This really shouldn't come as a surprise to any Storm owners out there who visit the Storm OS discussion forum but it does need a blog post mention. BGR has posted information on what was supposed to be "next official OS" for the Verizon BlackBerry Storm. OS 4.7.0.141 was destined to be delivered to Storm owners but at this point has apparently yet again failed Big Red's technical certification (it seems they're being pickier than other 9530 carriers as we have seen newer OS releases get official from Bell and Telus).
So this outcome leaves everyone to wonder, what will the next official OS for the Verizon BlackBerry Storm 9530 be? There's been talk in the forums that internal development work has stopped on OS 4.7 and been transitioned over to OS 5.0, but from conversations at WES last week it seems 5.0 won't be rolled out until August/September. It seems crazy to me that Verizon's current supported OS, version 4.7.0.75, still possesses the bug that prevents some sounds from playing through external speakers on the Storm in apps (not cool for fart or alarm clock apps!), an issue that causes developers customer support grief every day, as well as consumers who can't get refunds via app world and are uncomfortable with the thought of upgrading to an unsupported OS in order to make their newly-purchased app work (I'll keep this short and not get into any other stuff...).
With the "Storm 2" rumors now being confirmed, I just hope Verizon and RIM don't forget about the first generation of Storm owners out there and kick "Storm 1" OS development into high gear. Seriously, according to the VZW BlackBerry download site the last update for the Storm came on December 5th, 2008... that's over six months ago! Storm owners - feel free to express your frustrations in the comments -- we feel your pain -- just try and keep the four letter profanity to a minimum.
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387 comments
yep...saw it coming.
I'm not bothered by it because I am running 4.7/5.0 hybrid and lovinggggggg it!
But like I said, no surprise to me at all that Verizon failed this.
Where do you get the hybrid OS? Can I find it on a mega upload somewhere? Thanks
It's here:
http://forums.crackberry.com/f132/9530-9500-141-5-0-0-93-9000-
hybrid-beta-204517/
Make sure you combine that address above. It wouldn't show the whole thing without adding a space in the middle.
hybrid os here i COME!
But the most upsetting thing of all is the lack of communication from big red. Why don't they just let us know what's happening? Information is power. It makes me more upset that I have no idea what is going on, how long it's going to be and what the course of action is. If they come out and say "it's going to be 2 months" then great, I can make my own decisions. I can wait or change back to the curve. Their tight lipped inaction is the most infuriating of all.
I totally agree with what Paul!765 said.
The worst part of all this is Verizon's lack of communication. Except for the few people providing rumors and hear-say, nobody has any clue whats going on or when to expect anything regarding the Storm from Verizon.
The Storm is on top of Verizon's phone selection, and is one of their most expensive phones...and yet Verizon leaves us all in the dark.
How could anyone feel safe about buying a Storm 2 when (if) it comes out knowing how under developed the original Storm is? WTF is going on Verizon!?!??!
birthday gift and need to pick a verizon phone?
Get it. It's a great Blackberry. You can install the 5.0 hybrid and it runs beautifully and gives you a great deal more app memory.
The Storm is definitely the best phone I've ever had and I use it all the time.
OMG AFTER 3 DIFF STORMS I FOUND ONE THAT WORKS GREAT AND I AM IN LOVE NOW I AM LITERALLY SHAKING IN MY CHAIR CAUSE ALL OF THE GREAT TALK ABOUT THIS HYBRID OS I AM SOO READY ABOUT TO LOAD THAT BABY NOW = ) THANKS FOR THE PREVIOUS LINK FOR THE 2ND COMMENT
Unless you feel like having a brick for a phone or dealing with the painful slow running OS dont do it. I would happily trade in my phone for almost any other phone at this point. Sure if you feel like downloading an unapproved OS and cutting and chopping bits and parts of code into it to make it run only to find out your warratny is voided by all means go ahead and deall with this piece of garbage. Have somone with an Iphone go to the store with you and compare how each works and there is no way you will purchase this thing. Paper weight junk!
Don't be ridiculous. You don't need a hybrid OS. .132 works great and does not have any major bugs left.
Do not give this phone as a gift! I would feel embarassed to tell someone they need to install beta software in order for their phone to work properly. Get them a gift certificate from Verizon and tell them you were not sure that they would like the phone. People are usually picky about their phones and the Storm is an aquired taste. It is a great phone at times, but not always.
