BlackBerry Storm 2 9520

RIM are a company with style and simply hopping on the touchscreen bandwagon with another iPhone wannabe just wouldn’t suit them. They certainly realized the importance of having a full-touch device in their portfolio but wanted a clear and legible BlackBerry imprint on it.

BlackBerry Storm2 official photo

The BlackBerry Storm 9500 was a truly intriguing device but never really managed to find its place in the new market it was built for. Too bold and unusual for the BlackBerry-loyals and yet too conservative for the rest of the world, it didn’t quite get the results it was hoping for. But the successor might use the publicity the first Storm generated for its own good.

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 microSD 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

Main disadvantages:

• No email support without BlackBerry Internet Service account
• Interface not as quick as competitors’
• Chubbier than most touchscreen phones with similarly-sized displays
• Mediocre camera
• No FM radio
• No web browser Flash support
• No dedicated video-call camera

The good news is RIM decided to honor the Storm2 with a few upgrades over the original. However, none of them seems to be absolutely crucial so the greatest responsibility falls on the brand new piezo-electric touchscreen. The missing link between touchscreen and a hardware keypad is what many keen texters must have been waiting for. Or at least that’s what RIM believe.

The BlackBerry Storm2 9520 views

Now, the SurePress screen didn’t work out particularly well on the first Storm and a second failure might herald the demise of the entire series. So the BlackBerry Storm2 knows it needs to impress the audience or it might take a spot in history for all the wrong reasons.

But first thing first, let’s check out what you get when you buy a shiny new Storm2. Unboxing follows after the break.

Retail package

Considering the high price tag we find the BlackBerry Storm2 retail package fairly modest. There is no memory card included and the supplied one-piece handsfree looks second-rate. There is a leather carrying case supplied so it’s not all bad.

The Storm2 box contents

The other items in the box are a charger and microUSB data cable. As you can see in the shots, there’s also a user guide and a CD with the software required for synching your handset with a computer and that’s all.

Design and construction

The BlackBerry Storm2 9520 sports some nice design improvements over the original Storm. For one, the four keys at the bottom now blend with the display and are part of the consistent touchscreen experience, not to mention the illusion they create of an even larger display. Also the side keys are now black instead of silver and are much more inline with the general styling of the device.

The rest of the design pretty much sticks to the original, the metallic battery cover and the sleek top with invisible buttons still our favorites. Combined with the solid weight, the nice exterior gives the Storm2 the feel to match the price tag.

Most of the front of the BlackBerry Storm2 9520 is taken by the magnificent 3.25″ piezo-electric display. Its picture quality is among the best we have seen from RIM and this is quite an achievement given the consistently good BlackBerry screens.

The 360 x 480 resolution is hardly remarkable as we can easily think of a number of handsets that come with several times the pixel count but the image quality is splendid. The contrast and brightness are top-notch, easily among the best we have seen on an LCD screen.

The sunlight legibility is also great, the display easily maintaining readability and colors even in the brightest sun.

The 3.25″ display of the Storm2 has excellent image quality

Now for the really interesting part – the piezo-electric technology that stands behind the touchscreen operation. If you don’t have much experience with either of the Storm devices you might be led to believe they use the same clicking screen but that would be wrong. OK, not totally wrong perhaps, as the user experience is similar, but the improved performance of the Storm2 is certainly welcome.

The screen surface is a regular capacitive touchscreen, which responds to the lightest of touches, bare fingers only though (no gloves or stylus).

However, the Storm2 interface uses the tap-to-select and press-to-confirm logic. So, a tap will only highlight an app or a menu item. If you want to activate it, you will need to apply some pressure and push the whole display down.

On the original Storm the whole display was one regular big-ass button. Now with the piezo-electric enhancement, the screen now is much softer to touch. The piezzo technology is also said to allow multi-touch input, which wasn’t possible with the SurePress on the original Storm.

You’re not to expect pinch zoom or anything on the Strom2 but multi touch support is quite relevant to typing – think two-key combos like Shift + whatever. The reduced effort will also make sure your fingers are less tired after longer typing on the handset.

Because the Storm itself takes part in the display movement, pressing it down isn’t possible when the phone is off – the screen won’t click unless you power it up.

The new technology of the BlackBerry Storm2 9520 brings both positives and negatives but it’s pretty clear where its strength lies. Typing has never been a touchscreen forte but the Storm2 is the closest you will get to a hardware QWERTY keyboard. Quite a lot of users complained about their hands getting tired after writing a few emails on their original Storms but we guess the situation has notably improved.

