This week at CTIA Fall 2008 has been interesting so far for RIM. Early this morning start with the launch of the BlackBerry Pearl Flip 8220 and now RIM is proud to announce the much needed iDEN BlackBerry Curve 8350i. Finally his brings a upgrade to iDEN users on Sprint-Nextel’s aging iDEN network. This new Curve will sport both Wi-Fi and GPS along with a 2.0 megapixel camera, MicroSD memory card slot and stereo Bluetooth. This new Curve will also be the first Curve to operate on RIM’s new OS 4.6 as seen in the Pearl Flip and Bold.

Pricing has been announced yet, but you can expect to find out more within the next few months…

Press Release:

Sprint to Deliver Industry-Leading Push-to-Talk Services on New BlackBerry Smartphone

Operating on the fastest national push-to-talk network, the BlackBerry Curve 8350i will be the first from Sprint to offer built-in Wi-Fi capabilities and Group Connect, allowing instant group conversations with up to 21 people nationwide

OVERLAND PARK, Kan. and Waterloo, ON – Sprint customers seeking the benefits of industry-leading push-to-talk services and the power of BlackBerry® smartphones will have a new version of the coveted combo available later this year. Sprint (NYSE: S) and Research In Motion (RIM) (Nasdaq: RIMM; TSX: RIM) today announced plans to deliver the BlackBerry® Curve™ 8350i – the newest Nextel Direct Connect-capable BlackBerry smartphone – by the end of 2008.

The BlackBerry Curve 8350i will be the latest BlackBerry smartphone to utilize iDEN technology and feature Nextel Direct Connect, the only national push-to-talk service in the industry to offer sub-second call setup and connection to the world’s largest push-to-talk community with millions of users and integrated business solutions, including one of the largest selections of GPS-enabled solutions. With Nationwide and International Direct Connect, Sprint customers will be able to instantly connect within the US and to users in other eligible countries including Canada, Mexico, Argentina, Brazil, Chile and Peru. The BlackBerry Curve 8350i will also be the first BlackBerry smartphone from Sprint to offer Group Connect, allowing customers to instantly set up group conversations with up to 20 other participants.

“Smart phones in general, and BlackBerry products in particular, have become more important to both business people and consumers lately,” said David Chamberlain, Principal Analyst with analyst firm In-Stat. “The BlackBerry Curve 8350i with PTT capability rounds out Sprint’s options to fill communications needs of many industries particularly those in the blue-collar segment of construction, field services, transportation and manufacturing.”

“Sprint is the undisputed leader in push-to-talk services, and with the launch of the new BlackBerry Curve 8350i smartphone, we are keeping our promise of expanding the Nextel Direct Connect capabilities and options for our customers,” said Danny Bowman, president of Nextel Direct Connect. “The BlackBerry Curve 8350i will be very attractive for business customers who need instant, convenient push-to-talk services to communicate now with employees, customers and suppliers but also want the capabilities of a high-end smartphone.”

In addition to delivering the unmatched push email and messaging capabilities of the BlackBerry solution, the BlackBerry Curve 8350i will provide rich multimedia, organizer and Internet browsing capabilities, as well as access to thousands of other mobile applications. The smartphone will also include built-in Wi-Fi® capabilities, allowing customers to browse the Internet and download email attachments quickly and easily. When connected to a Wi-Fi network, customers will also be able to send and receive emails or surf the Internet while talking on the phone.

Other key features include:

• Integrated GPS – Built-in capabilities for assisted autonomous GPS capabilities
• 2 Megapixel Digital Camera – with 5x digital zoom, flash and video recording*
• DataViz® Documents to Go® – preloaded software makes it easy to edit Microsoft® Word, Excel and PowerPoint documents directly on the smartphone
• Internal Antenna – improves design appeal and durability
• Speakerphone – optimized for exceptional sound quality with Direct Connect
• Advanced Media Player – great for listening to music, watching videos and showing pictures
• Removable/Rechargeable 1400 mAH Battery – provides exceptional battery life
• Expandable Memory – microSD memory card slot allows plenty of storage for pictures, videos, music and documents
• Bluetooth® – version 2.0 with support for (A2DP) stereo Bluetooth and more
• Additional Messaging Capabilities – support for instant messaging and multimedia messaging including audio, pictures and text to email addresses and capable phones

“The BlackBerry Curve 8350i smartphone will offer customers an exceptional communications and multimedia experience together with the power and convenience of the popular Nextel Direct Connect service,” said Mark Guibert, vice president of corporate marketing at RIM. “We are pleased to build on our successful relationship with Sprint to bring this powerful new smartphone to Sprint’s customers.”

Customers can find more information on the BlackBerry Curve 8350i smartphone and sign up to be notified of commercial availability from Sprint at www.sprint.com/instantconnectbb. Pricing, service plan details and an exact availability date will be announced at a later date.