I am going nuts with the touch screen not work more than it does work. I hope the hybrid will correct. Where can I download?
Well my storm freezes all the time and is incredibly slow so I'm very hesitant about the new hybrid software especially when this is my second storm
Also verizon is going to forget about the old storm and work on the new one with wifi
I just sent a strongly worded e-mail to VZW, I plan on calling them tomorrow, and also go to the store to question and complain until I get tired of hearing myself. I suggest that everyone flood them with calls, e-mails, and store visits. I'm doing my part, will you do yours?
Yeah seriously. Don't do that. That's just creating more stress on the part of the VZW employees who aren't going to do anything but get flack from their managers for not keeping call volume down. You aren't going to get any new info out of the poor rep...just stress them out and cause them to get razzled by the influx of calls for no reason.
Then the person that actually needs help will get a disgruntled rep.
Seriously just chill and wait for RIM to release something good enough to be official, or if you really want one of these current leaks then just download and install one. People just love to be mad at someone about something.
Like little kids you just want to throw tantrums.
They will release it when it is ready. In the meantime, read on crackberry how to install an OS yourself. There are plenty of leaks to choose from. What difference does it make if Verizon supports it or not? If you run into an issue, read online how to fix it. Saves time.
Here is a typical call at a cell-phone tech support call center:
Customer: Hi I'd like to get help installing this software
Rep: "Ok insert the disk that says 'Blackberry Desktop Software'
Customer: "Ok"
Computer: "Press Next to install Blackberry Desktop software"
Customer: "What do I do next"
Rep: "... (sigh)"
Seriously!
Just do it yourself and stop causing yourself and other people headaches. It won't break. And if it does, then follow the instructions in the many threads hear about how to fix it.
I don't buy it when people say "well not all of us are technically inclined"... BS.... you are just AFRAID of what could POSSIBLY happen. People are afraid of what they don't understand...and rightfully so, but sooner or later you gotta take those first steps....
The fool telling you not to flood VZW with complaints has no idea as to what he is talking about. If they get high volumes of complaints on a single topic(phone functionality in this case), they report it to thier supervisors(if they are worthy employees). This eventually makes it up the ranks to people that matter. Anyone who has had a job in retail and actually pain attention would know this. If they can't handle the stress of customer service then they need to look else where for employeement. They are there to represent a company and its products. I am not in anyway suggesting directing your frustration towards the reps or make it personal. Express your unhappiness and ask questions and I sure they will do all they can to help even though it is usually not much.
Verizon already knows we want a new OS and I am sure they are as frustrated as we are with it but they could not pass .141 with the locking bug, that's prety significant to most people (I'm using StormLock so it does not effect me but the vast majority or users are not doing that.)
Yelling at the person in the store (even if they are the "manager") as they are at the very bottom of the food chain when it comes to stuff like this.
Read my posts under this username and tell me again that I'm a fool that doesn't know what I'm talking about. Just because a call center gets high call volume on a particular topic, it doesn't mean that you will all of a sudden get a rushed "official" release(and honestly after the 'rushed official release' you are running on your Storm right now, would you REALLY want that again?). It means that you will get a rushed "official" canned answer from each and every rep that you hang up and call back to because they will all be told to say the same thing.
That's all it does!!
If you really want to make an impact, write to VZW corporate and ask them to do something about it. Flooding the call centers will get you nowhere.
If you want VZW to approve the software that is already out there in the wild, stop waiting and then load a Beta OS. I guarantee that if VZW approved .141 you and many others would be calling and complaining about the locking issue which VZW can do NOTHING about. They did their job by rejecting the shoddy software so RIM gets back to them with a better version.
Can you really complain about that? Sure it takes longer but I'd rather load an OK beta build while waiting instead of crying on Crackberry.com about it all the time and then spending my valuable time going from store to store and calling into a call center all day long. WTF does that accomplish than delay those that actually need immediate help (you ARE being helped by VZW rejecting the crap software...it's a work in progress).
Look how long it took for the Pearl, Curve and even the 8830 to get updated to 4.5. One took much longer than the others but still, those were in their sorry states for months as well and those were handsets that RIM was used to making. The Storm is something entirely different for them.
IF ANYTHING YOU SHOULD FLOOD RIM AND LET THEM KNOW THAT YOU DESERVE SOMETHING DECENT. I'm running .132 and there are still plenty of bugs and my phone reset 3 times yesterday. Just because Bell and Telus went official, doesn't mean that the software is anywhere near good.
