Bolt Browser

[G.Gecko]

Last week Nalar and myself started testing a beta version of the new Bolt browser. Bolt is a free downloadable browser from Bitstream it is built on Bitstream's ThunderHawk browsing technology, and is the result of 5+ years of experience developing mobile browsers that optimize usability, speed and performance on resource-constrained systems with limited memory, processing power and screen space.

First impressions of this new browser are great. Even though this is still a beta release it is out preforming my o.e.m. blackberry browser. and completely blows away the opera mini browser for blackberry. So far it has been much faster at loading pages (even large pages) it displays content incrementally as it is downloading, meaning you can start navigating content before the entire page is loaded. (no more blank loading screens yea).

The Bolt browser supports streaming videos, JavaScript, AJAX pages, WAP content, and XML Web feeds in RSS, ATOM, and RDF format.

Bolt also has a ‘split screen browsing‘ option, where - 2/3 of the screen shows the full page, serving as a mini-map with a highlighting box, while the other 1/3 shows the magnified area. a nice feature for filling out forms and browsing large pages.

The best part about the Bolt browser is that it displays web pages just as you would see them on your pc ! This browser finally will put Blackberry web browsing. on par with the iphones' Safari browser.

For those of you willing to take a ride on some beta software this is something you must check out! Perhaps the best software I've installed on my 8100.

Download Bolt browser for your Blackberry HERE

Check out Bolt's FAQ page HERE

Please Let us know what you think about the bolt browser on your device. Enjoy!

[Hydro]

I keep running into problems trying to download this on my phone, sometimes I get an out of memory error, sometimes it just locks up middle of downloading to my phone. Is this actually worth the all the effort to download? what am I doing wrong?

[G.Gecko]

I had to take several shots at downloading this one too. Pretty much the same issues but the bolt browser is great once you get it. Make sure your not clicking the link in the email they send you, instead copy and paste the link in your regular browser. The links they send are only good once so if it dosen't install you'll have to have bolt send you another link. kind of a pain but totally worth it I think. it really makes cruising the web way better. let us know what you think if you get it installed. Good Luck Hydro!

p.s. Bolts browser seems to use a lot less battery life on my pearl, and it loads faster than my bb browser too.

[Hydro]

I finally was able to download the BOLT ! took me like 10 times of trying but it finally works . this is way better than my regular browser. sites look totally right on it , dig it.

[GrodanMan]

Sounds cool i'll check it out when I get home tonight.

[Einstein32]

Great Browser! LOVE IT! new update just released today. downloading now.

[GrodanMan]

Definitely better than the stock browser , I hope this stays free when the official release comes out!

[Einstein32]

Well when I went to upgrade from .83 to .86 something went wrong and bolt quit working ... long story short, I had to remove bolt entirely from my phone and install .86 fresh. Working great again now though.

[Berryadict]

What's the latest on the development of this browser? I tried using it a couple times and couldn't deal with it so I deleted it.

[G.Gecko]

Still in a beta version I believe 0.86 is the latest version, although I have no idea when a final stable release is due out.. We're you able to download it successfully? Nalar was having a lot of issues with it on his 8330 (glitchy menus, ect) . but its never given me any issues on my pearl.

[Luciferseamus]

I can't wait till the full release of this program!
for some reason the menu kept giving me this weird flashing error.
I could hardly read it. hopefully the final release will work and will be free.
if not free I hope they release a watered down version that will be free.
I guess only time will tell eh!

[adrenalinejunky]

Threw it on my 8900 last night. It's deffinatly still in beta. Had no probs downloading it or running it. can even get the the first page of the website but that's about as far as it gets. Unfortunatly it won't access any of the lnks or buttons throughout the website. Gonna play with it a bit more see if I tweek some of the settings to see if I can't get it running right. It does seem to be a better browser than the blackberry browser. It displays everything but flash. As to be expected seeming as flash hasn't rolled out any support for blackberry
Other than that it's great. Thanks for the heads-up on this Gecko.

[G.Gecko]

Thanks for taking a look at this adrenalinejunky I was courious to see how the bolt would stand up on the 8900 being that it is already wicked fast... let us know if you get it working well. Hopefully they'll have all the kinks worked out soon.

[adrenalinejunky]

Well sorry to say that I tweaked as much as I could and changed every setting it had to no avail. Although I did fill out a support request form today. We shall see how far that goes. I will keep my fingers crossed.

[adrenalinejunky]

Wow! Crossing my fingers totally worked this time. Hahaha! The support team responded to me within a couple days. They asked for some info about the sites i was going to and if anything was happening before the app froze. They came to the conclusion that it was a bad install and to delete Bolt browser, pull the battery and reinstall. Seems to have worked. The only thing now is youtube and google video don't work so well. I have to download the video to my memory card to view it. Which isn't so bad. The problem is it only downloads 1 min. and 37 secs of the video. Which is fine with me. I usually download video to my computer and put it on my memory card with media manager. I went ahead and let them know about that issue also. Maybe they will help get that sorted out too.

[G.Gecko]

Wow thats awesome they got back to you really pretty quickly, I had inquired about some similar issues but never got a response back. Glad to hear that their support was helpful. I love using this browser and hope it becomes the standard to base Blackberry Browser off of.

[YELLOWMELLOW]

Thanks for the info i will give it a try mine runs so slow it drives me crazy

[Kat]

I was really dissapointed in the Bolt browser! I thought it would be better. Maybe it is because I hyped it up in my own mind and set my expectations too high. But in the end it failed. I mean it was slow, and it constantly froze on me. My regular BB browser is more effective!!

[Luciferseamus]

I was really dissapointed in the Bolt browser! I thought it would be better. Maybe it is because I hyped it up in my own mind and set my expectations too high. But in the end it failed. I mean it was slow, and it constantly froze on me. My regular BB browser is more effective!!

I can't say that I totally agree, but I also can't say that I totally disagree...

bolt was cool in the fact that you could see entire web pages all at once. there are some pretty cool features but not having a menu (no matter how isolated an event it is) at all really made me mad at this program. it seems cool but it's almost non-usable without the menu.

I gave the new beta of opera mini another try and by gum I think I like that WAY better then 1) the previous version of opera and 2) bolt!

it works really well, and because it does not do a full page load (unless you want it to) when not in mobile view the page loads remarkably quick, and you still get the jist of what is going on. and with a cool little view finder you scroll around the page and go to mobile view with just a click of the track ball, or push "5" to zoom in and out.

anyway, if you have not tried the new version of opera give it a go!
pretty cool!

[Kat]

Yeah I may have to try the newest version of Opera! I tried an older version of it and wasn't too taken with it, but I am willing to try the newer version.