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Wednesday 3 August 2011

7 things to Make Blackberry better

Since I got the Blackberry Torch 9800 I have been wondering how it could be better. The phone works well and to date I have no complaints. However there are those little things that you notice over time that would be nice to have when you compare it to other phones and manufacturers.

My 7 things that I hope Blackberry introduce that would make it even better.
  1. Improve the Blackberry Desktop Manager software
  2. More apps in the App World
  3. Improve the usability of Blackberry Maps
  4. Voice guided navigation as standard with Blackberry Maps and not through an app
  5. Bright, colourful icons
  6. E-mail subject lines to scroll (so you don't need to open the e-mail)
  7. Get the headset to ring when a phone call comes through

My first improvement would be to completely overhaul the Blackberry Desktop Manager software. Apart from making backups and copying folders across there really is not much more to be done with the software. Ok, you can you application maintenance as well but when you compare it to the likes of say Nokia Ovi suite, BB desktop manager is found wanting in just about all areas.

It would be great to have better access to your device, like being able to view your contacts on the physical phone, read and delete text messages with ease. Even integrate the Blackberry App World into the software to make purchasing apps that little bit easier.

Talking of the App world, when is it going to grow into the size of the Android, Apple and Ovi stores? Also why is not possible to get apps like "Angry Birds" for example. Blackberry needs to do more to get better apps onto the market.

Blackberry Maps appears to be something that RIM just added because others had it. Maps offers navigation but it is difficult to drive and constantly look at your phone for the turn-by-turn navigation and then realise you need to have manually moved the navigation checkpoint on after each point. Bring on free voice guided navigation. There are voice guided navigation apps in the App world but if another brand can do this why can't RIM.

Something that would be nice is nicer looking icons, where is the colour? The icons are boring, functional yes, but boring as hell to look at everyday. I am sure there is probably an app or something for this but surely as a default package you could add some choices.

When accessing the strong point of the Blackberry, e-Mail, something that would be nice is have the subject line scroll so you do not need to open the mail to remind yourself what it is about. This would save time due to peoples poor e-mail etiquette.

The last thing that I believe would make Blackberry that much better is something that seems small and obvious yet RIM have not implemented. When you have the headset plugged in, make sure the phone rings in the headset. This is very annoying when driving along with your headset on and the phone rings and you do not know it is even ringing.

Let me know what you think would make the BlackBerry devices better.

2 comments:

  1. They should put a torch on the Blackberry Torch.

    ReplyDelete
  2. You can switch the 'torch' on by pressing the space key when in video camera mode.

    ReplyDelete