It's essentially a Bold Touch 9900, but with special treatment from the folks at Porsche Design.

As you can notice, although it's based on the Blackberry Bold Touch 9900 it has gone through a major design overhaul. The whole phone is made of stainless steel, while the back tickles your hands with the special leather it's wrapped in.

Although it's based on the BlackBerry Bold 9900, it sports an underclocked 1GHz QC8655 processor, 1GB of RAM and 8GB of internal storage. At the back we find a 5MP snapper, capable of shooting 720p HD videos.

Naturally, the P9981 runs BlackBerry OS 7, but has gone through special Porsche Design treatment and as a result features special fonts and customized icons.

Like it? Then expect it to hit Porsche Design stores by the end of the year for the colossal $2,000.

Source | Via

BlackBerry Porsche Design P'9981 luxury smartphone announced by RIM

Research in Motion and Porsche have officially unveiled the BlackBerry Porsche Design P'9981, a new luxury smartphone that was first seen a few months ago.

The Porsche Design P'9981 runs BlackBerry OS 7 with an "exclusive Porsche Design UI", and is 11.3mm thin. It's build from a forged stainless steel frame, and has a "sculpted QWERTY keyboard", in addition to a hand-wrapped leather back cover.

Other features include a 2.8 inch VGA touchscreen display, HSDPA, NFC, Wi-Fi, GPS, Wikitude World Browser augmented reality app, 5MP rear camera with 720p video recording, 768MB of RAM, 1.2GHz single-core processor, 8GB of internal memory, and "exclusive PINs that help easily identify another P'9981 smartphone user."

The BlackBerry Porsche Design P'9981 will be available in Porsche Design stores around the world sometime later this year. There's no word on the smartphone's price yet.

It isn't the first time Porsche ventures into the mobile phone world - the company has also worked with Sagem to make that Porsche Design P'9522 candybar back in 2008.

BlackBerry Bold 9790 sees a change?

The BlackBerry Bold 9790 from Research In Motion (RIM) has yet to be announced officially, but one of the more recent images leaked showed off a change to its external design, where the flat button panel has been removed in favor of individually raised buttons. Said image that showed the modification proved to be blurry in vein with most of the other mysteriously leaked images that we've seen so far regardless of the device, so hopefully when an announcement on the new 9790 is made, things will get clearer – literally.

Interestingly enough, the image that you see above shows off the new button construction in a decent way, where you can even make out Arabic characters on it. Perhaps this has something to do with the Porsche Design's 9890 debut that is happening in Dubai on the 27th. Do you think this will be a Middle East exclusive?

BlackBerry Bod 9900 Shows Up In White Skin, Coming Soon?

But what is surprising is the fact the the BlackBerry 9900 was wearing an elegant shade of white, bringing us to suspect that a BlackBerry Bold 9900 white model is being readied for imminent availability.

Now, we have learned that only the external colors have changed which means all the under-hood mettle will remain the same, and of course, you will find it running the BlackBerry 7 OS under the hood.

Regardless, the specs sheet remains same : a 1.2GHz processor with 768MB of RAM, an unusually large 2.8" capacitive touch screen display joined by a backlit physical keyboard, 5 megapixel camera with LED flash, support for HD video recording and built-in NFC sensor.

Other interesting features include Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, onboard GPS, dedicated camera button, a 3.5 mm audio jack, 8GB of onboard storage, support for up to 32GB of expandable storage and much more.

As a refresher, Research in Motion released a bunch of BlackBerry OS 7 phones (the BlackBerry 9900 is one of that breed!) in an effort to keep up with the competition but its hardware is still relatively less powerful than other competitors. However, it's greatest strength lies in the BIS and security and very obviously, the BlackBerry Messenger aka BBM.

There is no word from RIM on whether the device will officially be available in white color besides the standard natural black variant we've been used to seeing now. Anyway, the report sure does give users some liberty to pick from their choice of colors, if it were true.

Click here to know more.

AT&T's Blackberry Bold 9900 to be launched “soon”

While T-Mobile USA is selling the BlackBerry Bold 9900 since August, AT&T has yet to announce an official launch date for the new Bold.

However, we now know that the 9900 is "coming soon" to AT&T - or at least that's what one of the carrier's Twitter accounts suggests here.

Most likely, AT&T will launch the Bold 9900 sometime next month, possibly for a bit more than $200 on contract (T-Mobile is offering the handset for $299).

