Its a simple question. The first Storm flopped in a very big way. I am still yet to find anyone who likes the phone. There was a lot of hype in the UK fuelled by Vodafone, that this phone was the next big thing, internally labelling the phone as a handset that would help turn the company’s fortunes around. Sales were pretty high, complaints were even higher.

The first version of the Storm looked ok and like all Blackberrys, handled email and messaging better than any other handset out there. Unfortunately thats where the positives stop.

There were two major negatives. The first seemed strange as every smart phone released at the time had wifi as standard the storm didnt. The remaining negative was the screen, the infamous suretype. In theory it was a good idea, in practice it sucked. Highlight and press were the instructions on how to use the screen. The touch screen actually moved in order to give a tactile response to the user. It didnt work. the screen wasnt accurate enough and it left users frustrated, very very frustrated.

There was much discussion around the Storm 2 with rumours everywhere about a pull out keyboard, a more conventional touch screen and the inclusion of wifi. Well its nice to see RIM have listened on the WiFi front but the continued use of the suretype screen means many people will avoid this handset like the plague.

You have to wonder, if a handset flops as much as the first Blackberry Storm, why create a 2nd version which seems to only have minor improvements?