BlackBerry Bold 9700 Shrinks Down in Bold 9790

It appears RIM will be releasing a smaller version of the BlackBerry Bold 9700, dubbed the BlackBerry Bold 9790.

The smaller edition will also sport a Touchscreen and keyboard, like its bigger cousin, the Bold 9900. It will apparently have a 2.4-inch display like its predecessor the Bold 9780, rather than the 2.8-inch one in the Bold 9900.

The upcoming Bold 9790 will reportedly also feature a 5MP camera, 8GB of built-in storage, NFC and GPS capabilities. The smartphone is going to pack a 1.2GHz processor and have Wi-Fi support.

If all goes accordingly, we could see the BlackBerry Bold 9790 as early as next month, according to an unconfirmed report. The timing would line up well with RIM's five latest BlackBerry devices that have been rolling out since August. All of the handsets run BlackBerry OS 7, the last version of BlackBerry OS that RIM plans to release before transitioning over to QNX OS, which is used on the company's BlackBerry PlayBook.

The release of the five devices, including the Bold 9900 and 9930, constitutes the largest global launch in the history of RIM. The company has been facing some setbacks as of late, with Sprint delaying the release of the BlackBerry Curve 8350 due to unspecified circumstances and cancelling the 4G PlayBook. In a smartphone world dominated by Android and iOS, RIM stays afloat thanks to its enterprise-friendly BlackBerry OS, but while Google strives to increase security on its Android OS, RIM needs to hurry along its transition to QNX before the company loses its main clientele.

Source: BGR