I doubt you’ll find anything new or unannounced buried, but have at it. You know you wanna. It’s Friday and you’re probably just looking for something to do. Well, friend, I guarantee this will kill three and a half minutes and you might learn something about the BlackBerry Storm 2. Bonus!

[thanks for the tip, Bill!]

That reliable tip came in about the same time that CrackBerry posted an image of a Storm 2 dummy phone sitting on a Best Buy shelf. What other proof do you need? The BlackBerry Storm 2 will be here soon whether you want it or not.

The Storm 2 is sort-of on VerizonWireless.com right now in fact. The phone doesn’t have a product page yet, but someone found the phone’s 3D demo page. So have it. Click over to VZW.com and give the phone a spin. You really don’t need to see a product page anyway, it’s not like you plan on buying the second incarnation of the worst phone ever made when the totally sick Motorola Droid will be available around the same time. At least I hope not.

[Verizon via BGR]

The BlackBerry 9520 Storm 2 has probably the best pre-release coverage of any cell phone in history. We’ve seen previews and videos and pictures and more videos of the upcoming cell phone for months. RIM and Verizon haven’t released a thing about the phone yet though so some key details hadn’t been revealed. That is, of course, until Walt Mossberg posted his Storm 2 review last night alongside the Motorola CLIQ review and Vodafone went live with its Storm 2 launch details this morning that happened to include all the phone’s specs for good measure. God bless the Internet.

Uncle Walt,

Overall, I found the Storm2 worked well in my tests. Battery life was decent, with 5.5 hours of claimed talk time, and typing was much improved, though I doubt it will satisfy lovers of physical keyboards.

The browser is still inferior to Apple’s, Google’s and Palm’s. And the traditional BlackBerry interface cries out for a major overhaul in a touch device like this, especially when you add a lot of apps. RIM’s menu and folder metaphor seems tired on this device.

Verizon hasn’t set a launch date or price for the Storm2, but it’s likely to appear in November at around $200.

The Vodafone press release reveals the phone’s entire spec list. Thankfully RIM updated a few key areas like doubling the amount of Flash memory to 256 MB and equipping the phone with 2 GB of onboard memory. Also, the mechanically clicky screen has been replaced with one that gives electronic, tactile feedback. It also confirms that the phone is powered by BlackBerry OS 5 that hopefully *fingers crossed* along with the extra Flash memory will mean the phone will hang less and be oh-so-much-more responsive.

Vodaphone UK will be offering the phone free with pay-monthly contracts from £35 on up and will be available on October 26 in the UK, Ireland, The Netherlands, Spain, and Germany. The rest of the Vodaphone world should see the phone before Christmas. Now all we need is for Verizon to let us in on how much it plans on charging for the Storm 2. A release date would be cool too.

Update: RIM just launched a Storm vs Storm 2 interactive comparison chart. Have at it.

NYT,

“I let them play with the second-generation Storm device,” he said. “They came back and said ‘Oh, my gosh.’ They were very excited. This is what they hoped the original Storm should be.”

As a BlackBerry Storm owner myself, I can tell you that the most frustrating part of using the Storm is that it’s evident the platform has so much more to give. I stare at my Storm everyday wishing and hoping that it would live up to that potential. But it doesn’t. It sucks even more every time I use it.

There still isn’t a firm release date for the Storm’s second coming. The NYT’s article states something about a launch this week and there have been retail signage leaked online the last few days, but our Verizon retail tipsters still haven’t heard anything about it being available for purchase this week. The honest truth is that no one knows for sure.

Remember last year when everyone was stoked about the new touchscreen BlackBerry called the Storm? Oh man, the hype was huge. There was iPhone-ish lines, media coverage, the works. But then the first reviews came out and we all realized the truth: the phone sucked. It’s now a lot better thank to firmware updates, but the upcoming BlackBerry Storm 2 will hopefully recapture some of the original anticipation.

The BlackBerry Zone is reporting that Verizon will launch the BlackBerry Storm 2 around Black Friday in November. Also, Vodafone in the UK will release it in October which hopefully means if there are any issues, RIM will quickly work them out before launching the phone in here. WiFi and OS 5.0 is expected to be featured in the second Storm, and yes, the SurePress screen will be there too. (I like the clicky screen btw) Now, the only question left is what price point the phone will launch at: $99 or $199.

[via CrackBerry]

So now some Dutch guy who seems to represent RIM in some vague sense now says that the Storm 2 will have an improved text input system, which seems to suggest a slide-out keyboard.

The new model will appear this or next year. We wrote about the rumor two days ago, so RIM must be hungry for press or this Dutch guy is clueless.