Amazon UK has listed the BlackBerry Bold 9900 for preorder with a launch marked for October 15. Although RIM has announced the next-gen Bold, the most we’ve heard about a release date is that they’ll be missing the back-to-school rush. It’s hard to say for sure if the North American release will be as delayed as the UK’s, since we often get phones a little earlier over here.
The BlackBerry Bold 9900 will bring RIM back up to speed with the competition when it comes to hardware specs. It will be their first handset with a 1.2 GHz processor, backed up by 768 MB of RAM. The display is also a big step forward, clocking in at 640 x 480 and 2.8 inches, not to mention being touch-sensitive. The camera is still 5 megapixels and comes accompanied with an LED flash, but will now be able to capture HD video at 720p. The real new additions will be near-field communications support for contactless payments, a magnetic compass to support augmented reality apps, and mobile hotspot capabilities over Wi-Fi b/g/n. The software will also get a bump up to version 7, boasting a new Liquid Graphics rendering engine which will make for smooth UI transitions as well as power rich 3D graphics. Take a look at our hands-on over here.
Even if the Bold 9900 manages to hit North America by late September, it will miss the back-to-school rush, as RIM had forecasted. We’ve been seeing a lot of RIM’s other upcoming OS 7 handsets, like the BlackBerry Curve 9360, and the Touch 9860/50, but the way things are going, their release will likely be backed up all the way to the holidays. RIM maintained that their schedule for launching QNX-powered dual-core smartphones is still in line for early next year, but I’ll believe it when I see it. Any Brits out there clamouring to pick up the Bold 9900?
[via CB]