bijan:

Today I had a number of meetings between Union Square and Madison Square Park in New York City.

I had a brief break in between two meetings and found myself wandering into a Verizon Wireless store on Broadway & 17th street.

They had the new Blackberry Storm on display. This is the new touch screen model that is being touted as the competitor to the iPhone.

I really wanted to see what the keyboard was like on this touchscreen. The Blackberry franchise is due in large part to their email/keyboard superiority over the competition.

I didn’t have time to give the OS a full test.

But I did try out the Blackberry Storm touch keyboard in the store.

And my god, it’s awful.

[End of review]

Bijan, I can’t agree more.  People at work are starting to get BB storms.  I’m not impressed.  Here are the flaws I’ve found:

1) the interface is VERY laggy.

2) the changed to a proprietary usb cord (a page right out of the apple play book)\

3) they went with the annoying 2 letters per key layout for portrait.  Full keyboard layout in landscape mode. The letters always show in UPPERCASE.  It is very hard to type.

4) not for the fat fingered.

5) no side scroll wheel.  It really makes navigating the new menus difficult.

If i was going to get a blackberry the Curve is still superior.