More pictures of the BlackBerry Slider have surfaced over at BlackBerry Leaks including one next to a Curve 8900.

For a personal point of view this seems to be the perfect form factor- a full touch screen and a QWERTY keyboard, but in portrait rather than landscape- why not have the best of both worlds in a device that is not much bigger than one of the smallest BlackBerry’s out there?

The Storm screen is a bonus for BlackBerry OS, but a hardware keyboard is needed to drive it in its current form- I say bring it on.

I recently purchased a BlackBerry Pearl 8120 from Orange for a freelance writing project and chose this particular smartphone because I had never used one before. Three later I am glad… glad that I had never used one before.

I was ready to write a review of the Pearl, but really cannot be bothered. It is slow, frequently stalls and in comparison to the Curve 8520 feels basic and from a time when smartphones were slow and didn’t do much well at all.

Part of my frustration with the Pearl came from having to deal with Orange- two days of calls and five promises that BIS had been set up got my juices flowing until eventually on the third day it appeared. Everyone was polite, but seemingly had no idea of what they were doing and this left a very poor first impression of the company to me. My very first mobile phone was with Orange many years ago and the service was delightful; every agent was multi-skilled and all too willing to help. Compare that with today where talking to each agent leaves the impression that their training was given to them on a post-it note.

Anyway, I digress. The strange thing about the Pearl is that three days later I kind of like it. The keyboard is surprisingly useful and the software takes care of almost every word I input. Despite its small size I can respond to emails very quickly and can fully understand why people like this phone so much. However, for an extra £60 the Curve 8520 offers better battery life, better call quality, a better speakerphone, a better camera, a bigger screen, a better keyboard, better OS, faster performance, more memory and an overall feel of a phone that you can rely on. It is a complete no brainer to me to say that the 8520 is the option to go for.

Like many BlackBerry’s the Pearl will be employer supplied and so most users will not care what it is like in the real world, but there is much better out there and better means being more productive. The diminutive size of the Pearl does offer many advantages though and it is one of those devices that can do an awful lot in the smallest of spaces. At its current price point it is still a bargain, but one which could do with some spicing up in the near future. Chances are that that will happen very soon.

PhotoNote for BlackBerry looks like a simple, but potentially useful new app. “PhotoNote lets you take photos with notes. You can use it to share ideas with friend and colleages. It is also useful as a visual todo list or photo diary.”

• Take photos with notes
• Capture ideas quickly
• Share them thru email
• Use as a visual todo list
• Keep a photo diary
• Fast text filter

Jerry Seinfeld has had a dig at BlackBerry people on the Letterman show and even though he is not usually funny, he probably sums us BlackBerry users up perfectly.

The iPhone is often criticised for having many stupid apps available for it, but just take a look at some of the new BlackBerry software releases-

Gangster Speak: Gangster Speak is a fun way to practice your “gangster/mobster” voice. It has two different takes, or accents, on classic gangster lines you would likely hear in old movies. Laugh with your friends as you see who does the best impersonation or fire off one of the sound clips as a funny addition to a conversation! Download Gangster Speak today and see if you could have passed as a gangster!

Child Height: Baby height application predicts the height of the baby or child based on the parent’s height. The height shown is the midparental height for the child. Just to clarify this one, my Father is 5′ 7″ and my Mother is 5′ 0″. I am 6′ 1″. Go figure…

Blackberry Round: Using an easy to use interface, you can select each drink, it’s size and mixer from the touch of a button. Once you’ve built up your round order the application will generate a “results screen” which you can use to read off, or even show the Bartender in a noisey environment.

So there you go- three apps that you will have no use for. Once again, PDA-247 delivers the stuff you need!:)

iCall Manager PRO is a seriously smart app for BlackBerry phones and is also discounted until the end of April to only $8.99- “iCall Manager, the most powerful call filter for Blackberry smartphone. iCall Manager allows you to create custom profiles to manage your incoming phone calls. You can create unlimited profiles as you need.

Profile let you manage blacklist numbers, reject or accept private or unknown number, accept or send the caller to Voice Mail

You’ll have complete control over who can reach you.”

SwooshContacts for BlackBerry adds some personality and cleverness to the standard BB contacts app. “SwooshContacts automatically ranks your contacts based on activity and makes it quick to contact them.”

• FREE TRIAL
• Tracks contact activity
• Automatically ranks contacts
• Sort by activity
• Sort by date
• Sort by rank
• Sort by name
• Sort by company
• Shows contact photos
• Quickly filter contacts
• Quickly send emails
• Quickly send SMSs
• Quickly place calls
• Quickly show maps
• Award stars to valuable contacts
• Award hearts to your absolute favourites
• Less than 40 kilobytes!

Tether for BlackBerry is down by 50% for today only to $24.97. Still a best seller and deservedly so.

Have you ever been stuck in an airport, hotel room, coffee shop, or on the road with no Internet? Frustrated paying $9.95 for 30 minutes of internet service? Resorting to your Blackberry but wished you could use your laptop?

Tether is here to provide a solution to all those worries!

Tether is an application that allows your PC to take advantage of your Blackberry’s data plan, allowing you to access the Internet on your laptop anywhere there is cellular coverage from your BlackBerry.

Tether is easy to install, easy to use, works practically anywhere, and is cost effective.

