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“Underwhelming”: BlackBerry Torch 9800 first weekend sales
Waterloo-based RIM released their newest device called the BlackBerry Torch 9800, this also came loaded with their new BlackBerry 6 OS. The Torch went on sale officially on the 12th in the US by AT&T. It will be coming to Canada soon from TELUS, Rogers, Bell and Virgin.
How were the first weekend sales of this anticipated touchscreen/QWERTY device? Well, according to Goldman Sachs the sales were “underwhelming” and “nearly all of the stores they called did not sell out of the device. Also the checks showed that the vast majority of Torch sales were driven by upgrades from existing BlackBerry subscribers.”
RIM has not released official numbers for the Torch, but the vast majority of reviews have been OK with nothing about the device or OS being remotely astonishing or innovative. What do you think… will you be getting the new Torch 9800?
Source: IntoMobile
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35 comments for ““Underwhelming”: BlackBerry Torch 9800 first weekend sales”
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I’ll probably be getting it for my Wife when it comes out. She’s currently using an old Curve 8330 which barely made the cut for BB OS 5. She hates touch screen devices, but I think she would appreciate the nice blend of touch screen and physical keyboard while getting a nice upgrade from the old Curve.
Sadly, the nerd is me is too underwhelmed by the lack of innovation and lack of power coming from this device to buy one for myself. Still waiting on the Droid 2 or Epic Pro (physical keyboards) for me.
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RIM can’t seem to innovate. You’d think the major lead they’ve held for so long would do something.
Their company must lack creative people and became to corporate.
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AHAHAHAHAHA- finally, vindication!!! I knew this would flop…its a great start on BB’s journey to “Evolve” but currently the torch is a “lets just catch up” device.
BB is working on some very cool ish that is not mobile centric…but as far is mobile handsets…meh.
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It looks like consumers may not be that stupid after all. Selling 2007 – 2008 era hardware at today’s prices is a joke. While the BB OS 6.0 is generally a decent improvement with the WebKit beased browser, the hardware is old and slow and pales in comparison with current devices like the iPhone 4 or the Samsung Galaxy S series of devices. Only someone locked on to the BES would consider buying the Torch.
Adi
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If it comes out before school starts! I will diffently… and I hope Rogers does the same thing like they did for the iPhone 4 to see if your eligable to upgrade. I upgraded in January. Now I have to buy it out
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Your spelling SUCKS.
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It’s too bad really, it would be nice to see a Canadian manufacturer compete in this arena but the device itself does not look competitive versus other devices in the same market. I like the design but I’ll echo the same statements that from a performance point of view it competes with devices 2 years ago.
For a Canadian buyer why would they buy this versus the Vibrant or Design or Iphone4 unless they were very tied to the Blackberry experience?
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RIM could have really stepped it up and made this phone more desirable, higher res screen, faster processor, it may have been enough for me to upgrade from my 9700..Maybe they will release a Torch 2 sooner than expected. C’mon RIM, wake up!
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I say it serves them right for launching the phone in the US market first.
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yes i will buy and add it to my bb collection
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No innovation at all and old tech, sloppy touch scrolling, yeah.
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I will get it because I have to use a Blackberry and it’s the best one. If I had the option to use other devices, this would not even make my short list.
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I think RIM goofed when they decided to launch the Torch as an AT&T only event. I’m sure there are many people in other countries still waiting for it to be launched. On top of that to find out that the Torch is using the same old technology as its older cousins with the only real upgrades coming to the OS and the camera is a bit disheartening. If RIM wants to get out in front they are going to have to step up the processor and memory on their devices and quit relying on old technology.
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Terrible phone. If RIM keeps this up, they will surely go under in the next year or two. People want to see more than a qwerty keyboard these days.
There is a absolutely no innovation in this company. Android and iPhone have already stole the consumer market from RIM, and they are slowly stealing corporate and government market as well. In fact, EU recently has moved away from BBs to android and ipho e.
RIM is on a downward slope.
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Sorry but no government or decent enterprise would switch to unmanaged iphones or android devices. Rim literally have a monolpoly on enterprise devices. Winmo was their only competitor and thats dead..winmo7 isnt for enterprise.