UK: 16 GB BlackBerry PlayBook sees price cut to �249

The BlackBerry PlayBook may be running an entirely new, not-BlackBerry operating system, but that doesn't mean that RIM's first tablet is selling well. Or at least not as well as RIM would have liked it to. It's clear that the PlayBook, at this moment, is more of a niche device than a competitor for Apple's iPad.

In the UK, this interestingly may turn out to be to the advantage of those of you who'd like to purchase a PlayBook, but haven't done so yet. Over there, RIM is doing what every manufacturer thinks of doing when a product isn't selling well: slash the price.

It has to be said that the BlackBerry PlayBook launched in the UK with pricing identical to the iPad, which probably wasn't the best decision RIM ever made. Anyway, they've now rectified that.

The Carphone Warehouse now sells the 16 GB Wi-Fi-only PlayBook for just £249, which is amazingly £150 less than the launch price. If you'd like 32 GB of built-in storage, you'll have to pay £329, and £409 for the 64 GB of storage.

BlackBerry outage could cost RIM $100 million

Research In Motion's recent BlackBerry outage was the worst in the company's history, leaving BlackBerry users in the Middle East, Europe, parts of South America, Canada, Africa and the United States without service for a total of three days. This major outage could cost the Canadian vendor more than $100 million, Financial Post reported on Friday. The costs include refunds RIM may have to issue carriers for monthly fees it collects for each BlackBerry user. “Given a large portion of global traffic looks potentially affected we believe that a 5% impact to service fee revenue is plausible though likely worse case,” JPMorgan Chase analyst Rod Hall said. Read on for more.

Scotia Capital analyst Gus Papageorgiou estimated that lost revenues could be in the ballpark of $117.7 million, or $0.22 per share, but that RIM should have the crisis under control by the weekend. The costs however, do not include the possibility of shaken faith from RIM's top enterprise users, who rely on BlackBerry products and services for day-to-day operations. RIM co-chief Mike Lazaridis issued a public apology on Thursday in which co-CEO Mike Lazaridis said RIM was “working around the clock to fix this,” and the company stated a few hours later that service had been fully restored.

White BlackBerry Curve 9360 coming to Orange UK

Already available in the UK since the end of September in its original black version, the Blackberry Curve 9360 will be released there in white, too.

Orange UK is currently listing the white Curve 9360 as coming soon, saying it will offer it for free on pay monthly plans (but that's not a surprise).

The Curve 9360 runs BlackBerry 7 OS, and features a 2.44 inch display with 480 x 360 pixels, optical trackpad, full QWERTY keyboard, HSDPA, Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n, GPS, 3.5mm headset jack, 5MP rear camera with LED flash, VGA front-facing camera, and an 800MHz processor.

RIM: BlackBerry services restored globally

After being down for the past few days, it looks like RIM has finally repaired its BlackBerry services. The company announced in a conference call earlier this morning that all BlackBerry services have been restored globally. RIM will now be closely monitoring and placing safeguards on its networks and servers to make sure that such events never occur again. RIM is also considering how it will be reimbursing carriers and users for the disruptions this week. No word on what or how BlackBerry users will be compensated, but we should expect to find out more pretty soon.

How's your BlackBerry phone? Are you still having trouble with BlackBerry services?

BlackBerry Curve 9350 launched by US Cellular

US Cellular has launched its second RIM smartphone to come with BlackBerry 7 OS (after the Torch 9850): the Curve 9350.

Until November 20, US Cellular is offering the Curve 9350 for free to new customers (on contract, after a $100 mail-in rebate). The smartphone's price on contract without a new activation is $49.99 (also after a $100 mail-in rebate).

The new Curve is available online starting today, and will be in stores, too, starting tomorrow, October 14.

The BlackBerry Curve 9350 (which is the CDMA version of the Curve 9360) features a full QWERTY keyboard,  a 2.44 inch portrait display with 480 x 360 pixels, Wi-Fi, GPS, 3.5mm headset jack, 800MHz processor, and a 5MP rear camera with LED flash.

BlackBerry 9380 and 9790 get officially announced, sort of

RIM has announced the new BlackBerry 9380 and 9790 smartphones. However, this is not your usual announcement, with detailed specs and press images. The announcement comes in the form of a blog post which was addressed towards the developer community, informing them of the new handsets.

