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The BlackBerry Bold 9790 gives you the latest BlackBerry operating system, BB7. It's a stretch to call it the 'new' OS, since it's been out for a few months. And even when it was first released, we didn't particularly feel that it was fresh or new compared to OS6.
Nevertheless, moaning aside, it does the job and bridges the gap before we get our hands on the all-new BBX later this year.
The icons in BB7 are a bit of an acquired taste. Like the BlackBerry PlayBook, they look a little bit hotch potch and cobbled together, although they do have the benefit of being incredibly detailed and looking like they could jump of the screen at any time, albeit at the risk of looking rather busy.
As introduced in BB6, RIM gives you several drawers to swipe between on the BlackBerry Bold 9790. The idea is that you can view all apps, just favourites or just, say, media apps. It's well-intentioned but not something we ever used, and nor did anyone else we asked.
Searching through the phone is a cinch, and you can access apps, contacts, music and more by just beginning to type on that home screen, like a number of the other big operating systems.
Ring profiles are as comprehensive as ever, with several available, although there are so many options to customise that even for an advanced user, it can get a bit confusing.
The big difference between the BlackBerry Bold 9790 and BB6-rocking devices is that the BlackBerry Bold 9790 has that touchscreen as well as a physical keyboard - just like the Bold 9900. It's useful to have but not essential by any means, and we found ourselves instinctively using the trackpad more often than not.
The 1GHz processor whizzes along so much faster than the older 9700 and 9780 handsets, and we must say that we were impressed with the speed, despite the reduction in grunt compared to the Bold 9900.
Sadly that's about it, because BB7 hardly pushes the boundaries, and if you're a previous BlackBerry owner, you won't find this to be that different to handsets you've used before.