Btw, just because they havent sold out everywhere doesnt mean its not selling. As well as at&t supposively arent giving their customers early upgrades like they did with iphone4. Droid2 btw, isnt sold out either.
Anyways, will I get this phone? Probably not. Im waiting for the magnum to come out. I really dont want a slider. Give me the magnum but preferably the size of the 9000 instead of the 9700.
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Crap tastic phone. I hope RIM goes under.
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Unbelievable how a firm like RIM can fool themselves into thinking that WE are foolish enough to think that the Torch is a “revolutionary product”…. maybe for product managers of RIM but not for the rest of the world. RIM is living its life in a vaccuumous bubble – proud of the technical achievements they designed 10 years ago. Not only are they threatening their brand and their share price with this terrible product and OS, but they are also dooming their future growth by allowing Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Pakistan, India, and other nations access to their secure message and voice databases. Who in the world would want to do business on a BlackBerry ?
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As stated by so many already, the Torch is a significant improvement to current BB line up. That being said, it simply is not the best phone on the market with respect to hardware. To me it seems as though BB completely missed the boat on the required hardware upgrade that accompanies any new phone in this instance and instead was too focused with OS6. Too bad too because I really did want a reason to not switch to the iphone.
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RIM has a solid hold on the Enterprise space with the BES and the manageability it offers (I’m a BES admin for my company) but beyond that they are completely failing to innovate when compared to the current crop of smartphones on the market. Unless you are a corporate client locked into a BES solution, or a diehard BB fan who loves the physical keyboard I can’t see why you would upgrade to the Torch. You can get so much better from the Apple and Android camps.
RIM is starting to remind me of Novell (anyone here remember them)? They were king of the hill in network operating systems for a long time and they lost it all to Microsoft because they couldn’t innovate and got stuck believing their own reasons for why they had a superior product. In the end the market didn’t care about Novell being “better” and they are a shadow of their former selves.
RIM also seems to be stuck in that particular groove, except that their latest offerings aren’t even technically superior to their competitors, they are behind the curve and look destined to stay there.
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pls correct me if i’m wrong
but did anyone notice countries are worried about how too strong Rim’s security is?
or did i miss understand something
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Instead of working on BBOS6, RIM should have worked on putting Android OS on the Torch and future touchscreen devices.
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TNKGRL said it best… ” RIM really has to move out of Waterloo and head to Cali…”
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Very little buzz was created for this new Blackberry so I”m not surprised by the results. It’s a step in the right direction, for sure, but they have a LONG way to go to catch up. As a long time Blackberry owner, this looks disappointing. Sure it will do everything it used to do, but slightly better, but it still can’t compete from a functionality standpoint (apps).
Too little, too late
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Who thought this phone would break any records? Its a rehash of the same products. Storm 2 with a keyboard and new fancy theme.
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While I’m not necessarily a fan of this device, how off the mark is RIM with the hardware specs? Do you need a 1ghz chip to do txt email. Whether on BES or not that’s what this device is. Native email is still mostly txt based. Google talk, BB messenger, Phone, basic browsing – you don’t need a 1g processor or a large screen to do any of that. Nor do you need it to play music. As for video, my Bold 9700 is still the only mobile device I have that I can torrent down a video file, directly copy it to my device, and have it play fine. No re-encoding required.
Has anyone thought this device is the first step or setting itself up to be paired to RIM’s tablet. Perhaps that’s where they’ll put their screen and processor. I think a Torch paired to a RIM tablet could make ALOT more sense than an Iphone 4 and Ipad pairing solution.
Last – for all the geeks out there, I have 4 nieces/nephews all under the age of 20 who have all just gotten Blackberry Curves from various carriers. When asked why they didn’t go for Iphone or Android device they indicated cost and ease of use for what they wanted (full qwerty messaging) with SOME limited music/surfing and apps.
I am not a BB fanboy, however they might be more on the mark with the Torch than a lot are giving them credit for PARTICULARLY if they are setting it up to be paired to a RIM tablet.
I’ve always said if you could take a Bold or Curve and mate it with some of the benefits of the Storm, you’d have the best “overall” device. Ya, you give up some stuff, but I still say the majority of phone users out there want Phone, Email, Music, video, some surfing, and MEANINGFUL/USEFULL apps. I think the 9800 will do this fine.