Anyway, the whole clickable screen thing only makes sense perhaps in BlackBerry terms. What makes a BlackBerry handset is messaging after all, and QWERTY and adding touchscreen to the equation shouldn’t change things much.

But in regular touchscreen terms, the extra step (tap-to-select, press-to-confirm) is more of a disadvantage. In any case, we would strongly advise to try it in person before dropping the cash. And this will involve at least an hour or two of typing and navigating, not just a 5 minute trial.

Design and construction (continued)

The four controls on the front panel are operated in the exact same way as the display. Those include the Call and End buttons, as well as the Menu and Back keys.

The keys are also (kind of) touch-sensitive

On top of the front panel of the Storm2 we find the earpiece and the LED indicator. The status LED notifies of missed calls and messages, low battery and charging.

The earpiece and status LED are on top

The left side of the BlackBerry Storm2 9520 hosts the microUSB port and one of the convenience keys. There isn’t a cover for the data jack so dust is likely to accumulate.

The microUSB port and the left convenience key

The default function of the left convenience key of the Storm2 is voice commands, but you can change that as you see fit.

On the right, we find the other convenience key, a 3.5mm audio jack and the volume rocker. The 3.5mm audio jack is exposed too. The convenience key is a two-step button, which suggests that it is best suited for its default purpose – operating the autofocus camera. Yet if you aren’t much into using your phone camera (which is likely if you are looking at the Storm2 at all) you can assign it a different functionality.

Unfortunately, you won’t be able to assign two applications to it despite it being capable of handling them on half press/full press.

The right side view: volume rocker and 3.5mm audio jack • convenience key and lanyard eyelet

The BlackBerry Storm2 9520 loudspeaker grill is located on top of the handset, between the two hidden keys. Those take care for switching the Storm2 on/off and muting the handset. The on/off key also locks/unlocks the display.

The loudspeaker is flanked by the two invisible keys

The bottom of the Storm2 is very plain with the microphone pinhole providing the only entertainment there.

The Storm2 mouthpiece

The back hosts the 3.15MP autofocus camera and the LED flash. You shouldn’t expect miracles from the shooter given its specs and the RIM track record in imaging.

The 3.2 megapixel camera is complemented by a LED flash

Under the solid metal (me likey!) battery cover hides the 1400 mAh Li-Ion battery. Given the ample capacity it’s little surprise that it can last for almost two full days under fairly heavy usage (about 2 hours a day of fiddling with the phone and 30 minutes of calls).

The 1400 mAh battery is sufficient for the Storm2 power needs

The microSD card slot is also here. It is fully hot-swappable and has no trouble handling the largest memory cards currently available on the market (16GB). The only problem is you will have to open the cover each time you access it but we consider it a fair sacrifice for having one less aperture on the surface.

So, as you might have sensed we are delighted with the build quality of the BlackBerry Storm2 9520. There is no wobbling display, or gaps between panels or anything else to raise questions. The handset just radiates sturdiness.

The Storm2 fits nice in our hands

BlackBerry OS 5 goes touch

The BlackBerry Storm2 9520 runs the new, fifth, version of the company’s proprietary OS. It brings a couple of nice new extras to the touchscreen-operated Storm, unlike most other BlackBerry devices which benefited very little from it.

If you have been keeping track you would know that we aren’t in love with the BlackBerry OS looks but, in all fairness, the touch implementation is a bit better. The little 3D touch to the icons and the few nice transitions look better than what the 9700 Bold has to offer.

Touch makes the BlackBerry OS look better

The BlackBerry OS 5 also introduces kinetic scrolling which greatly facilitates handing of longer lists. The automatic rotation is also supposed to be faster now. Those upgrades have also made their way to the original Storm via a firmware update so they aren’t Storm2-exclusive.

Unfortunately, very little has been done about the tons of plain ugly text-only submenus that can still be found in the BlackBerry Storm2. Even with the slickest theme applied you are still just a couple of clicks away from these eyesores.

Unfortunately, there is still a lot of work to be done

And with the Storm2 we aren’t talking hardcore business users only – the target audience has now widened and might include some people that, you know, might have an eye for the aesthetics. Touchscreen handsets need to provide nice user experience or else their existence is pointless.

Coming with a generally new touchscreen platform took quite a lot of R&D effort, but they should have saved some for the UI polishing. We really hate it when nice ideas fail only because of negligence. But we digress.

