BlackBerry Magnum Hybrid Smartphone Pictures Leaked BlackBerry Magnum to Feature Touchscreen and Full QWERTY Keyboard

The BlackBerry Magnum is not official yet but it s a handset which will
be getting a lot of attention from faithful BlackBerry fans but not
only. The handset is going to be one of the first RIM creations to
feature both a touchscreen display and a full QWERTY keyboard. It s a
Storm meets Bold kind of a phone which should have been conceived a long
time ago.
One of the most important things people love in a BlackBerry is the
full-featured, easy to play with, QWERTY keyboard. The Storm and the
Storm 2 replaced the keyboard going touchscreen and virtual QWERTY
instead. That was not a bad idea but neither the Storm nor the Storm 2
managed to fight the iPhone. Not being the iPhone killer that people
expected, the Storm didn t exactly made it to the BlackBerry hall of fame.
Handsets like the Bold or the Curve series are far more popular than the
Storm so, needless to say, RIM will not dump the QWERTY keyboard for
good anytime soon. That s why I still wonder why instead of making the
Storm in the first place not create something like the Magnum? It would
combine the usefulness of a full keyboard with the touchscreen interface
that would get you faster through the menus.
Sure the Magnum doesn t look like a true iPhone competitor, does it? But
who s to say that a true iPhone competitor should be all touch but no
QWERTY? The Palm Pre has a keyboard and so does the Droid, and other
Android smartphones for that matter. They are all supposed to be iPhone
killers, aren t they?
As you can see the Magnum has been spotted already and we hope to see it
at MWC 2010. There are no specs available at this point but it s not
pretty difficult to imagine a BlackBerry Bold 9700 or Curve 8900 with a
touchscreen, is it? Take out the trackpad and you ll get something like
the Magnum.
We have no arrival dates for this baby yet folks, but according to leaks
and rumors, the Magnum is not the only hybrid smartphone from RIM out
there. A certain Dakota is also going to sport the same features at some
point in the future.