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BlackBerry Storm Video Playblack

By: , IntoMobile
Thursday, October 23rd, 2008 at 5:52 AM

Oh, hey, I guess there was one more goodie left in the BlackBerry Developer Conference bag-o-treats. We’ve got some of the first hands-on video of the BlackBerry Storm that doesn’t involve some kind of advertisement. A lot of the OS is still a work in progress, so it wouldn’t be fair to do a whole run-down, but I thought a demo of the more-than-ample video playback would be nice. Sorry about the umbrella reflecting in the back, things were a bit spur-of-the-moment. The screen is 480 x 360 HVGA – not bad compared to a lot of things, and more than steps up to the Bold, but the one thing you do risk with larger screens is more pixelation. The Storm wasn’t that bad at all. The one thing I was iffy on was the sound quality.

Maybe the Bold has spoiled me, but the Storm did sound a bit tinny. As far as I could gather, most of the sound was coming from a rear speaker down by the battery door latch, with a little sound coming from the phone bit, while the Bold has an extra two sound ports on the rear. Part of me thinks that there might be a speaker under the screen, since it seems to wrap around fairly nicely. I won’t lay the haterade on too heavily – maybe some clever equalizing on the software end will boost the bass and give it a fuller sound. The picture itself was great, and easily on par with many alternatives now available.

About The Author

Simon Sage

Simon Sage’s education largely surrounded writing, technology and online community, leading him to begin his blogging career at www.BlackBerryCool.com and to quickly discover a vibrant and active community surrounding BlackBerry and mobile technology. In exploring RIM’s platform, he has learned what enterprises are looking for in mobility as well as what makes the innocuous BlackBerry so appealing to them. Recently Simon’s been covering RIM’s gradual move into an already-crowded consumer market, and the impact of burgeoning challengers, such as the iPhone, as well as long-time leaders, like Nokia, on BlackBerry’s advancement. With plenty of content under his belt, Simon will be branching off a bit to see what other smartphone manufacturers are working on while still using BlackBerry as a barometer. At IntoMobile, you can count on his posts being even-handed, well-informed and thought-out.

  • Tony Reilly

    WOW… looks nice! Can't wait to get my hands on one.

    A quick question regarding Video Playback. The spec's say it's does Mpeg4, so… will it play back Xvid / Divx natively?

  • Simon Sage

    Unfortunately, I didn't have time to test it, and honestly, it would have been unfair to do so and say yes or no. The OS was still in such a state of flux that it's hard to nail anything down. The BlackBerry Bold supports DivX right on the spec sheet, and I would presume that sets precedent, especially for such a multimedia phone as the Storm, but I think we're going to have to wait for release to see for ourselves.