Nationally, the Nextel National Network continues to operate at best-ever performance levels based on internal metrics. Internal performance metrics show double-digit percent improvement year-over-year (i.e., March 2007 to March 2008) for drops (i.e., where a customer’s voice connection fails or drops during a call) and blocks (i.e., where a customer is unable to make a voice connection) for the Nextel National Network. Customer issues related to dropped and blocked calls, and voice quality combined, have decreased more than 60 percent year-over-year (i.e., March 2007 to March 2008). This level of improvement translates to a more reliable calling experience for our customers. Customer calls on the Nextel National Network are successfully connected and maintained better than 99 out of 100 times.

For more information about Nextel Direct connect, please visit www.sprint.com/nextel.

More updates have come in about AT&T’s BlackBerry Bold release. Looks like ordering will start for AT&T dealers on September 24th and then be available for sale October 2 or so (according to Boy Genius). Apparently all AT&T staff has been sent an email stating “AT&T is pleased to announce the launch of the new Blackberry Bold. It will be available to order on September 24, 2008.”

So any luck at all and you guys will be able to get your hands on a Bold early next month!

As of October 1st Rogers Wireless will introduce new data plans to replace their crazy 6GB for $30 a month. A recent study by Rogers indicates that 95% of iPhone 3G users use less than 500MB of data every month. Becuase of this Rogers will introduce new data plans as follows:

$15 - 2MB
$25 - 500 MB
$30 - 1GB
$60 - 3GB
$80 - 8GB

A few interesting notes about these new packages: All new clients will receive 3 months of “Freedom of Data” allowing unlimited usage for the first three months to see which data plan they really need. Also all of these new plans include tethering, Clients will be notified by SMS when they have used all of their available data, Overages are now capped at $100/month so no one will get any crazy phone bills.

So we recommend that you pick up Rogers current $30 a month for 6GB on data with your new BlackBerry Bold!!

[Via BBNews]

We have confirmed with two sources that Telus will be launching RIM’s first touchscreen BlackBerry later this year, however details are still a little sketchy. You may have already heard that Verizon is launching the Storm and Vodafone plus maybe Rogers as well. Well after we didn’t hear about Telus we started digging. Two close sources (who both confirmed Telus launching the Pearl 8130 last year) confirmed Telus will launch the 9530 before or around Christmas this year. Now at this time we don’t have any pricing or official dates but stay tuned!

Keep in Sync with all BlackBerry Thunder/Storm realted news >>

Finally some more details on the highly anticipated BlackBerry Thunder or Storm 9530. As you may or may not know this will be RIM’s first touchscreen BlackBerry smartphone. Anyways it seems that Verizon will be using the BlackBerry Storm name and not Thunder as we saw before. This puppy will be packing a 8GB microSD card in box, 3.5mm headphone jack, Sim card slot for international roaming and NO Wi-Fi (sorry folks!).

Boy Genius seems to think that RIM will go with BlackBerry Storm for Verizon and other carriers such as Vodafone and Rogers may see it branded as the Thunder. So maybe we will see several models (9500, 9530, etc.). He also notes he thinks the Storm/Thunder is still on track for launch later this year…

[Engadget via BGR]

Word on the streets is that Vodafone’s BlackBerry Bold might not be launching for another month. This would mean the Bold has been pushed back at least two or three times now. We aren’t too sure what to say honestly… Let’s hope AT&T and Rogers stay on track for sometime this month and Vodafone please no longer than September 1st… In the mean time keep an eye on Vodafone’s website for updates.

Apparently RIM has confirmed that the official roll out for OS 4.5 will start today. This news comes directly from a RIM spokesperson at a BlackBerry seminar. He says that OS 4.5 will start to release on all carriers World Wide within the next two weeks or so. This is truly great news for anyone who is still using a buggy beta version of 4.5, such as myself.

[Source - BerryReview]

Thats right folks! BlackBerry Media Sync is now available for download. This means anyone with a BlackBerry Pearl, Curve, 8800 or Bold can sync their iTunes library with their BlackBerry via iTunes software. Unfortunately for now the software is only available for Windows and not OS X. You can sync your library with DRM-free songs, however songs purchase with DRM won’t be transferable.

Click here to download at BlackBerry.com/MediaSync

The weeks starting off a little quiet in BlackBerry news, but we will make you drool some more. Just in case you aren’t drooling enough over the rumored BlackBerry Thunder. We’ve got a hold of a few more OS shots for you to enjoy. I know these aren’t as good as live shots but hey at least you get to see what OS 4.7 will offer for multimedia. Meanwhile you can check out other BlackBerry Thunder topics or click read more to see the rest of the shots.

Portrait camera on BlackBerry Thunder

Landscape music player on BlackBerry Thunder