I think every storm user should send Verizon an email about it. Dont take it to the stores, they are just mindless boobs that are trained to sell phones.
Here is the Verizon address for complaints if anyone cares
http://www.verizonwireless.com/b2c/contact/index.jsp
If .141 doesn't meet VZW's "strict" standards, I'd love to know how .65 and .75 did. I know we all know the answer to this, they had to get the phone out before the holidays, but this just shows that if they really were serious about releasing the storm with a quality OS, the storm still wouldn't be out yet. A classic case of pushing out a phone wayyyy too soon.
you make a good point, i just don't understand how the OS continues to have bugs... with every leak it seems there are two bugs fixed and one new one...
Because that's how software development works, every time you make an addition to or change in code that change has the potential to impact the functionality of dozens or even hundreds of other bits of code, sometimes this can be predicted and is easy to track down, other times it is something they would never have guessed and it takes a week to find. Then they need to see how easy it is to reproduce and how vital to the operation of the phone it is to decide if it is going to be significant to fail the OS over.
If .141 meets *your* standards, there are no Verizon henchmen wating to jump you if you choose to put it on your phone. Don't wait for Verizon to tell you it's OK to try!
I certainly hope Big Red gets over themselves, they are going to do little at this point to redeem themselves with this phone, so go ahead and release something. I just hope they get an OS going since they are planning to release the Storm soon to the Alltel side of the house, I want one! Guess I'll just have to run a Bell or Telus version of 4.7. Not really a deal breaker for me as I am running a Telus version of 4.5 on my Curve!
I can't say that I couldn't see this coming. I'm suprised that they were testing a OS 141. thats was highfor my thoughta. I don't know. I have verizon... I have the 141 beta! It's great! but verizon does what they think is best for their customers, so I'm sure it'll bring something better!!!! I truely love my storm, but......... sometimes i just want my curve back. 9630....GOSH someone help!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I was one of the first to get a Storm when it came out through the Best Buy preorder and waited patiently to renew my contract with Verizon on the Verizon rep promise that the Storm was going to be a serious contender with the iPhone. Well, six months later I am very disappointed in the lack of an updated OS. In my opinion, current Storm owners on Verizon should be provided the option to renew at their contracts with another device at the "new every two" pricing plan because of the shortcomings with this OS.
Verizon... if you're listening... you will lose customers if you do not address this issue.
Although it has been an ongoing issue for months now, I highly doubt Verizon is going to allow customers to upgrade early at a deep discount because of OS issues. That's like what some people in the forums have said---they should allow storm 1 owners to trade in their storms for a storm 2...
c'mon, that's just funny.
I know people are upset, just go get a leaked OS, or go to AT&T.
STOP USING THAT AS AN EXCUSE OR DEFENSE FOR VERIZON! THERE ARE USERS WHO CAN'T UPGRADE BECAUSE THEY HAVE IT POLICIES WHICH PREVENT THEM. I'm not one of them, but stop being so obtuse!
I am 100% with you,I was at 5 o'clock in the morning waitnig for Verizon to open so I can get my storm. 6 month later I wish I would've gotten the curve or switched to AT&T and gotten the iPhone. Verizon needs to give their "storm customers" the chance to get a phone that would work 100% ( at a great price). I am really tired of missing calls because the phone freezes... Please Verizon.... HEAR US!!!!!!!
Seriously, You guys ever hear of the Motorola Q on every carrier..... Nightmareish nightmare there. Everyone just had their Q, no refunds, no exchanges, just One Big Happy Nightmare!
the Q was a piece of shit, but lets digress.. as far as mobile intel, Motorola doesn't have the rep going for them that RIM does.. I mean one word can prety much sum up Moto Nightmares, RAZR..
RIM is a bigger company on this front and will work harder to make its customers happier. Just as Apple did with refunds on the iPhone after its initial price drop. I'm not trying to predict what RIM/VZW will do, I'm just stating that comparing the Q to the Storm isn't a good judgement..
Let me start saying that was a hard fan of RIM.
Today, plain and simple, I got tired of looking for unofficial OS releases, problems with usability and everything else. I don't believe users should pay the money to become debuggers of products like the Storm. Come on, every single phone coming out of RIM now has tons of issues, tons of updates. Is this the new standard?
