Treo 650 Killers Update: Vodafone UK Launches Blackberry 7100v

Now this is really interesting and demonstrates just how good a business the people at RIM are running.

You will remember that a couple of days ago I posted a short review of the latest purported "Treo Killers" and within this was BlackBerry's 7100t which was being released by T-Mobile in the US.  However, what I did not realise at the time was that the "t" stood for the carrier denomination.  Vodafone today announced [via ZD Net UK] the forthcoming  UK release on October 1st of the Blackberry 7100v ("v" now obviously standing simply for Vodafone...) and at a cost of between FREE and $160 depending on which contract you choose it's not exactly like making a decision will be too difficult...

I can state that I'm really impressed by how well BlackBerry has worked at customizing smartphones for its customers and judging also by the recently released Windows Mobile devices it looks like the days of phones with "Your Carrier Logo Here" are now numbered...  I wonder what palmOne will be doing around its future Treos in this respect...

The specifications of the 7100v appear to be exactly the same as the 7100t (although I imagine that the weight may vary).  According to ZDNet "The 7100v is a quad-band GSM/GPRS mobile phone measuring 5.6cm wide by 11.9cm deep by 1.9cm thick and weighing 120g (Treo 600 is 6.0 x 11.2 x 2.2 cm and 168g).

The 7100v has a 16-bit colour screen measuring just under 2.5in. across the diagonal, and comes with a fixed 32MB of memory -- there's no expansion slot for extra storage. Connectivity is via USB cable or wireless Bluetooth. Talk time is claimed to be 3.5 hours, with standby at 200 hours -- less than the Treo 600's 6 hours and 240 hours respectively. There's a speakerphone on the back of the device, so you should be able to handle calls safely -- and legally -- using a Bluetooth headset while in your car."

Things are definitely shaping up to be very interesting over the coming months in the smartphone space!