Hands-On With RIM's New OS 4.3.1 for the BlackBerry Curve & BlackBerry Pearl 8100
Posted in News & Rumors on 01 Nov 2007 13:51 by Kevin Michaluk | 61 comments

BlackBerry OS 4.3 With the BlackBerry 8130 now shipping with OS v4.3, we knew it wouldn't be too long before this updated operating system became available for other members in the BlackBerry family as well. From what I've seen today, the Curve and Pearl 8100 won't have to wait much longer to enjoy 4.3's full benefits.

Back in August we ran some leaked screenshots of a BlackBerry Curve running OS v4.3. Today we'll take it a step further and give some hands on feedback with v4.3. But first...some pictures!

Hands On BlackBerry Curve OS 4.3.1 Video

Just incase you're skeptical that the Camera in your BlackBerry Curve will be able to record video... the following video provides the proof and also takes a quick look around some of the easily noticeable improvements to OS v4.3.1.


BlackBerry Curve OS 4.3.1 Images

Installation Images:

BlackBerry Curve OS 4.3

BlackBerry Curve OS 4.3

 BlackBerry Curve OS 4.3

Screenshots: 

 BlackBerry Curve OS 4.3
the previous screenshot we saw in August was v.4.3.0.18.

BlackBerry Curve OS 4.3
Like the 8130, the Dimension L theme comes standard

BlackBerry Curve OS 4.3
Your Curve will soon be able to record video!
Can't record while plugged into the USB, hence this message

BlackBerry Curve OS 4.3
DataViz's Word to Go

BlackBerry Curve OS 4.3
We knew this would be there

BlackBerry Curve OS 4.3
Media Player shows improvements

BlackBerry Curve OS 4.3
Much smoother web browsing

 BlackBerry Curve OS 4.3
Freshened Up Address Book

More Video Captures Taken from the 8300 Curve:

Here it is! Videos taken with an AT&T BlackBerry 8300 Curve (and uploaded immediately to youtube) thanks to the soon to be released OS v4.3!! If you own a Curve and update to v4.3 when it comes out, you too will be capturing your own vids!! The first video of Bruno is with the bedroom lights on. In the second video, the bedroom lights are turned off (the room is dark) and the Curve's flash is kept running throughout the recording (what a nice feature for RIM to include!). Good Boy Bruno, Good Boy!


Bruno the Dog!


In the Dark with the Curve's Light Feature Turned On

BlackBerry Pearl 8100 OS 4.3.1 Images

BlackBerry Pearl OS 4.3
v4.3 for the Pearl 8100

BlackBerry Pearl OS 4.3
Pearl Gets the Voice Recorder,
No Video Recorder

BlackBerry Pearl OS 4.3
DataViz Documents to Go Included?

BlackBerry Pearl OS 4.3

BlackBerry Pearl OS 4.3

BlackBery Pearl OS  4.3

 

More To Come: In-Depth Video Walk Through Still to Come. Ran into a little installation hiccup on my Curve that needs to get resolved first (she went into a vicious power on/power off cycle when I was 90% of the way through the install. Pretty sure I had wayyy too many apps loaded up on the device/no free memory when I tried to do the update). Do it have installed successfully on another Curve & Pearl (where the screenshots & vids above came from), but no video recording capabilities at the location where those devices reside. Working on it though. In terms of release date, before the end of the year is the plan. 4.3 will be available to all devices from the 8700 and up. The Curve gets Video Recording and Voice Recording, the 8100 Pearl just gets Voice Recording (no video recording from what I can tell at this point), and I'm guessing that will be the case with the 8700/8800 too since they don't have cameras! Lots of exciting little refinements! Stay Tuned for more...

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Comments
By: martuca | Date: Thu, 11/01/2007 - 13:38 |

I only hope this update will be available for installation by Mac Users!

By: sugarspicebaby1 | Date: Thu, 11/01/2007 - 14:08 |

agreed- I use a mac too

By: Anonymous (not verified) | Date: Fri, 11/02/2007 - 11:48 |

as far as I know, mac users WONT able to install the updates on their mac. Only on pc. Sorry to break the bad news to you all mac folks...

By: D S (not verified) | Date: Sat, 11/03/2007 - 13:16 |

After 4.3... all updates will be OTA.. so the mac/pc bit won't matter for SW updates..

By: Anonymous (not verified) | Date: Mon, 11/05/2007 - 15:39 |

Oh well ... there's always the iPhone.

