Ooohhhh... Miss CrackBerry is not going to be happy about this when I tell her. She's totally a mute key standby person.

Am I supposed to fish through menus to put my phone in standby now?

Definitely not impressed. Sticking with .351 for the time being.

Well, with the lock key locking the device keyboard and not the entire device, it should function as a standby mode.

I use the mute key standby option constantly. I work in a dusty environment and there are no full coverage cases to adequately protect my 9700 that also have standby magnets. I'm currently using a hard shell nylon camera case. Currently on official .405 for ATT and I still have mute key standby. Maybe no upgrades for me now. Unless key lock will also activate standby mode.

Never used the previous setting but the new one is better, if you use a lot your device you can save more bettery like this...

As long as I have a way to lock it I am fine. Left top or right top, it doesn't matter to me. I carry My Tour in all sorts of pockets and have "pocket dialed" way too often. I like locking/unlocking it with 1 touch.

I use the standby mode all the time with the mute key on my 8330. Why? because my son got a hold of my brother's BB and hit the 911 key when he had his device locked.....
Yeah my at the time 4 yr old was wrong, but what's next? No sleeper magnet?

So it isn't effecting me yet but once I upgrade or VZW rolls out an officail it definitely will. While at work I use a holster so no problem there but when I toss it in my pocket after work or on the weekends I always use the mute button to put it into stand by.

I would have to think that there is a good reason for removing this feature, otherwise why waste the time. Guessing it either effected something in the newer 5.0 builds or maybe they had to remove it for something that is coming soon.

I have 5.0 on my Tour and my mute/standby works great.

I love the mute key standby feature. I'm so hooked on it with my phone when I reach for somebody else's phone I'll quickly tap the mute key if the display is off. It's such a habit. Maybe I won't upgrade for a while.

This is precisely why I left bb and went to the iPhone. RIM keeps effing things up way too much. I have seen the light, bb used to be the greatest thing since sliced bread but now they just straight up blow goat balls

All I can say is, WELL THAT SUCKS!! I use that standby all the time. I love that great feature, keeps me from making pocket calls.

Pressing mute for more than a second puts my Bold in standby, using OS 5 from TMO (.330).

Hi,

I own a Curve 8520, and I recently upgraded to 5.0 (the official one from Wind Hellas). So far (i.e. 4.6) what i had was:

- long press on * would lock the keyboard; screen would stay on displaying the owner info; unlocking was made by pressing *, followed by Send key;
- long press on Mute (top of phone) would present, for a second or so, the message "Entering standy mode", after which the screen would turn off; getting out of standy mode was made by pressing the Mute Key [which, by the way, in the Curve 8520, also functions as Play/Pause and as a shortcut to Media]

The behaviour I now have is: either a long press on * or a long press on Mute will immediately lock the keyboard and turn off the screen; either way you do this, unlocking is done by pressing Mute (if you press some of the keys, the screen will light up and tell you "keyboard is locked, please press Mute to unlock"). The owner info is not displayed as it used to be when keyboard was locked in 4.6; the only time it appears is when keyboard is locked after turning the phone on, but, unlike in 4.6 (where you had to manually unkock the keyboard with * and Send), it automatically unlocks after one second or less.

I still haven't figured out if the current key lock feature is something between the old "key lock" and "standby" modes.

My Bold 9700 with 5.0.0.330 still goes to standby by pressing mute.

For those that don't use holsters or sleeper cases, place your BlackBerry on a hyberpad to get the same benefit.

A lot of people seem to be missing that you can put it into standby, by pressing the LOCK key now. I have the Bold 2 (9700) and this came into effect after OS 5.0.442 - so that one is still "safe" but any releases after that will have the new functionality.

I like the new standby mode *better* because it INSTANTLY goes into standby, instead of waiting 10 seconds while giving you that warning message.

What I miss is the original Lock Key functionality, because I no longer have a one-press method of just locking (and thuse securing) the phone instantly.

Actually I just learned this when I got my new Storm2 and thought it was just related to that.

By holding the power button, it locks, but my understanding is that w/o standby mode or in a holster, the locking mode isn't the same as standby when it comes to battery consumption. Would love if CrackBerry could confirm!?

I definitely notice a difference from my 8830 World Edition. Granted I have a few more apps running, bigger screen and the touchscreen no doubt uses up more battery power, but I used to go a couple days at least without putting my 8830 on the charger. Even without using it as a phone, I end up putting my Storm2 on the charger every night.

*edit* sidebar: Maybe just the Storm2, but also hate that I can't set a delay for asking for a password. Used to have it set for 4 hours, which was a balance between risk and convenience. Now, with having to enter it every time, I don't use a password...probably like most people. Great feature upgrade...not.

Meh.

Press and hold the "a" key. On my bold with the latest 5.0 Os this puts the phone into standby now. Its much easier and actually faster as the screen dims instantly.

I wish I could take it out of standby with a key insted of the mute key as well. That key is hard to press sometimes.

I wasn't even aware of the function until the uproar about it being gone started. It's amazing how vehement some people are about it. Me? I couldn't care less.

I've got 5.0 on my VZ Tour and the mute button still puts it standby mode.

why remove this feature? RIM needs to stop changing things that work and start fixing things that don't work...

I use the mute key all of the time on my 8330. I have 5.0 running on it. It works great but if it goes away how else would one put it in standby mode?

The reported inabililty to password lock using the A key is a deal breaker for me. I have too much critical data (passwords, account numbers, etc.) on my device to leave it without password protection. I don't want to mess with having to click on some icon that takes up space on my screen. I need a quick, easy (A key) method to protect the device.

Terrible decision by RIM to remove this functionality. At a minimum they should give users the option of retaining this functionality.

I use this feature all the time and its irreplaceable...i cant imagine using it on another key!!
Miracle habits!! ;))))

So I'm still running 4.7.161 on my Tour, mostly because I was hoping Big Red would come out with a really awesome official 5.0 version someday before I get rid of the device all together. Not sure that will even happen....Anyhow, on the new 5.0 OS does the top left key still lock the phone from performing any operation other than an emergency 911 call? I didn't use the standby mode key much but if the lock key feature has changed or been taken away too then I'm totally screwed. My phone lives in my pocket and we all know what happens to unlocked phones down in the depths of our pants pockets.

Standby mode has been a staple... it removes power from the keyboard and screen... AND SAVES BATTERY LIFE!!!!

WHY take that away... does the Lock button now do this for us.... NO!!!!

Curve 8900 here with 5.0.0.411 from December I think. Mute still works for standby.

Having lock and standby as separate things has always seemed kind of strange to me. Maybe this change is to combine them(?). It seems doubtful they'd take away the battery-saving stand-by mode.

When I lock my Storm 2, the battery life improves immensely. It may not say it's standby mode like it used to, but I see all of the benefits of standby mode anyway. My two cents.

i think the only reason this move is justified is with newer devices such as the storm 2 having a separate mute key from the lock key....i guess the older devices getting the 5.0 upgrade just pretty much get the shaft from RIM