The BOLD has landed

Well, the first Blackberry Bold landed on my desk to configure up. And I have to admit I'm impressed. The build quality feels good, and the beveled edges help it feel that its not as big as it is. Dimensionally, the Bold is bigger than an IPhone, but feels about the same due to some clever engineering cheats... I mean tweaks. :)

The screen on it is SWEET.. I mean really sweet. Its a real pleasure to use.. The default theme really makes the Bold feel a iPhone-ish which, if you've been following this blog recently, you'll know that this probably isn't a great thing IMHO. The battery life, on wireless and 3G kills the iPhone that I had tried for 3 weeks, still being at full after being left on overnight. One area that I thought was "close but no cigar" was the packaging. The iPhone kills it here, with a BEAUTIFUL presentation and boxing, but the new Black boxing for the Bold is great, and the theming goes all the way, even to the black battery under the faux black leather back case. Oh, and RIM, thanks for putting the SD card accessible from the outside is the sweetest!

Wireless activation had me a bit stumped, and in the end had to call the Telco to get it activated. I'm sure that will improve as I get used to the wireless (ie 802.11) activation. It just wouldn't activate normally. Mind you, I didn't RTFM, but plowed on through like it was a Curve... That's most likely where the error lay..

Anyway, I'm a fan.. Can't wait for mine to arrive.
Sent via BlackBerry® from Vodafone