[asw7474]

I have owned 4 blackberries over the last few years, starting with the Curve 8900 (Javelin), to the Bold 9700 (onyx), 9780 (onyx 2), and now 9790 (bellagio) which is only 3 days old so I haven't really battle-tested it for heavy workloads.

At the same time I have owned one Iphone 4.

I will never ditch the blackberry for 3 reasons:
1. No screen typing can match a physical keyboard (I love the javelin's keyboard the best, the clickety click feels like squeezing bubble wrap , and the spacing between the keys somehow gives me more confidence in typing faster)
2. BBM is superior to anything out there that I know of (definitely trumps imessage)
3. Easy to use, high productivity calendar app (partly due to physical keyboard)

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Here are my brief comments:

1. In australia, i'm forced to go with the big 3 carriers for BB service (optus, telstra and vodafone). That means that I am paying a premium for the 'big 3' plan at a min charge of $35 a month. Admittedly this is an older plan, I don't know how much BB plans cost now in 2012.

With my iphone, although more expensive initially hardware wise, I can go with a much less expensive plan from a second tier provider (but running on the tier 1 optus network) for $15. Both plans have similar usage allowances, so that means with the Iphone I save $240 per year (assuming BYO phone).

I think if RIM wants to expand their market, they somehow have to change their infrastructure to allow the BB to work under any data enabled plan, not just a specialised plan to cater to BBs.

2. Inputting calendar appointments is so much quicker on the BB calendar. In the iphone, in addition to the std calendar app, I have 2 PIMs on the iphone4: Pocket Informant and Calvetica. But I prefer my BB for this.

3. I absolutely hate the BB browser before the Bold 9790 with OS 7, to the point I always use my iphone when I need to browse for anything (that doesn't have a special page for smartphones).

4. I can read magazines and books on my iphone during short breaks, although the screen is too small for lengthy reading sessions.

5. Forget playing games on the BB after you play a game on the Iphone (such as Anomaly HD). But this is not crucial.

6. Prior to the 9790 and the touchscreen, the touchpad of the 9700 and 9780 are bug ridden. Scrolling left or up in a text message (or bbm message) to correct a typo, suddenly it would exit or do weird things. This happens 6/10 times so it's really really really annoying. But it made me a better typist with less mistakes...

7. All my work related image files and pdf files somehow end up in my iphone. Iphone's pinch zoom in and out is a time saver when browsing images or pdf files. Hopefully with the 9790's touch screen this will change, we will see....

8. One of my biggest gripes with the BB however is the one ID per device rule. With Apple, I can link up to 10 apple devices to one ID so I buy one $2 game or app and I can share this across all of our devices without having to pay extra!!! This means 2 iphones and 2 ipads in the family. With the RIM system, I'd have to pay 4x as much if I wanted the same app on all devices.

It's not the dollar amount but having to purchase 2 identical apps for mine and my wife's BB, after what I'm used to on the the Apple system, is irritating.

9. I'm not ultra mobile, so I can't comment about battery life of both my iphone vs BB.

10. BB and BBM seems to work better in bad signal conditions whereas iphone's data stream will simply stop in bad signal conditions (eg when the signal drops to EDGE or GPRS, which happens more often than I thought).

11. Updating (some, many perhaps?) BB apps require a reboot! Somewhat annoying.

12. Buggy network connection in my previous BBs (previous to 9790). Signal in my basement is low, so I try to update apps via wifi, always gives error about not being able to connect (even with network preference set to wifi preferred)

13. On previous BB 9780 the last time I changed SIM card, the email settings would go awry and upon returning to original SIM card, emails won't work. Tried to setup email from scratch but gave an error. So practically for the last 6 months+, I've been checking my email from my iphone instead of my BB. BB has been exclusively for calls, sms, and BBM. Too annoyed to do a device reset and setup from scratch. I now get a nervous tic anytime I have to change my BB's SIM card.

14. On previous BB, I've deleted my BB groups but anytime I create a new calendar appointment, always defaults to group and asks me "Share with BBM Group? YES/NO". Annoying as heck as I have an extra step to click NO every time I make a new calendar entry. And since it defaults to group calendar, it doesn't sync to my gmail calendar which ruins everything (maybe not syncing is related to point 13). Tried going into calendar options, bbm options and setup but no luck. Point 13 and 14 basically renders my BB into a glorified phone with BBM.