By: Anonymous (not verified) | Date: Fri, 08/22/2008 - 18:01 |

I'm in the same damn boat. It's a shame the Mac community gets ignored so much.

By: sugarspicebaby1 | Date: Thu, 11/01/2007 - 14:07 |

Awesome! Looking forward to the update for my Pearl - keep us updated with the info and links! :-)

By: mattmarenic | Date: Thu, 11/01/2007 - 14:31 |

Can't wait to upgrade my Curve...

By: Bla1ze | Date: Thu, 11/01/2007 - 14:36 |

Man, I cant wait to get ahold of that OS, starting to look great!

By: Tommy 29 (not verified) | Date: Thu, 11/01/2007 - 15:07 |

Get this up on bitorrent!!!!

By: kmeyers (not verified) | Date: Thu, 11/01/2007 - 16:23 |

Kevin - any idea when this will be available for the 8320? Just got mine a few days ago, and I'm psyched for it.

By: jlemons01 | Date: Thu, 11/01/2007 - 17:01 |

Gimme!

By: outlyer (not verified) | Date: Thu, 11/01/2007 - 17:11 |

So RIM is planning a new OS and focusing on the consumer models only? You would think the 88xx series would get some attention.

By: EtherealLover | Date: Thu, 11/01/2007 - 18:25 |

NICE!! I want it!
When? When? When?

By: Anonymous (not verified) | Date: Thu, 11/01/2007 - 18:36 |

I want 8320 in Canada for sub 350$ sooo bad

By: kurrupt_1 | Date: Thu, 11/01/2007 - 18:49 |

Are we sure the curve WILL record video with this update?

By: kwues | Date: Thu, 11/01/2007 - 19:14 |

Let There Be Light!!! yessssssss!!! thank you for the good news!!! can't wait!!!!

By: jessiluvsmanny (not verified) | Date: Thu, 11/01/2007 - 19:38 |

I wish it would make the 8100 record video. That would be the best!

By: thisoneisa | Date: Thu, 11/01/2007 - 20:06 |

is the pearl 8100 going to record video as well?? do we know the date this is going to come out?

By: dtapia | Date: Thu, 11/01/2007 - 21:22 |

i cant wait untill the software is out and we can enjoy it. any word if the video option will work on the 8300 ? thats going to be the major thing for me since i record a lot of vid from my grandaughter.

By: Jeepberry | Date: Thu, 11/01/2007 - 21:56 |

Does anyone know when this might be available for download and update in the curve??

By: Anonymous (not verified) | Date: Fri, 11/02/2007 - 01:15 |

Awesome....Now, I officially want a blackberry. Can't wait til this is available!

By: mlomeli | Date: Fri, 11/02/2007 - 02:56 |

This news is better than se.....no....no it isn't. But, if only I had the WiFi Curve, this would complete the package. Great news!

By: kurrupt_1 | Date: Fri, 11/02/2007 - 07:47 |

Can you record a short video on BB - A and send it to BB - B and have it play BB - B?

By: booberrylious (not verified) | Date: Fri, 11/02/2007 - 11:17 |

will we be able to save our sms, mms, email messages on our media card? i am tired of having to erase my important texts, and having the warning message, sim card is almost full, crap.

By: TrueDis (not verified) | Date: Fri, 11/02/2007 - 11:31 |

A2DP on the Pearl - yay or nay!?!

By: njsithlord | Date: Fri, 11/02/2007 - 20:43 |

i wonder when at&t will release this, i miss being able to video record on my phone

ya know if verizon werent secretive idiots, i wouldnt have canceled my account cuz i was sick of waiting for a year for them to release the pearl, if they told their reps a few months ago about releasing the pearl 2 i wouldve waited more -.-

i want the pearl 2 but im not paying 400 bucks for it, but im wondering when at&t will release it now

anyone know when at&t will be releasing 4.3 and the pearl 2???

By: wcurrin | Date: Sat, 11/03/2007 - 00:03 |

my new pearl came today, and I CAN record videos, just a bit of info for the 8130 people.

By: Anonymous (not verified) | Date: Sat, 11/03/2007 - 00:04 |

Thank you for doing such a great review of the new OS. Now I'll just have to upgrade!

By: Eloquence | Date: Sat, 11/03/2007 - 00:05 |

Does this conclusively work with microSD cards in the 6GB+ range? I know 8GB cards are dropping soon and I would like to know if the 6GB is read properly.

