BlackBerry Storm

Come on you gave this a higher performance rating than the original iPhone ! How can this possibly be ? I think I would give my old psion siena a better rating. I love you guys at trusted and your reviews but this seems unrealistic and I feel many people may be disappointed if they get one on reading this review.

@Andrew Stephens - Of course the Storm got a higher performance rating than the original iPhone, since you can actually make phone calls on it. The signal strength for calls on the original iPhone is appalling - I know from first hand experience. Both myself and Hugo still have to go out to the car park every time we want to make a call, that’s how bad it is. Thankfully this was fixed with the iPhone 3G, hence its higher scores.

@Francis Phillips - As Gordon says, looking at very early hardware in a review will always highlight issues that should not have been there. The early HTC Touch Diamond samples for instance were terrible, but firmware updates fixed many of those issues. Likewise early samples of the T-Mobile G1 had a lot of problems, which is why T-Mobile wouldn’t send out review samples until it had retail boxed versions. And even then it proved to be a disappointing handset.

Personally I don’t really care what other reviewers say, and I make a point of not reading other reviews until I’ve finished writing mine. But since you were keen to point out that other reviewers all thought it was a terrible device, I thought I’d grab a few quotes at random.

The Telegraph - “Research In Motion's first attempt at a touchscreen device, is a triumph. It's a really powerful device with plenty of clever features”

Gizmodo - “By trying to actually innovate rather than imitate, RIM has conjured up the phone most deserving of the title "iPhone killer".”

Wired - “The Storm, though, actually gets closest of any device we’ve ever laid hands on. And in one critical area it — get ready for it — it actually beats the iPhone.”

The Times - “I really didn't think I could be impressed by a new touchscreen device. To my surprise, I was.”

I have had this phone for 1 week now and sadly my SIM is back in my faithful Bold. I waited and waited for the release of this phone and was so delighted to finally get my hands on one.... The screen is wonderful, I played with the swiping action and then set about changing my PIN online.... Emails came through just as slick as ever. It all started going wrong when I tried to type, the portrait suretype keyboard was ok but a pain when entering non standard words and I quickly found the little editing trick of touching the keyboard for a few second to get a cursor just above your finger very useful. Too useful in fact as I had to correct almost every word. I use suretype on my wifes Pearl and have no issues with it even with the smaller keys. The landscape standard qwerty is surprisingly worse due to the smaller keys. You have to put your finger directly on top and this is hard to do if you used to a normall BB keyboard where you type with the side of your thumbs. I licked the clicking sensation so struggled on determined to get use to it. Web browsing was great the screen was good. But what about the 3meg camera, press the button to focus the light lights the camera focuses, you press harder to take the picture and then wait for 2-3 seconds before the light lights again and the picture is taken. I have loads of pictures of people walking away !! But the screen, the coolness I will struggle on. Day two - I had my "tunes" loaded only to find that the sound was not as loud as my Bold. I was using the excellent "buds" that came with the Bold as the ones supplied with the storm were not even worth taking out of the box!! Worth 50p at the most, when the Bold ones compare well to my Sennheiser's. Even with the volume boost enabled it was quieter. But still it looks so good and the screen, I struggled on determined to love it! At around 3pm that day when I had listened to music for 50 mins and made a quick 2 min call, the battery warning went! To be followed 30 mins later by BB's "Not enough power for radio use" warning. Maybe if it had a mini USB like all the other BB's I have owned I could have kept it on charge on my desk, but no mini USB instead micro USB, what a waste of 7 BB chargers from previous phones... I had to put my SIM back into my Bold and the first call I made? You guessed it Vodafone 14 day returns... Who offered me all manner of Batteries and chargers to keep it (no doubt becasue of similar calls) , but what is the point of a mobile phone that needs to be tethered by wires. I don't expect a phone to last for days and days, I am happy to charge every night. (especially as BB had a cool bedside feature) I am dissapointed, really dissapointed! I have loved all of my 7 Blackberries. I get teased for being a "crackberry fan boy"! I have been with Vodafone for over a decade and would not be persuaded to move to another network. Its such as shame that the Storm did not live up to the idea behind it. I am sure they will get it right with the Storm 2. But if your thinking of getting one, don't. My Bold has forgiven my little affair and we are reunited once again, Blackberries are all about reliability and typing. The Bold is a much better bet.