UPS came through with an extra special delivery this morning, the highly-coveted Verizon Wireless BlackBerry Storm 9350 Smartphone. The first-ever BlackBerry Smartphone with a touchscreen has been building momentum across Cellfanatic for the past few months, but finally the day has come to review the device and see if RIM and Verizon’s hardwork has paid off.

What’s In the Box?
When you first see the box you are immediately humbled by the convenient packaging. Inside is a vast array of accessories including a microUSB charger, microUSB sync cable, 3.5mm Wired Stereo Headset, pre-installed 8GB microSDHC card, 2GB USB Verizon Wireless branded memory stick, and a variety of International power adapters to comply with charging outlets as you become a Global Traveler. As far as the literature and software is concerned a Navigation QuickStart Guide, Global Support Guide, Tips Hints and Shortcuts Manual, BlackBerry User Tools CD and V Cast Music With Rhapsody / VZAccess Manager Software CD is included.

The Device: Build Quality and Screen
There was little doubt in our minds before having the Storm that RIM would neglect the fine detail and materials for a high-end smartphone. At 4.43 x 2.45 x 0.55 inches and 5.5 ounces, the device has excellent balance and can best be described as ’solid’. The low-grade plastics we’ve seen on other smartphones are absent when it comes to Storm and this is where the materials and construction shine.

The 3.25-inch HVGA+ (480 x 360 pixel) touchscreen is simply stunning. Side-by-Side with the iPhone 3G you can see the higher level of clarity and benefit of added screen resolution. The screen uses RIM’s SurePress technology which allows the entire screen to be pressed similar to the feeling of clicking the mouse on your desktop computer. There is an inherit benefit in this click-screen technology which allows fewer accidental keystrokes and presents an affinity to traditional keypads. Beyond the technology behind the screen are also several Touchscreen settings which allow you to adjust the Tap Interval, Hover Period and Swipe Sensitivity.
Keyboards: SureType, Multi-Touch, Landscape QWERTY
The biggest complaint we hear from first-time touchscreen users is that the learning curve to typing poses a serious threat to their productivity. With the BlackBerry Storm this learning curve is minimized thanks to SurePress technology and 3 on-screen keyboards.

Unfortunately no device is perfect and one area we found bothersome was the autocorrect capability since even we can’t maintain 100 percent typing accuracy. When common spelling mistakes were made it seemed to be hit or miss as to whether the intended word would be displayed. As a result we often found ourselves using the backspace for manual corrections. Auto correct aside, the touchscreen is extremely accurate in a way yet to be seen outside of the iPhone until now.
Software: Verizon Services
The Verizon Wireless BlackBerry 9530 Smartphone ships with OS v4.7.0.65, 15.8MB of Application Memory Available, 879.2MB of Device Memory and 7.3GB of the 8GB Media Card available. At the moment the Application Center is rather limited, with only 8 titles available to download: AOL Instant Messenger, Windows Live Messenger, Google Talk, Yahoo! Messenger, Facebook, Flickr, VZ Navigator and Visual Voicemail. Long-time Verizon Wireless customers will be happy to know that GPS functionality is fully enabled within the BlackBerry Maps application as it is in VZ Navigator: Traffic Enhanced Edition.

What would you like to know?
We are going to hold off on releasing a full review for the Verizon Wireless BlackBerry Storm 9530 until we have enough time to fully explore the phone. At the moment we consider the device to be the best alternative to the iPhone 3G based on touchscreen performance, build quality and the updated Operating System. While there have been some hiccups in the speed of the device as well as typing, further exploration into the touchscreen settings could prove extremely important in our valuation. We would like to open up this post to questions for readers so go ahead and drop a comment below.
| Dimensions | 4.43 x 2.45 x 0.55 inches (112.5 x 62.2 x 13.95 mm) |
| Weight | 5.5 ounces (155g) |
| Screen | 3.25-inch High resolution 480 x 360 (HVGA+) pixel color display, SurePress touch screen |
| Network | UMTS/HSPA: 2100 MHz, North America: 850 MHz GSM®/GPRS networks, 1900MHz GSM/GPRS networks | Europe and Asia Pacific: 1800MHz GSM/GPRS networks, 900MHz GSM/GPRS networks | Dual-Band: 800/1900 MHz CDMA/EV-DO Networks |
| Processor | 528 MHz Qualcomm MSM7600 |
| Memory | 128 MB Flash (flash memory), 1GB onboard memory |
| OS | BlackBerry Device Software v4.7 |
| Multimedia | Built-in GPS, SMS, MMS, Video Recording, Video format support: MPEG4 H.263, MPEG4 Part 2 Simple Profile, H.264, WMV | Audio format support: MP3, AAC, AAC+, eAAC+, WMA, WMA ProPlus |
| Camera | 3.2-megapixel camera, autoflash |
| Card Slot | microSD (8GB in box with Verizon Wireless) |
| USB | v2.0 miniUSB |
| WiFi | -- |
| Bluetooth | Bluetooth® v2.0; mono/stereo headset, handsfree, phone book access profile, and serial port profile supported |
| Battery | 1400 mAh (removable) |
| Release Date | November 14, 2008 (Vodafone), November 21, 2008 (Verizon Wireless) $199 after $50 Mail-In Rebate |









