RIM BlackBerry PlayBook OS 2.0 review

Research in Motion (RIM) has launched the much awaited and anticipated PlayBook 2.0, its next generation of the operating system (OS) for its PlayBook tablet. We're fairly impressed but the update is far too late and somewhat uninspiring.

RIM released the over the air (OTA) earlier this week, so if you don't have it already you download it now. The three biggest additions to the OS are the Messages, Calendar and Contacts apps.

Messages
The Messages app is by far the best of the three additions and includes email and integration with social networks. You can add an unlimited number of email addresses, including Microsoft, Gmail and Hotmail and accounts for Twitter, Facebook and Linkedin.

Overall the app looks and runs extremely well and uses the 7in screen effectively. You can view all the inboxes at once or select one account to view on its own. When viewing all in one go it's not clear which email is linked to which account but logos indicate private messages from the social networks.

It's easy to refresh the inbox with a pull down gesture and messages can be viewed in full screen mode. Writing an email is easy with the Messages app using the updated keyboard, which we'll talk about later. There are a number of editing options including font size, type and colour, justification, bullet points and bold, italic and underlined.

Calendar
The Calendar app is also good looking and has a number of handy features. There are monthly and weekly views to choose from and the app integrates calendars from your PlayBook, email accounts and Facebook. You can select which calendars you want to view and each is helpfully colour coded.

On the monthly view the date number grows as that day gets busier with events and appointments, an intuitive way to quickly see when you've got a hectic or free day. Each day can be looked at in a detailed view showing the date, agenda or people you are meeting with. You can also add new entries to any of the linked in calendars from the tablet.