My storm is gone for 3 months now and I can proudly say that I am an iPhone user. Yeah, paid the money for the Storm, paid all the overpriced plans that VZW has, and had no problem paying the ETF to get rid of it. Even after all the delays, I gave it a chance - did not work. I am sorry for VZW and RIM because the sad news is, in doing that, I was not alone.
Today, I simply love the fact that I can get my phone and get things done with it, both in terms of business and entertainment. You know the hard part now? Well, it is trying to convince my teenagers that they are too young to get they own iPhones.
please please please "overpriced" on Verizon that isn't overpriced on AT&T.
The overpriced and "crippled" argument are old news. They don't hold water anymore. People just know these buzzwords and spout them about to justify their rampant hatred of cell phone companies.
I'm frustrated about this phone also but it's got nothing to do with Verizon. It's RIM.
Also, yes, you paid for a product and should get support for it when it is buggy as hell, but please stick to the matter at hand...what pricing on VZW is overpriced compared to AT&t's offering? I'd like you to back up that comment. Also take a look at AT&T and see that they are more expensive in several areas. Mainly data...
They only listen if they hear you complaining. Do you really think a VZ Wireless store employee is going to report every complaint he hears to Verizon??? NO!!!!!!
You have to tell Verizon yourself
Here is the Address to email Verizon a complaint.
http://www.verizonwireless.com/b2c/contact/index.jsp
Let them know how we feel about this "Lack of support"!!
Storm on Crackberry users!!!!!!!!!
The generation after next iPhone on Verizon in 2011 is on my mind. It is pretty much a go as it is the only way Apple can expand its market share. It will be just in time for thier new network.
I don't mean to sound like a complainer.. but this is stupid... I joined verizon from Alltel in Late March. And i got my storm thinking there was going to be legit support and such from verizon. however i'm beginning to think verizon doesn't really care that much about me or my phone since they already got my money and to be honest i'm beginning to think the storm is dead to them. either that or it honestly seems like rim can't get their act together... so which is it? either way it looks like i'm going to be getting a different phone in 2010 and chance's are it won't be a blackberry, or on verizon.. don't get me wrong I love my storm i really do, however i don't think i should be installing leaked OS's to get it run correctly... scratch that better.. . and i'm finding this whole situation to be pretty disappoining. thats my two cents
I've been a storm owner since Dec 24th, 2008. I have the latest .141 leaked OS, yet for some reason, I get more excited when leaks come out for the bold or curve. Explain that one.
......
if vzw don't release a good os for the 9530 very soon I going to go a diffrent service provider or they can give me a second gen. storm for free they can't keep putting junk out there we wont stand for it very long
good luck getting that free second gen. storm. not gonna happen, even if you threaten to leave.
Hi all
I to am frustrated at the storm os that verizon has. I have been having trouble for a while and they just keep sending me another phone. (4 so far) I add apps and keep running out of app memory. Even thou I have amost full phone mem and card mem. So I keep freezing and have to take the batterie out to get it to run. Some times 4 to 5 times a day. They say that the new OS will cure that. Don't know. If anyone has some fixes please let me know.
Thanks
John
FAIL!
fail is an understatement. how about BUSH.
idiot
This is bad, but I don't think it would every come near as much of a failure though. He is going to be pretty hard to top.
If you want an OS update all you need to do is go to the CB Forums, Storm OS Discussion. Try 141 for yourself, or maybe 132, or whatever, as there are loads of leaks and other carrier releases to try. :)
so even the .130 beta, or the one prior to .141 (I can't keep track now) doesn't meet the requirements, yet .75 does? I'm ready to drop verizon as soon as the pre, iphone, or ... ha anything else comes out. ... all I can recommend is taking a piece of folded paper and placing it behind your battery. that'll help the click. very disappointed. oh, and screw the 4 letter profanity! VERIZON PHUCK YOU!
Anyone who tested .141 knew that it wouldn't pass. It is the quickest but had all kinds of problems. Since 4.7 software development has stopped I think Storm owners on verizon are going to be left in the cold. We should have returned them when we could have. If not for the leaks by awesome people who actually care about us crackberrys then my phone would have been in the garbage already. Its heavy enough to be a good paperweight LOL
the only problem i've had with .141 is quicklaunch, and to be quite honest, I realize I don't even use it that much anyways.. I know other users vary.