I have been using the Blackberry Tour 9630 since launch on July 12. Overall, I think it is a very good phone but I feel as if I were a guinea pig beta testing the Tour 2 which is expected to correct the two most significant problems with the Tour.
First, the trackball on the Tour was the subject of much publicity for being faulty. It appears that RIM has corrected the problem in later builds. I had a faulty trackball and my carrier, Verizon, allowed me to swap it out for a later build. The trackball is covered by RIM’s 1 year warranty. The Tour 2 will use a optical trackpad instead of a trackball. This could be a step in the right direction.
Second, the Tour was launched with OS 4.7.1.40. Under the right stress (which nobody can seem to identify), loading an app can cause a “552 error” which often requires reloading the OS and risks data loss. Carriers are allowing some Tour owners to swap out for a new Tour if the 552 error appears which dumbfounds me because it is not a hardware problem. Swapping out hardware will not solve the problem. It is clearly a problem with the OS. I had a few 552 errors and reloaded the OS each time. Finally, after loosing my patience, I upgraded to the “leaked” version of OS 5.0.0.230. It is very stable and nobody I know running it has encountered the dreaded 552 error when loading an app. An official release of OS 5.0 is expected very soon. (The Storm 2 was the first Blackberry to ship with OS 5.0.)
Taking into account those two problems, overall I am very satisfied with the phone. With a later build date and later OS, the phone functions very well. I am enjoying it and have not jumped at the opportunity to go Droid yet.
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