Sunday, August 23, 2009

Storm 2 video

Ok, FINALLY a video of the RIM Blackberry Storm 2 that explains the new screen! First, is it Surepress? Yes, and no. :) NO, its now apparently going to be called “TruePress”, but “yes” it has the same philosophy, only better.

Surepress uses a standard touch screen with a single switch under it. This allows you to select an icon, then push slightly harder and the screen will press the button and now you have activated the icon. So touching the screen is like a single click and pressing down a bit is like double clicking. Very nice, but there is a problem. There is only on button under the screen, so if you try to type fast, you get screwed waiting for the button to bounce back. No big deal, but still… Also, that button under the middle of the touchscreen means that sometimes the presses in the corners of the screen don’t register.

Enter “TruePress”. TruePress is the same concept. You touch an icon to select, and press it to activate. BUT, there is no switch under the screen! Instead TruePress uses piezo technology. So a touch screen senses you touching it and sends the coordinates to the operating system, but with TruePress there is ANOTHER layer (under? over?) that you have to push a bit harder to activate, and when you do, those coordinates are also sent. One cool thing about TruePress using piezo means that you still get the feedback! The feedback is not as aggressive as SurePress, but near the end of the video he types on the Storm2 and you can hear it when he presses down harder. AND… (drum roll please) TruePress is multitouch! (“did he say multitouch?”, “you know Gladys, I think he did!”) That's right, multi touch! So now when you get really flying on the typing it wont get all wonky, and of course this means all sorts of cool possibilities for new user interfaces.

When I got my Storm with SurePress I fell in love with it, I thought “THIS is how a touch screen should work.” I was wrong, based on what I know about the Storm2, TruePress is how a touch screen should work.


p.s. Don’t be thrown by the CDMA vs GSM crap, the Storm2 on Verizon will still be a world phone.


  1. I disagree. I think the thing on Storm will be better overall than what's on Storm 2. I think it makes way more sense to have a touch screen with one button that just senses when you push down. On the other hand, with Storm 2, you can "click" two locations at the same time. I'll really have to hold in in my hand and play with it (no what I mean?) before I pass judgement, but as of right now I see this as the same functionality done by an almost imperceptibly different process.

    I am excited that Odin (that's what those of us in the know call Storm 2 at this phase) has some form of click confirmation, and I think that making it "not surepress" will appease the morons who don't like surepress by essentially making them try surepress again, but this time it will work out of the box, which was the real problem, not that surepress is bad, but that it didn't work.

    Bottom line: me = happy, but with trepidation. Just like Robert Downey jr. as Sherlock holmes.

  2. I agree Thor, to me it feels like TruePress is just a better SurePress. Not having the single button in the middle means better screen coverage and multipress should be groovy.

  3. What was the touchscreen technology that CDC used way back when?

  4. Actually watched the video just now. Dude is a nutbag. He keeps talking about how much better Odin looks than Storm. WTF is he talking about? They look exactly the same. And the screen looks disconnected just like on Storm. Turns out it's not, but it still looks like it is.

    His whole "wait for the screen to pop up again" comment is also ridiculous. You type with your thumbs. You only have two. By the time your other thumb comes down, the screen is back up. If I was typing full-hand on a keyboard that works like Storm, I would throw it out the window. But I'm not. Just typing with your thumbs, you can't possibly push your other thumb down before the screen comes back into place.

    After watching the video, I agree that Odin will be better than Storm, but people keep going on the assumption that there is something wrong with Storm, and there just isn't.

    Wifi is cool though. I almost didn't get Storm because it doesn't wifi. And piezoelectric screen is way cool. So much better than a one-button screen.

  5. People who have never had a good high speed smart phone say "wifi in a phone is great!".
    No, it sucks, you will never use it. Why take the time to set up wifi for the local network, when you can just use the high speed evdo?