Client Support is testing out the new BlackBerry Storm. Smartphones are becoming more prevalent on campus and we want to be prepared when users come to us with questions. After his first day using it, Client Support manager David Ecker had the following to report. We’ll check back in with him in a few weeks to see if his initial impressions have changed.
"I like the device, but the learning curve is big," said Ecker. "With the old BlackBerry, I was used to a little scroll wheel and the keyboard being right in front of me. This device is completely touch screen. The screen is phenomenal and I love reading e-mail on it. What’s frustrating is that it has so many more features that I want to use, I just don’t know how to use them yet."
Ecker’s Pros and Cons of the New BlackBerry Storm
Pros
- Bigger screen size and touch screen allow you to view a complete e-mail message simply
- Screen resolution is impressive
- Integrated 3.2 megapixel camera with auto-focus is very nice
- Terrific zoom feature
- Using the Web is much faster than on the old BlackBerry and the zoom feature helps this. I hardly ever used the Web feature on the old BlackBerry because it took too long and you had to scroll all over the place. I can’t live without it now.
Cons
- The full keyboard is not accessible very easily
- There is a learning curve to use the keyboards. You have to turn the device sideways to get the full keyboard. The vertical keyboard has two letters on one key, which I don’t like. You have to learn how to type by pushing the screen. It would be nice if you just clicked the letter and it understood your touch.
- It takes more than 20 minutes to figure out how to use all the features
- Fingerprints show up easily and the screen gets dirty quickly. You definitely want to put something on it to protect it
If you have a BlackBerry Storm, let us know what you think!
My first experience with downloading movies was not so great. Roxio Media Manager kept crashing and my BlackBerry was not being recognized by the Roxio software. Once I uninstalled the version of Roxio that had been installed prior to Roxio for BlackBerry, downloading movies was a breeze!
I had the same problem with Media Manager that Sandy had and probably for the same reason. But I solved it a different way. When I connect to my computer I get a message on my Blackberry asking if I want to work in mass storage mode. I answered yes to this message and look in MyComputer for the Blackberry as a USB device. I open it and open the folder named Blackberry. In there are folders for documents, pictures, and videos. I just dragged the pictures I wanted to download to a folder on my computer. I also tested uploading to the folder. This works fine, but you can’t see the files on the Blackberry until you disconnect from the computer. There is a folder on the Blackberry that is named documents. I uploaded a word docx and a powerpoint pptx and viewed them on the Blackberry with the Word to go series of applications. Next to try are Excel and videos.
My first experience with the Storm was phenomenal.
Although there is a definite learning curve to fully enjoy the device, the features that it has and the detail for the small things definitely will give the Treo a run for its money.
The click-down keyboard simulation makes for a difficult transition to this type of touch screen when you’re used to touching the screen for a response, however, once you get the hang of it, your typing will become second nature. I also realize that there may be some correlation between which hand you attempt to type from and which keys you are hitting. For example, no matter how hard I try to type the letter “e” with my right hand, it seemed to not select the correct key. Once I tried it with my left hand, the “e” key was selected on the first try…still not sure why, will keep you guys posted.
Other features that make this an outstanding device, that may or may not have been noted, include the video recorder, voice notes, visual voicemail, and better integration with Facebook and other programs.
I will say that if the device is asleep and you wake it up, it can be a bit slow until it gets going, but that is quite rare and does not happen in every instance.
The learning curve is substantially greater with this device than any other PDA device I’ve experienced and I’ve had plenty.
So, what I am saying is that although it is a great all-in-one, touch-screen device, it is definitely not a device to pick up and expect to know very quickly. It will take longer than one day to learn how it performs best and how to get the maximum experience from it.
BTW do you know about a huge amount of “>absolutely free applications for BlackBerry that were created by developers from all over the world?