A few details of RIM's first QNX smartphone have leaked out, and it looks like the release for this device may be delayed right out of the gate. RIM is famous for their device battery life, and unparalleled device security. However, RIM has had to delay native email support for its first QNX device, the Playbook, because it did not play well with BlackBerry Enterprise Server. Rewriting it's Enterprise software has proven a challenge, and integrating a smartphone with QNX would be even more challenging.
The rumured device is codenamed Colt. While I have seen a supposed pic of the new device, I am unsure if it is genuine, or a cleverly photo-shopped 9900 with a shrunken Playbook screen pasted on the front, so I will not reprint it here.
The details say that this device will be sporting a single-core processor, but this can change if RIM can do something with the battery life, as a dual-core chip would increase the drain from, and reduce the life of, a standard BlackBerry battery.
Since RIM is rewriting its BES software to support QNX, which has proved extremly difficult, and rumured to be working on a QNX-based BES, this device could luanch without BES support entirely. The leaked details show that the Colt would launch with native support for Microsoft Activesync, which would provide an Enterprise solution, even though this would just be a band-aid fix.
The projected release date for the new BlackBerry Colt is rumored to be the first quarter of 2012, which would be good news for those of us deciding to pass on the recent announcements of RIM's new OS7 devices, and wait for the newer QNX-based superphones.
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