Click to Skip Ad
Closing in...

BlackBerry Touch (Monaco / Monza) hands-on!

Published Mar 31st, 2011 12:52PM EDT
BGR

If you buy through a BGR link, we may earn an affiliate commission, helping support our expert product labs.

Part of RIM’s upcoming 2011 BlackBerry lineup we leaked in January contained the company’s latest evolution of a full touchscreen device, the BlackBerry Monaco / Monza. Both names are codenames that signify different carriers the phone will land on, we’re told — Verizon Wireless will get the Monaco while the BlackBerry Monza is the  global GSM version. In any case, the BlackBerry Storm is a thing of the past and RIM finally realizes that its SurePress innovation wasn’t innovative at all. In fact, it was probably one of the biggest complaints users had with the orignal BlackBerry Storm. Hit the break for more details and don’t forget to check out our photo gallery!

The new device, most likely not a member of the Storm family — it may launch as the BlackBerry Touch, though that’s not confirmed — is a thinner, faster and sexier BlackBerry handset. It will run BlackBerry OS 6.1 and as part of the new OS, users will need a BlackBerry ID to login to the system. This is something we’ve been throwing around in our heads for a while — the concept is that you have a BlackBerry ID as opposed to a PIN, which might help facilitate a cloud-type service for backing up data and restoring it, sharing contact information, switching devices, and so on — all tied to your BlackBerry ID. In any case, OS 6.1 looks to be pretty similar to OS 6.0, but we’ll have to see if RIM has any surprises left for us in the three to four months before the BlackBerry Bold Touch is released.

Finally, we’re also hearing that RIM will make all of the devices we exclusively leaked official at BlackBerry World in May — the BlackBerry Bold Touch, BlackBerry Curve Touch, BlackBerry Torch 2 and BlackBerry Touch (BlackBerry Monaco / Monza). Looks like it’s shaping up to be quite a show! Make sure to check out all the photos in our gallery!

Jonathan S. Geller
Jonathan Geller Founder, President & Editor-in-chief

Jonathan S. Geller founded Boy Genius Report, now known as BGR, in 2006. It became the biggest mobile news destination in the world by the end of 2009, and BGR was acquired by leading digital media company PMC in April 2010.

Jonathan is President of BGR Media, LLC., and Editor-in-chief of the BGR website.

What started as a side project at the age of 16, quickly transpired into 24-hour days and nights of sharing exclusive and breaking news about the mobile communications industry. BGR now reaches up to 100 million readers a month through the website, syndication partners, and additional channels.