The only thing I will slam it for is price. yes it should definitely be no more than $400 Canadian for a device with those spec’s
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I think your dead on russ.
Having owned a first gen BB Bold, then quitting that job and getting the ‘consumer’ iPhone 3GS, now back at work with a BB 9700…I would be lost with my old iPhone 3GS in the business world.
Hundreds of thousands of useless apps, vs thousands of useful apps (if you look at the top apps for iPhone, they are made for BB as well) – is the difference, I LIKE the OS 6, I DISLIKE OS 5, looking forward to loading OS 6 when it’s released, unless I can get the Torch upgrade. Hardware get’s the job done.
BES – this is where RIM can really start laying down hurt…BHS -> Blackberry Home Server, running apps via WiFi to your device moving Desktop Manager into this role by stepping up the next stage to automatically sync via the mobile infrastructure.
Web browser – much better
Media – much better, but I only use music @ the gym from a portable device, where my iPod Nano does the job and if I smash it…I didn’t smash a $600-800 phone…as for videos, 9700 and I’m sure 9800 works fine, you are looking at a tiny screen…I guess I’m spoiled with my 50″ HD plasma at home, lets get realistic here.
Hardware – QWERTY physical keyboard – huge…though when you send a SMS message such as ‘ok’ or ‘be right there’, touch screen is fine. When you start needing to express a thought, QWERTY.
Price – this is where Android based and iPhone’s have RIM beat. RIM simply cannot beat with ‘Made in China’, when their phones are ‘Made in Canada’ for the North Americans.
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russ said it best, everyone keeps harping on about hardware specs, but this is not an Ipod that makes phone calls. Also, no one has discussed battery life… ever owned an Iphone or Android? Blackberry absolutely owns the podium in smartphone battery life, and for those whose phones are primarily work / business tools, battery life is extremely important.
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Why the Torch was “underwhelming”:
1) Screen size
2) Hardware – slow processor
3) web browsing still not up to spec, failed due to processor
(the list can go on…)
RIM really needed to nail the web browsing because there aren’t many apps on the platform that work well so you need to access information on the web but if the browser doesn’t work, you need to go to a PC which makes it pointless to own a smartphone in this day and age.
They got some things right but their refusal to bump specs with hardware, the processor and ESPECIALLY MEMORY (could go on for hours about this one) will most likely be their reason for falling behind in market share if they don’t change their tune soon.
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I guess everybody already spent their money on the galaxy and iphone 4.
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Yeah…. Anyone who’s used a iphone or android phone should know the spec are lower than hem for a reason.
That reason is so heavy users don’t run out of juice half way through the day or sooner.
I think the device is great…. Price should be less though, like. 400-450 with no contract.
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Blackberry fan boy here, I am a little disappointed with RIM for releasing this “iPhone killer” I was really excited for this device until I read the specs, they upgraded the software but just flat out left the old hardware on.Whats up with that? they could have waited but maybe it was a strategy to bring out these first generations to pair with the BlackPad? I really see this as a first release to a bigger and better Phone to be released on 2011. I hope when they release the new phone they’ve worked out all the kinks put on a better hardware….and gotten justin timberlake to “bring the sexy back”….two ideas im hoping RIM would adopt is to create a venture with either EA games or even Microsoft or any company handling online gaming to create a web portal for BBM or appworld so we can have some gaming involved our life….sure there can be a balance with work and play…
another idea that would benefit RIM is to outsource or again another venture with Chorus media group….put up that music and video for everyone to purchase….the finance department of chorus can handle the payments of course. or not? does anyone really like to use paypal to pay for their apps? I dont!
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I think it’s a mistake to think that this is RIM’s response to the iPhone or anything Android. It’s a followup to their enterprise solution. They do a little consumer promotion to get all the folks who have a BB for work to get excited and go for an upgrade at their office. I know this will happen at my work…they’ll sell millions of them to BES customers everywhere, and a couple to consumers who like the keyboard and straight-forward use.
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What if you can’t plan manufacturing and distribution…you end up with long line up…
Better engineering long lasting BB without the line ups
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RIM has chopped the price in half to $99. Maybe this will entice potential buyers to pick it up.
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Rim buying Palm
tell me what you think
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