Can anyone shed some light on that?

-Elo

By: donnamatt | Date: Sat, 11/03/2007 - 09:23 |

I'm already using a 6GB card on my Curve (4.2.2.180) with no trouble...upon installation, free memory was 5.6GB, and I was able to use the adapter to transfer files between my 2GB card and the 6GB card with no trouble...I've had it for about a week now, and not one problem (yet!)...

By: luc-mobile (not verified) | Date: Sat, 11/03/2007 - 16:01 |

Try putting more than 2.8 Gb of data on that card and you will see the trouble.

By: Carl ayers (not verified) | Date: Thu, 12/20/2007 - 17:41 |

I bought a 6g media card, and everything was good until I tried putting about 3g's of stuff on there. Some music and video files wouldn't even be recognized. After inserting the card and turning the phone on, I'd get a message saying that there is a problem with the card and I need to check it for bug s(or something like that), and the phone wouldn't read ANYTHING on the card...

So now I'm back to a 2g card... and I just use my 6g to shuttle files from work to home.

By: Khan (not verified) | Date: Mon, 01/21/2008 - 01:49 |

Please tell me from where I can download the 4.3 Device software. Awaiting for your reply and link anxiously...

Regards,
Khan

By: chrisbimmermd | Date: Tue, 12/09/2008 - 16:10 |

I'm probably about to downgrade to the 4.3 OS from 4.5 because I'm getting the reboot sequence loop. I've tried all but that.

By: casinojames | Date: Sat, 11/03/2007 - 13:31 |

Is there somewhere we can get this now?

Will I be able to use my new video capability as a caller id option? This was great feature on my old sprint phone!!

By: Anonymous (not verified) | Date: Sat, 11/03/2007 - 18:48 |

Release date?11

By: Michel Cochegrus (not verified) | Date: Sat, 11/03/2007 - 13:42 |

One big feature missing is Flash. That means YouTube and many other websites.

By: pnutbudrcherryb... | Date: Sun, 11/04/2007 - 11:04 |

Man i can't wait for this man! i have kids so a video recorder on my bb will be like heaven! ya that's right i'm gonna have video! wwwoooo hooooo!!!

By: jibi | Date: Tue, 11/06/2007 - 13:20 |

They've added support for the 8300 family for the following formats in MMS (carrier-dependent, I believe, but the actual MMS client support is there).

video/3gpp
video/mp4
video/quicktime
video/x-msvideo
video/x-ms-wmv

:)

By: babe16 (not verified) | Date: Mon, 11/26/2007 - 13:36 |

When OS 4.3.1 I downloads ???

By: flairbrtndr3 (not verified) | Date: Thu, 01/03/2008 - 16:53 |

so i just got my curve in the mail finally and i really want the new software is there anyconfirmed dates on it yet

By: Anonymous (not verified) | Date: Sat, 01/05/2008 - 01:49 |

I WAS WONDERING IS THIS OUT YET AND HOW CAN I GET THIS
PLEASE INFORM ME

By: Blackberry Support Group (not verified) | Date: Wed, 01/09/2008 - 04:59 |

Hi guys! I've got goodnews to all of you. The New OS v 4.3.1 is already out and is readily available for download at this page. www.blackberry.com/downloados431/reverse/loof/bmud/toidi/norom

By: Anonymous (not verified) | Date: Thu, 01/10/2008 - 12:47 |

The website is saying that the page is not available. Are you sure that is the correct address?

By: Anonymous (not verified) | Date: Sun, 01/20/2008 - 09:09 |

Omg, someone actually fell for that shit.

By: Anonymous (not verified) | Date: Fri, 02/08/2008 - 14:35 |

i fell for it...damn it!!!

By: Anonymous (not verified) | Date: Fri, 02/15/2008 - 23:17 |

ahahahahahaha.

i didn't fall for it. almost did, but looked at the last word and was like "hmm. that looks like moron spelled backwards...oh wait! it IS!"

lmao.

good one though!

By: Anonymous (not verified) | Date: Tue, 03/11/2008 - 14:27 |

If you look even closer, the last few words spell:

fool/dumb/idiot/moron

LOL

By: Shaeluv | Date: Sat, 04/26/2008 - 21:18 |

so I followed the ATT link to the blackberry site and got the 4.3 Os... but how do I install it? My computer cant open it its called this right "430_b025_multilanguage.exe.part"

 
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