BlackBerry PlayBook OS 2.1 Beta Goes Live Today As Promised

PlayBook developers all over the world have been dying to get their hands on the next OS update of our beautiful tablets. As promised by PlayBook Product Manager, Michael Clewley on Twitter a few days ago, OS 2.1 has officially been released by RIM as a beta exclusively for developers only. What does this mean for the rest of us mere mortals? Well it simply means we wont be able to get our hands on it just yet. Not to fear though, this is all for a good reason.

This release is specifically meant for developers to be able to run and test their apps on them before the public gets a hold of it at a later (and hopefully not too long from now) date. This helps ensure that all our favorite apps are compatible and are able to run smoothly on the next implementation of the OS that gets released publicly.

What's New

• Improved HTML5 support (Browser HTML 5 Score 391+10 Bonus Points)
• Each Android app will now run in its own window. This greatly improves the user experience and consistency among the other application runtimes.
• Access to the Camera hardware is now supported for Android apps, allowing many more application types to work on the BlackBerry® PlayBook™ tablet.
• In-App Payment is now supported through the BlackBerry Payment SDK, so Android applications can include virtual items for sale in their applications.
• Portrait support for Email, Calendar and Contacts
• Improved folder support including IMAP folder support

If you're a developer and want to be able to load this puppy up, head on over to the registration/sign up page here and get enrolled.

• Check out more information about PlayBook's beta OS 2.1 release at the Inside BlackBerry DevBlog
• Discuss PlayBook OS 2.1 findings/fixes in the forums!