Handset manufacturers and mobile carriers tend to spend quite a bit of money on fluff phone launches (cough*Samsung*cough) but AT&T rarely, if ever, falls into that category. When RIM’s unannounced BlackBerry 9780 aka Bold broke cover last week, many – including myself – assumed that was the device AT&T would be unveiling. Turns out it’s not. And lest we forget that AT&T has always been the one to launch RIM’s latest and greatest excluding the Storm since, you know, that was a terrible, terrible product.
No, what RIM and AT&T plan to announce today at 11AM ET is the fabled touch-screen BlackBerry with a slide-out QWERTY keyboard, the 9800. The vertical slider can be used in its default portrait mode or turned horizontally for landscape mode. It appears as though RIM has ditched SurePress, which was a longstanding gripe with many over the Storm and Storm 2. The official unveil of the 9800 may also usher in a new era of RIM’s archaic OS with OS 6.0.
With the FCC giving RIM the thumbs up on the 9800, it’s basically a sure thing. We’ll find out more in a couple of hours. Tune in for live coverage.
[Images via Berry Times]