The homescreen is pretty well organized with 8 (by default) shortcut buttons placed at the bottom and all status icons at the top. The profiles can also be accessed straight from here, as well as two other features that you choose to assign to the convenience keys. Tilting the handset to the side doesn’t bring a landscape mode of the homescreen but opens the main menu instead.

You can enter the main menu by simply turning the handset landscape

The BlackBerry Storm2 has a menu structure completely different from any other touchscreen handset on the market (save for the original Storm of course). Unlike the iPhone’s what-you-see-is-what-you-get approach, you have a menu button here, which revels a list of context-sensitive options. You might want to spend some time learning what is available where if you are a newcomer to the BlackBerry world.

A press and hold of the menu key brings up the task manager

We are pleased with the Storm2 performance. Lagging was very rare and the handset seemed pretty stable for the time of our review. There was only one restart in about a week’s time and that’s not bad at all. RIM doesn’t provide any information about the CPU inside the Storm2 but either it is faster than the original Storm or the new version of the OS is better optimized to make the device feel snappier.

Phonebook: this is Spartaaaaaa

Sorry, we just couldn’t help it – the Storm2 Spartan phonebook graphics really brought it out in us. The unlimited capacity and the decent functionality is of course what matters more but, again, the overall experience counts too.

Not quite the looker this phonebook, is it?

The search line color has been changed from black to white in the new 5.0 version but that hardly makes much difference.

The contacts get listed alphabetically by first, last name or company in one of those black and white lists that we warned you about. You can search contacts by gradually typing a name like on almost any other phone.

You can put your contacts in one of two categories – personal and business and then filter your phonebook accordingly. There is also grouping available this time and you can create as many groups as you like.

Editing a contact gives you a vast number of fields which are organized in several sub-groups. You can also replicate some of the fields (those that you are going to need anyway) as many times as you like.

Telephony fares much better

Getting some eyesores from the phonebook we went over to inspecting the Storm telephony and we were in for a nice treat this time.

We really dig the Smart dial feature, which works when inserting contacts in messaging too.

The BlackBerry Storm2 9520 in-call screen offers four large and easy to press buttons plus five shortcuts to features you are most likely to need during a call. Those include notes, calendar, contacts, dial pad and home screen. Well that last one might not be what you need during a call but it’s the quickest way to an application that is not on the list.

The Storm2 in-call screen

BIS messaging only

The BlackBerry Storm2 9520 can handle all common types of messages – SMS, MMS and email. It also has the BlackBerry instant messenger preinstalled.

The Storm2 has a fairly simple and easy to use organization of messaging and all messages are composed through a common editor. The good news is that version 5 of the OS also introduces threaded messaging to help you organize your inbox even better.

The Storm2 message editor

It’s about time we discussed the text input methods available on the Storm2 in more detail. The handset offers a choice of three different keyboards and we did find them all quite pleasing. Those are the same as on the previous Storm, except that now that less effort is required to push the screen your fingers are less tired of long typing.

Let’s start though with the regular multitap keypad. Its predictive writing works much better with the touchscreen because you can easily select the word you’re looking for from the suggested options. That aside, it works as good as any other multitap keypad, only the keys are even larger.

It’s multitap for the traditionalists…

The good old BlackBerry SureType keypad is already making its way on several other platforms and that’s for a very good reason. It’s easy to use and if you master the AutoText (that’s the BlackBerry T9) you might as well match the QWERTY typing speeds at times.

…SureType for the BlackBerry faithfuls…

The nice thing is users are free to choose whether the SureType or the multitap keypad should appear by default in portrait mode.

There’s also a portrait QWERTY keyboard but we don’t think it will be a very popular option. Its keys aren’t big enough for large handed users and if you really insist on the QWERTY layout you would do way better tilting the handset to the side and getting the real keyboard experience.

…portrait QWERTY for the ones with really small fingers…OK, we said it: the real keyboard experience. The landscape QWERTY takes slightly more than half the screen height and comes in a four-row layout. Keys are large enough and with the display sinking on every press you can really speed your way through tons of text. The feedback provided is both visual (blue halo when a key is touched) and physical and with the two combined you get excellent results.

… and the real deal – the landscape full QWERTY keyboard

In general, this is a virtual QWERTY keyboard but it gets as close to a regular press as we have seen. What’s more, it’s less tiring on the fingers as the phone itself helps you push the screen – the piezo-electric technology works like power steering in cars.

