As smarphones continue to take over our work and personal lives, and two of the world’s biggest phone manufacturers go head to head, many of us face a dilemma. Do we choose the sleek, fun iPhone, jammed-packed with apps making it one of the most multi-functional gadgets around? Or do with opt for a more grown-up, professional-looking and reliable BlackBerry model?
BlackBerries may not seem quite as exciting as they hold a stigma of office-bound grumpy commuters, chained to their desks by 24/7 email alerts. However, they have in recent years become one of the most popular brands of phones for teens and young adults alike, drawn in by the lure of free instant messages to other Blackberries and the easy to use full keypads. So it seems the battle is on! And now Blackberry’s manufacturer RIM has confused us even more, by launching the company’s first 2-in-1 touch screen and keypad phone, The BlackBerry Torch.

RIM has made great improvements to its previous attempt at a touch screen model, The Storm, which made a click sound every time the screen was touched. In fact, the Torch screen is now comparable to those of the leaders in the touch screen market, Apple and HTC.
Inevitably, due to having both a sliding touch screen and a keypad, the Torch is slightly chunky, but BlackBerries have always been stocky phones so that shouldn’t come as a surprises, and the iPhone 4 is rather boxy and heavy anyway. So with issues of size and screen type sorted, the real deal-breaker seems to be the extras.

It doesn’t seem plausible that BlackBerry could ever take on the mighty iTunes and App Store as they provide over a quarter of a million different ways to make a standard phone more exciting. They have certainly tried with BlackBerry App World, and maybe now, with this new handset, they have a chance to challenge Apple, as the touch screen should allow for better games.

The BlackBerry Torch is RIM’s attempt at a middle-ground, providing us with both the style of a touch screen and alongside the conventional QWERTY keypad, which seems to be reaching out to a different generation of BlackBerry users and hoping to provide an answer for those stuck in the middle of the BlackBerry versus iPhone war.