BlackBerry Storm2 9520 is the successor of Storm 9500, an innovative model for RIM, but much criticized at the time. The BlackBerry Storm 9500 was a truly intriguing device; Storm's touchscreen has attracted the greatest criticism due to its mechanism which involves pressing the click to register a command. Storm2 aims to solve all the problems that have tarnished the image of Storm.
The screen now works better, but you still have to click on it like a button. I don’t understand why RIM insists to change our habits of using a touch screen. We are happy with conventional touchscreens, and Storm has shown that this concept doesn’t have a future.
We will see how good and how easy to use it Storm2.
Key features
• Quad-band GSM/GPRS/EDGE and 2100 MHz 3G with HSPA support
• 3.25" 65K-color capacitive touchscreen of 360 x 480 pixel resolution
• Improved touchscreen experience with piezo-electric touch feedback system
• 3.15 MP autofocus camera, LED flash
• BlackBerry OS 5
• Wi-Fi and built-in GPS with BlackBerry maps preloaded
• 2 GB internal storage and a hot-swappable micro SD card slot
• Landscape on-screen keyboard is as close to hardware keys as we have seen on a touch phone
• Nice looks and great build quality
• 3.5mm standard audio jack
• Accelerometer sensor for screen auto-rotate
• Bluetooth v2.1 and USB v2.0
• Document editor
• Good audio quality
View list of specifications and features of BlackBerry Storm2 9520
BlackBerry Storm2 retail box comes with strictly necessary accessories: the charger, a hands free headset, the micro USB data cable, the phone manual and the software CD. The leather case, common to other BlackBerry models, is missing in action.
In size, the phone is within normal limits. Width is 62.2 mm, is 112.5 mm long and 14 mm thick. It weighs 5 grams more than Storm, reaching 160 grams. It’s a lot of weight for a phone without a slider, but it is saved by its compact shape that gives the impression that it is actually lighter. The back cover is made of metal, but most of the housing is plastic.
The front is dominated by the magnificent 3.25" piezo-electric display. Its picture quality is among the best we have seen from RIM, the remaining space being occupied by the four buttons at the bottom of the screen: call and reject call buttons and the menu and back key. The contrast and brightness are top-notch, easily among the best we have seen on an LCD screen.
The left side houses the micro USB and the dedicated voice command key. The Micro USB port is protected against dust.
On the right phone has an audio jack of 3.5 mm, volume control and a dedicated camera button.
The back of the phone houses a 3.2 megapixels camera and a LED flash. The lens has no protection against scratches. Removing the metal back cover reveals the power plant; the battery is 1400 mAh, which managed to keep the BlackBerry alive for 2 days with heavy use. Also, here we find the micro SD memory card slot. It is fully hot-swappable and has no trouble handling the largest memory cards currently available on the market (16GB).
According to the manufacturer, the phone offers autonomy of 305 hours of standby in 2G and 280 hours in 3G and talk time does not exceed 5 hours in 2G network and 6 hours on 3G.
BlackBerry Storm2 uses OS 5 operating system. It has several improvements over version 4. The icons are 3D and the transition effects are nice. The BlackBerry OS 5 also introduces kinetic scrolling which greatly facilitates handing of longer lists. Accelerometer is better than the Storm’s, rotating the screen almost instantly.
Storm2 OS works very well, feels snappy and lag is almost inexistent, it also supports multitasking. RIM doesn't provide any information about the CPU inside the Storm2 but either it is faster than the original. In the phone menu, the icons are arranged as a matrix. Most functions are intuitive, but you need an adjustment period if you've never used Blackberry before.
BlackBerry Storm2's screen is 3.25 inches and offers very good image quality. The screen resolution is 360 x 480 pixels, and the number of colors is 65,000. The TFT screen has excellent contrast and vivid colors. You get the same image quality when using the phone in bright light conditions, legibility remains good. The screen is softer to the touch than the Storm, which improves utilization and makes writing text much faster.
In terms of telephony, everything works as it should, the in-call sound quality is very good and we didn't experience any drops or coverage issues at all.
BlackBerry Storm2 comes with 2GB of internal memory which can be expanded with a micro SD card.
The music player is not as advanced as other smartphones, but it gets the job done, playing most file formats which can be sorted by artist, album and genre. Also, it can run in background without problems, multitasking rules, remember that folks. Strangely enough, there's no indication of the currently playing song on the home screen. Audio quality is excellent; you may connect any headphones due to the 3.5 mm audio jack, not just the standard headset. A minus of the multimedia department is the lack of radio.
The video player captivated me so much that I managed to watch a whole movie on Storm2. The videos run smooth and clear, they have bright colors and high contrast. The screen has a size suitable for viewing movies and the native support for DivX and Xvid codecs allow you to copy movies from your PC to the phone memory without having to convert them.
The camera has 3.2 megapixels and is able to take pictures up to a maximum resolution of 2048 x 1536 pixels. It has autofocus and LED flash. BlackBerry Storm2 does not offer a lot of camera settings. Photos are of average quality but the colors and contrast are quite good. I do not think we can ask more from a 3.2 megapixels camera.
The video recording is at a resolution of 480 x 352 pixels with 30 fps. Clips are saved in 3GP format. LED flash can be used in filming. Quality is satisfactory for a phone, but you should not expect miracles.
In terms of connectivity, Storm2 is brilliant, you have access to the Internet via Wi-Fi and the HSPA with quad-band GSM/GPRS/EDGE and the 3G with 7.2 Mbps HSDPA .
Storm2's web browser is good, but unfortunately does not support Flash. Pages load quickly and are rendered correctly even when they are complex; it’s an improvement over the original Storm browser.
Storm2 also features a mobile office application, you can read and edit Word, Excel and PowerPoint files but you have no PDF reader preinstalled.
Other preinstalled applications are a calculator, a converter sizes and some games.
Storm 2 comes equipped with a built-in GPS receiver. For navigation you get BlackBerry Maps and you can also get the free Google Maps if data traffic doesn't bother you.
Conclusion: BlackBerry Storm2 is proof of evolution for the company and it's a pretty decent smartphone, the Storm2 is the dream device for those who have a solid BlackBerry background and want to explore touchscreen.
You can have one here on a monthly contract deal.
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