So far so good with the BlackBerry messaging department – the handset behaves beautifully when it comes to text input. Now the catch: out of the box you can only set up BlackBerry Internet Service email accounts on the Storm. This means that without a proper Blackberry service plan the handset is just a plain email-less device and globally there are quite a lot of carriers that do not support BIS yet.

Music player does the job

The BlackBerry Storm2 9520 music won’t get too many wows for its looks but it does a fairly decent job. If you are mostly about listening to music and not really into fiddling with different player options then you might feel just fine with it.

The Storm2 music player

The music player sorts the music library automatically by artist, album and genre and you can search your tracks by gradual typing. You can also create your own playlists in no time.

There’re equalizers too and different appearance settings this time

Album art is also supported and there is a single track repeat option. Quite naturally, the player can also be minimized to play in the background. You can then go back to it via the task manager or the main menu. Strangely enough, there’s no indication of the currently playing song on the home screen.

A great video player

Watching videos was one of our favorite activities on the BlackBerry Storm2 9520. The great picture quality, the ample screen and the good number of supported codecs make the handset a decent portable player.

The video player usually works fullscreen with the virtual buttons only appearing upon a tap on the display.

The Storm2 makes a good portable video player

The best part about the Storm2 video player is that it comes with DivX and XviD support. We had no trouble playing most of our test videos on the handset, which is better than most of its RIM stablemates.

So in most cases you will only need to upload the video to your Storm2 and start the player – no converting necessary.

Passable image gallery

The image gallery of the Storm2 is nothing spectacular, being hardly any different than the one we saw on its predecessor a year ago. It does pretty well overall with the 100% zoom shortcut earning our appreciation.

The Storm2 image gallery

The gallery has standard functionality including thumbnail and list view of the images. It also offers finger gestures, meaning you can browse pictures by sweeping your finger across the screen. You can also zoom in on a photo by pressing the screen and sweeping with your finger. Opting between portrait and landscape mode is automatic, thanks to the built-in accelerometer. All you need to do to switch modes is to flip the phone sideways.

Looking at a single photo

We are particularly happy with the zoom to actual size shortcut on the BlackBerry devices. This gives you a quick and easy way to review photos in the finest detail possible.

Overall, picture browsing is decently fast but the zooming is on the slow side. There is some lagging even when it is handling 3 megapixel photos, let alone if you upload higher-res images.

An average 3 megapixel shooter

The BlackBerry Storm2 9520 is equipped with a 3 megapixel autofocus camera and a LED flash. We are used to expecting next to nothing from the BlackBerry cameras so when one actually produces average photos we are nicely surprised.

The camera interface is still on the worse side of devices we have tested. Since the display has the same aspect ratio as the camera sensor, the readings that appear at the bottom cover a part of the viewfinder and impede proper framing.

The camera options are also pretty uncomfortable to access as there are no shortcuts on the screen meaning that you have to dig in the menu. Not that there are too many settings you can apply, but still.

The camera UI isn’t really user friendly

The best part (or rather the only good part) of the camera is undoubtedly the image-geotagging, which allows you to automatically record your location in the images EXIF data.

The few other settings available are: white balance, color effects and digital image stabilization. There is also the obligatory picture size and quality.

The image quality of the BlackBerry Storm2 9520 is about average in the 3 megapixel league. It’s about the same as on the Bold 9700 and close to what the other manufacturers offered a few years ago.

We are not enjoying particularly good weather around the office these days so the camera samples might seem even worse, but actually the amount of resolved detail is acceptable. The noise levels are acceptable for a 3 megapixel shooter in those kinds of conditions.

Contrast is OK, though hardly impressive, and the colors could have used a tad more saturation but they aren’t too bad overall.

Here go several samples so you can judge the image quality yourselves.

BlackBerry Storm2 9520 camera samples

Uninspiring video recording

If there is one thing that is generally worse than a BlackBerry still camera that would be the BlackBerry camcorder. Yet the Storm2 isn’t completely hopeless offering videos with a maximum resolution of 480 x 352 pixels and framerate of a good 30fps.

The camcorder viewfinder

There is still way too much compression applied and the colors seem a bit too dull but let’s not get too picky. In the BlackBerry world any video where you can tell a person from a bus is considered good.

Videos are captured in 3GP format and if you fancy, you can apply various color effects. The LED flash can also be set to work as a video light.