Blackberry Bold 9700 and Curve 3G Receive Upgrade to OS 6 from Mobilicity

Research in Motion (RIM) has just announced that Mobilicity owners of the Blackberry Bold 9700 and Curve 3G will be able to upgrade to Blackberry 6 OS. Both official update files can be downloaded from the manufacturer's website, but require registration.

Research in Motion recommends users back up their devices before to Blackberry 6 OS (6.0.0.380), as this is a major update.

The Blackberry 6 operating system is one of the few major upgrades for Blackberry users in years. Even though RIM tried to improve the performance of its mobile platform, most of the changes are cosmetic.

Compared with the previous versions of the operating system, Blackberry 6 features an overhauled user interface, as well as the multitouch function.

In addition, the mobile platform supports touchscreen commands such as click and hold to send an email, instead of choosing the Send command from the Menu.

Another feature added with Blackberry 6 is the Wi-Fi media sync function, which enables users to sync their iTunes or Windows Media Player libraries on the PC with their Blackberry phones using Wi-Fi connectivity.

Users can also create and edit playlists or download songs, as long as they're on the same Wi-Fi network with their PC.

The integrated web-browser has also been replaced with a faster WebKit based one. Recent speed tests revealed that it is faster than iOS 4 and Android 2.1 web-browsers and almost on-par with Android 2.2. The new WebKit browser supports HTML5.

Other key features of the Blackberry 6 OS include: Universal search, improved media player, customizable homescreen icons, as well as Social Feeds.

Mobilicity is the first carrier that upgrades the Bold 9700 to Blackberry 6 OS and the second after Sprint, that offers Curve 3G owners the possibility to upgrade to RIM's latest iteration of the Blackberry operating system.