I want to just preface this by saying, I LOVE the look of this phone. The White BlackBerry 9700 is as of this morning, now available for your buying pleasure. For the low low price of $99.99 after a $50 mail in rebate, the White Blackberry 9700 can be yours. Go. Buy. Now.
T-Mobile has officially announced two summer additions to the Blackberry line, the Blackberry 9700 in White and Blackberry 8520 in Fuchsia Red. Strictly speaking, these are two devices we’ve known about for some time but it’s always worth reminding the Blackberry faithful that they have two new color choices with which to choose. Nothing says I love my phone like something that can match your clothes. The Blackberry 8520 is brilliant Fuchsia Red is available today online and in T-Mobile retail stores for $49.99 with a 2-year agreement. The Blackberry Bold in White, which is just beautiful in its clean white coloring and will be available May 26th for $129.99 with a 2 year agreement.
Well it is another day in the T-Mobile world and that means another day of updates. Yesterday the HTC HD2 faithful got their hands on a much-desired upgrade and today, BlackBerry Bold 9700 users are receiving their day in the limelight. OS version 5.0.0.586 with a list of fixes is now available from the official T-Mobile BB Upgrade site and you should be heading there right now. Why are you still here? Go!
Update: According to the official T-Mobile forums, this update will actually launch May 19th…not the 18th and certainly not the 11th. We swear, its launching tomorrow, honest injun!
For many of you the Blackberry 9700 has been a terrific device following the excellent tradition RIM has set forth. For some of you, the 3G-dropped call issue has plagued you from the very beginning but fear not, T-Mobile is working with RIM to bring resolution to some of your troubles. We previously mentioned the update and had hopes for its arrival May 11th but due to unknown difficulties it was pushed back, if only for 7 days. According to the official T-Mobile forums you can finally expect to get your hands on this update May 18th.
Refreshing what exactly will be covered in this update:
Just two days ago, we got wind that the sought after White BlackBerry Bold 9700 had been scheduled for a May 26th release. Now we can confirm that with the above image and since an image is worth a thousand words, we’ll just say: we told you so!
The White BlackBerry Bold release date has seemingly kept many of you up at night, waiting for us to announce that special day. Well take comfort TmoNews readers because May 26th looks to be that day. It’s tentative for right now and of course remains subject to change but for now both the BlackBerry Bold 9700 and the Fuchsia 8520 look to be dropping Wednesday May 26th. Stay tuned!
During testing for the BlackBerry Bold 9700 software upgrade, several issues were identified that need to be resolved before releasing the upgrade to customers. Based on this feedback, a decision was made to postpone releasing the software via OTA and on the www.t-mobile.com/bbupgradesite.
Stores may have recently received inventory of BlackBerry Bold 9700 devices with the latest software. These devices can be identified by a yellow dot on the POS label. The software on these devices is not impacted by the issues identified in testing, and should continue to be sold in stores.
If you sell through these pre-upgraded devices and need to sell devices with the old software, inform customers new software will be available to download fromwww.t-mobile.com/bbupgrade in the future.
Well, we can’t say we saw this coming as BlackBerry updates tend to be plenty reliable. Unfortunately during the testing phase, this particular update was deemed not ready for consumer use and therefore ya’ll just gotta wait a bit longer. The good news is it seems worth the wait with a promised fix for the 3G dropped call issue, improvement to trackpad performance and a host of other fixes that promise to make your BlackBerry feel shiny and new again, maybe. We’re sure it won’t be to long before the fix comes to fruition and delivers itself to the masses. Until then.
I have to say that the White BlackBerry Bold is a sharp sharp looking phone. As a white iPhone user, I’ve got a thing for the “clean” factor that comes with the ownership of a white cellular device. BlackBerry is doing its part to show off the upcoming release with a 60 second promo video that really just shows the phone twirling around. Either way, it’s a hot looking BlackBerry and those waiting around for it will appreciate all that this video has to offer.
We’ve got good news T-Mobile Bold 9700 owners! Beginning May 11th, T-Mobile will be pushing out a new software upgrade to address some of the top issues Bold 9700 owners were experiencing. The new software upgrade will include several improvements along with some new features.
The new software upgrade will include:
Increased general OS stability (less battery pulls/lag etc.)
Improvements to the messaging experience such as, a separate icon for BES e-mail, improvements to chat view SMS interface, and an improved BlackBerry Messenger (BBM) client.
General Visual Voicemail improvements
Resolve 3G drop call issue
Mobile Backup Support
Improvements to TrackPad performance
Customers may receive devices with the new software as early as the week of April 26. So if you purchased a T-Mobile BlackBerry Bold 9700 on or after, Monday, April 26th, there’s a chance you might already be running the new software. For all other customers with the old software, the software upgrade will be made available via an Over-the-Air (OTA) Update and from the www.T-Mobile.com/bbupgrade site on Tuesday, May 11th.
For those of you that were looking to pick up a BlackBerry Bold 9700 in that sexy white color, we have some bad news. Unfortunately, it looks like the white Bold 9700 has been delayed. Originally, the white variation was scheduled for a May 5th release, but our sources are now telling us it has been delayed for unknown reasons. We’re working on finding more info as to exactly when it will be released, but until then hold tight. We’ll keep you guys updated!