[steveanthonyL20]

ALCON,

I have an android device and use to have a blackberry back in the day. I was wondering if anyone can give me any tips, sources, information on the advantages of going from an android phone to a blackberry. What is the application/program scene like on BlackBerry s these days? Is it anything like android devices where you can root or hack them to customize them even more? I know with Blackberry 10 in the midst I am starting to become more enthralled and researching a lot into blackberry again.

I miss Blackberry in a weird kind of way....almost like I lost some kind of interest in phones when I left. Please any help or direction would be awesome.

[RoseBud68]

Blackberry can not be hacked,rooted,jailbreaked,
Screen is great & can be seen in the brightest of sun unlike an android.
If your into a lot of apps then stay with an android.

[o4liberty]

The big difference from android to blackberry is how well a blackberry performs. I find my blackberry to navigate much easier than android and much simpler to use all around. I feel that a blackberry is a workhorse of a phone. The notifications on a blackberry alone make it worth owning one with android I never know I have a message or email.

In my opinion if you want to play on a phone than Apple or Android is the way to go but if you want solid performance than blackberry is the way. When BB10 gets released we will have the best of both worlds.

Sent from my BlackBerry Runtime for Android Apps using Tapatalk 2

[Rickroller]

The notifications on a blackberry alone make it worth owning one with android I never know I have a message or email.

Not trying to start anything..but it sounds like you don't have your phone set up very well if that's the case. I'm able to not only distinguish messages/emails, but whether it's a text, im, tweet, FB Notification, or work email vs regular email all with different tones. This, along with customizable LED, makes my Android almost as good as a BB (as far as notifications). I say almost, simply because I can't customize an LED light for individual contacts like I could with my BB..although I can set customizable tones for each contact.

[shemaree09]

I agree with the posters above.

Blackberry is a reliable phone. Its a great communication device. A lot of customizable features are built into the OS.

But, if you are more into Apps and Multimedia, it might not be for you.

All Blackberrys are not created equal (just like Android). As long as you get an OS 7 phone, preferably a Bold 9900 you should enjoy it. The new OS 7 is a big improvement from the previous versions.

[anthogag]

How to go from Android to Blackberry...get an OS7 phone or BB10 in a few months and pair it with a playbook

[shemaree09]

How to go from Android to Blackberry...get an OS7 phone or BB10 in a few months and pair it with a playbook

LOL! yup, that sounds about right.

[antheauxny]

It really just depends on your needs and what you're interested in.
If communication, email, heavy email & just a solid reliable phone is what you need, go Blackberry.
If youre heavy on games, multimedia, heavy browsing, etc...then stay with android.
OR you can get a BB, switch to it, & use your android as a wifi only device.


Sent from my BlackBerry 9930 using Tapatalk

[pantlesspenguin]

I really, REALLY don't want to start another BB vs Android debate...but I still really don't understand why people say Android isn't good for communication. With the exception of BBM, I use the same IM programs, have the same email accounts set up, do the same amount of texting, etc on my Android as I did on my BB. After finding the virtual keyboard that works the best for me I'm also as fast a typist as I was on my BB as well.

My main concern when I go to BB10 is porting my contacts over. Right now all my contacts are stored in the google cloud. I also hope that when BB10 comes out, it'll have a free (and native would be a plus) turn-by-turn gps navigation app, like Google Nav. I'm sure I'll keep my Rezound as a secondary device, but my daily driver (no pun intended) needs to have turn-by-turn navigation capabilities.

[kennyliu]

As someone mentioned, if you are a heavy web surfer, Android may be a better deal (due to arguably better browsers, usually larger screen resolution, usually much larger screen size, better touch optimization, Flash support, etc.)

[antheauxny]

I really, REALLY don't want to start another BB vs Android debate...but I still really don't understand why people say Android isn't good for communication. With the exception of BBM, I use the same IM programs, have the same email accounts set up, do the same amount of texting, etc on my Android as I did on my BB. After finding the virtual keyboard that works the best for me I'm also as fast a typist as I was on my BB as well.



My main concern when I go to BB10 is porting my contacts over. Right now all my contacts are stored in the google cloud. I also hope that when BB10 comes out, it'll have a free (and native would be a plus) turn-by-turn gps navigation app, like Google Nav. I'm sure I'll keep my Rezound as a secondary device, but my daily driver (no pun intended) needs to have turn-by-turn navigation capabilities.

Android is good for communication if emails aren't important.
Unless its gmail, you wont get your emails right away. You'll only get them after however many minutes you have your interval set to (i.e 15 minutes) or if you manually update your email feed yourself.

Androids are great devices but lack when it comes to push email.
Everything else is fine.

Also, porting your contacts should be easy. When you go to your carrier to get your BB10 phone just tell them to transfer your contacts.
I know Sprint does that.


Sent from my BlackBerry 9930 using Tapatalk

[ubizmo]

I wouldn't say it comes down to anything as generic as communication vs "media". The devil is in the details and your specific preferences. BBOS 7 offers a pretty good user experience, and you can customize with themes, etc., not to mention custom alert profiles.
You won't have 2-way sync with Gmail, but you will have the incredibly handy option to delete emails from the device but not the server.

There are plenty of apps but certainly nowhere near as many as on Android. It comes down to the specific ones you're interested in. There's a decent FaceBook app, Twitter, podcasts, music player, Pandora, and various other media options. But you probably won't enjoy watching movies on a Bold--maybe a Torch.

I have an Android (Samsung Galaxy Blaze) and a Bold. I'm using the Bold right now. Each has its strengths and weaknesses.

Pantless mentioned turn-by-turn navigation. BB Traffic is actually quite good, if you're in North America, and it's surprisingly easy on data and battery. Actually it's not so surprising, since it's not embedded in a mapping app that has to keep downloading maps as you go. For just mapping, Google Maps works fine, and so does BB Maps.

Cloud storage is not strong on BB, but if you use DropBox there's a paid app, FileScout, that handles uploads and downloads from DropBox very well. For Google Drive, SkyDrive, and Box...not so much.

If you do much in the way of cutting and pasting in text docs, you'll appreciate the BB trackpad and the ability to select with the shift key, as opposed to fumbling with those little tabs.

The BB OS is the result of quite a bit of "natural selection," so it has quite a lot of latent efficiency, I.e., shortcuts and options that aren't immediately obvious. As you find them and internalize them, you start to become more and more a Crack(berry)Head.

On Android, if you turn on location services, even just cell tower location, the OS will send location data back to the mother ship to be able to feed you location-specific advertising, even if you're not using an app that needs location services. In addition to your opinions about this practice there's the fact that this location data mining takes a toll on your battery.

On a BB you can leave location services on and they sit there dormant until some app uses them, so you don't have to have a widget to turn GPS on when you want to use Maps, etc.

[SRR500]

Ubizmo, that's one of the best BB pro/con lists that I have ever seen. Nicely done.

[steveanthonyL20]

Awesome insight here. Thanks for your post and input!