Business Card Reader for BlackBerry is a long overdue app on this platform, but one which some will love. However, I can’t remember the last time I saw a real business card…

• If you live active business and social life, contact partners, conduct negotiations, make business deals, you usually exchange business cards. Eventually you get tons of business cards and it becomes difficult to store, search and remember important contacts. Now you can scan them to your BlackBerry, just take a look at one of the best BlackBerry business card scanner apps!
• Business Card Reader scans and “reads” the picture using ABBYY’s text recognition technology and enters the data into appropriate fields of the BlackBerry address book.
• No more boring manual input of the names, phone numbers, emails and other information from business cards!
• Business Card Reader creates complete and accurate contact information on BlackBerry in a few seconds.
• Recognizes English, French, Italian, German and Spanish business cards.
• Business Card Reader is of great value for anyone who communicates with many people in work or personal life. It’s an excellent tool for business professionals, exhibitors at trade shows, exhibitions attendees and sales personnel.
• Supported phones with autofocus camera: Tour, Curve 8900, Storm, Storm 2, Bold 9700

As each day passes the BlackBerry Slider (that would be a good name for it actually) becomes more real. BlackBerry Leaks has posted some new photos of the device and the idea could work well- it would make it a more useful Storm and be one of few phones with both a hardware keyboard and a touch screen. However, it may be a bit big when opened out.

“Now here is something very interesting! It appears to be the first live images of a BlackBerry Slider! While we cannot confirm the legitimacy of these images just yet, they do seem ever so convincing. All of the characteristics fall into place (from what we can see). The buttons are up-to-date and “built-in” to the touchscreen. There is a touchpad, which makes sense, for additional navigation…”

Gotcha! for BlackBerry is an amusing little prank app that should be funny for… all of 5 seconds. May be worth it to you if you like pranking serious BlackBerry colleagues at work.

“Gotcha!” makes it easy to sucker your friends in to falling for a classic prank! It looks just like a normal game up until you begin playing the first level. Simply tell someone to check out the new game you downloaded then sit back and enjoy the show!

The app instructs your unsuspecting friends to watch the screen closely for ghosts floating through a scene that they will catch. After a few seconds of letting them stare intently at the screen, a horrifying picture pops up along with a loud shrieking noise! After their shock dies down, your friends will understand the true meaning behind the title of the app!

Download “Gotcha!” and see which of your friends will maintain their composure!”

FileScout for BlackBerry has been updated and discounted by $2 until March 15th. One of the very best apps available for this platform and a steal at under $5.

“FileScout – the complete file, text, zip, and image manager
-BlackBerry Developers Fund Developer Challenge 2009 Finalists-

FileScout is a file explorer for your BlackBerry®. In addition to its core functionality (browse the file system, create directories, copy, move, rename, zip, unzip, delete files, or open your media files directly, FileScout also allows you to open text files (including .ini, .xml, etc.) so you are able to edit, copy, and paste text segments of text.

Additionally FileScout allows you to manipulate images (resize & rotate), easily save and access your favorites, search for files, create playlists across multiple folders, and send files via email or Bluetooth®.

Before your purchase feel free to download the 14 day trial version.”

BlackBerry Enterprise Server Express is now available for free from the RIM website. If you have the right server, this could be perfect for your small business. “Connect two people via BlackBerry® smartphones and ideas get bigger. Progress happens faster. Answers get smarter. So imagine what happens when you give a business the freedom to connect all its employees.

BlackBerry® Enterprise Server Express enables businesses of any size to quickly and easily get started with the BlackBerry solution. It provides advanced BlackBerry smartphone features with no additional software or user license fees, and works with any Internet-enabled BlackBerry data plan or a BlackBerry enterprise data plan.”

Vodafone UK has priced the HTC Legend at a respectable £1.99 on a 24 month contract at £25/month which also gives you unlimited texts and 300 minutes. I am presuming that data is extra and the unusual pricing continues with the Legend costing only £12.99 on a 18 month £30/month contract. More at Pocket-lint.

It looks as though no current Windows Mobile phones will be upgradeable to Windows Phone 7. apcmag has the scoop and the following says it all really- ““Because we have very specific requirements for Windows Phone 7 Series the current phones we have right now will not be upgradable”, Kwan explained.”

pocket story – The Boy Giant has been released for the iPhone by Wotsamaflip and is as good as the excellent The Smelly Sprout from the same developer. Anything that keeps my 6 year old daughter transfixed must be good.

Good RSS apps are hard to find on the BlackBerry platform and matrixFeeds mightt help you in that search. One overriding question though- why the Matrix bit?

“Matrix falling code app that displays RSS feeds in each stream.

• -Individual RSS items displayed in each falling code stream
• -RSS feeds downloaded seamlessly in the backgrounds
• -Default AP News feeds
• Additional Features with Purchase:
• -Add custom RSS Feeds such as secured Twitter feeds, CrackBerry Blogs, Digg, etc.
• -Change the stream color and size of each feed
• -Option to Launch when a Charger is connected.
• -Basic Authentication for Secured feeds supported

It’s been a long wait, but the BBC iPlayer has at last arrived on the BlackBerry platform. All you need to do is go to http://www.bbc.co.uk/mobile/bbapps/ and then download the shortcut which will start the process. I haven’t had time to test it yet, but will report back as soon as I have had some quality time with it.