There is very little information regarding the two phones available at this time. All that RIM has divulged is that the 9380 will have a full touchscreen interface like the Storm and a 3.2-inch, 480 x 360 resolution display. The 9790 on the other hand will have a 2.44-inch, 480 x 360 resolution display with a full QWERTY keypad. Of course, both the phones will be running the latest BlackBerry OS 7.

BlackBerry has released SDK with built-in simulators for each of these phones. This was actually the main purpose of the blog post. We're guessing the actual announcement will be happening soon enough.

Source

RIM BlackBerry Bold 9790 And Curve 9380 Confirmed

RIM has recently confirmed the availability of the BlackBerry Bold 9790 and Curve 9380. The BlackBerry Bold 9790 features a 2.44-inch (360 x 480) touchscreen display, a 1.2GHz processor, a full QWERTY keyboard and an 8GB of internal memory. The BlackBerry Curve 9380 (Curve Touch) has a 3.2-inch (360 x 480) touchscreen display and an 800MHz processor. Both handsets support NFC and and a 5MP camera with 720p video recording. RIM has also released a simulator for the Bold 9790 and Curve 9380.

RIM confirms new BlackBerry Bold 9790 and Curve 9380

Although they still haven't been properly announced, the BlackBerry Bold 9790 and the BlackBerry Curve 9380 have been recently confirmed by RIM on its developer's blog, where simulators for both devices are now available.

According to the Canadian company, the 9380, which could be launched under the name of BlackBerry Curve Touch, features a 3.2 inch touchscreen display with 360 x 480 pixels. We also know - from previously leaked details - that the 9380 (pictured below) should come with NFC, a 5MP camera with 720p video recording, and an 800 MHz processor.

As for the Bold 9790, this will feature a 2.44 inch touchscreen display with the same 360 x 480 pixels resolution, full QWERTY keyboard, NFC, 5MP camera, 1.2GHz processor, and 8GB of internal memory.

RIM didn't say when the new BlackBerry 9380 and 9790 will be launched, but it should happen before the end of the year. We'll let you know when we have more details on this.

RIM gives tips on extending BlackBerry battery life

Now that some of the BlackBerry devices feature larger displays, they are subjected to the same amount of battery drain that most smartphones face today. We all know there is a price to pay for larger, full-colored displays. Well, the folks over at the official BlackBerry blog have decided to write a primer to help those of you who want to squeeze in an extra few hours of battery life from your BlackBerry phones.

It appears that apps left open (even when they're not in use) can affect the battery life of BlackBerry devices, so close any apps that you aren't using. Another tip (which works on all smartphones) is to turn off connections that aren't in use. Turn off WiFi when you're not in range or not planning to use it, the same thing goes for Bluetooth and 3G. However, if you're in a location with weak 3G coverage but you have WiFi available, turn on WiFi instead.

Other tips include using a holster, enabling auto on/off, and changing the brightness of the display's backlight. While all these tips should be second nature for regular smartphone users, I learnt something new - using a cotton swab or dry cloth to clean the metal contacts of the battery and the phone every few months should help as well. Anyone has tips to share about extending battery life (be it for BlackBerry or any other phone) drop a comment below. Be sure to check out our Android battery life guide as well.

Is BlackBerry More Secure Than Android? Ask Obama and the US Military.

Despite the growth of Android and iOS, corporate types continue to clutch their BlackBerry's on Wall Street and elsewhere, largely pointing to security as the main reason they won't give up on RIM. But how long until that becomes a distant memory? Maybe not long if the National Security Agency, US Army, and other American military branches have anything to say about it.

Word out of Government Computer News says Google, George Mason, and the NSA have teamed up to produce a hardened kernel of Android 3.0 with, “a government plan to create a secure national wireless network for first responders.” According to CGN, the hardened kernel is in the final stages of certification.

President Obama is a notorious Blackberry user, but check out this quote on the reason to go with Android rather than Blackberry in this snippet pulled directly from the article:

In addition to the Army’s plans to provide troops with smart phones, the Obama administration was attracted to the technology to support two of its initiatives. One is an effort by the White House Communications Office to move the executive branch from BlackBerry devices to Android-based phones. The reason is because Android devices with the new kernel can be secured at a higher clearance level than BlackBerry devices, McCarthy said.

You could argue that the type of security the government require and the kind corporations need are totally different, but regardless, I think it says a lot about the widening gap between Android, iOS, and the soon to be distant competitors including RIM.

What do you think about the difference between security – whether for government or business purposes – between Android and Blackberry?