Having owned both 4 BBs and an Iphone for a similar time period, my impression is that the bugs in the iphone are largely app related (double click on home button and closing the app resolved most of my app problems) where in the BB it is more systemic, as per above.

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So, as things stand now, I can't live without my BB for the keyboard, BBM, quick calendar entry, and I am loving OS7's browser (vs previous incarnations), but I love my apple products for its value not just in my work but during my downtime as well.

Can't make comments about Android, haven't used any of their devices extensively enough.

At the end of the day, so far the way I see it, whatever smartphone I'll have, a BB will always be part of my core inventory. So RIM had better not drop the ball on their next OS.

Wew, this post just became a lot longer than I intended.

[mmcpher]

Good post with interesting observations. If you have a chance to try the 9900 series, be prepared to supplant the Javelin with a new most-favored keyboard. And 7.1 is better across the board than previous RIM OS's. As interested as I am in seeing BB10, I am so used to the legacy OS's that I don't lie awake nights about it. The integration of calendar, email, text, bbm, social sites, etc., seems about ready to take a quantum leak if the new OS's play as well in use as they have in video. You may not own a Playbook, but when the OS goes to 2.0 later this month, take a look at how the integration works, because that is going to be part of the BB10 approach on th new handhelds. I still feel like the ultimate Blackberry hasn't yet been made. The 9900 series is very good, but the camera is lousy and the screen is too small to be optimal, which makes it hard to properly assess the browser. Throughout all of the Blackberries I've owned, the email has come trucking through for year after year, like an absolute rock-solid workhorse. Its something I can't do without, no matter how many apps are out there trying to tempt me away.

[shemaree09]

Good post with interesting observations. If you have a chance to try the 9900 series, be prepared to supplant the Javelin with a new most-favored keyboard. And 7.1 is better across the board than previous RIM OS's. As interested as I am in seeing BB10, I am so used to the legacy OS's that I don't lie awake nights about it. The integration of calendar, email, text, bbm, social sites, etc., seems about ready to take a quantum leak if the new OS's play as well in use as they have in video. You may not own a Playbook, but when the OS goes to 2.0 later this month, take a look at how the integration works, because that is going to be part of the BB10 approach on th new handhelds. I still feel like the ultimate Blackberry hasn't yet been made. The 9900 series is very good, but the camera is lousy and the screen is too small to be optimal, which makes it hard to properly assess the browser. Throughout all of the Blackberries I've owned, the email has come trucking through for year after year, like an absolute rock-solid workhorse. Its something I can't do without, no matter how many apps are out there trying to tempt me away.

completely agree.

[sam_b77]

Regarding data plans:
In india you can get mails and BBM for as low as $5 a month and full BIS for $10 a month.

On the E-mail setup, I actually like BBs automatically disabling e-mails to your previous device when you swap SIM cards. If you want to go back to your previous device you need to log into your carrier Blackberry page (normally blackberry.carrier.com) to switch over your e-mails to the new device. And if required resend service books. The problem you mentioned would have been solved on doing this.

[cherimoya]

thoughts:
rebooting: i have read on here on posts by people much more knowledgeable than i am that it is a result of the bb os security -- a security that puts all the other big competetors to shame. a small price for privacy, security when consider how close society is to a completely mobile financial life: nfc, banking...

i trialed a truly nice pdf app repligo reader. did wonders for pdf on my 9650. not in budget for now, but definitely on my wislist. didnt like beamreader,and havent trialed paid docs2go, which also has a pdf reader, so no idea how it is. you might trial any of the 3 and see if they make the difference.

paying per app vs sharing on more than 1 device: some leases include gas in rent, some don't. are various licensing approaches in pc as well, some sw is licensed for up to 3, some is per machine, some is per person. some include free updates but not upgrade to next full version, others are lifetime... in case of bb apps, some are per device, some per person and can move them to next bb, some will allow you to move them to other os as long as its still you... developers are attempting to make a living in a variety of ways and it is what it is.

i believe you didn't note that using playbook w bb smartphones, you dont pay for another 'phone line/phone service'. a major savings. which is why playbooks arent featured in phone co stores, they dont make $ off them for 2 yrs the way they do with the others.

not in australia so dont know how things work there, but in us if new phone didnt sync / pick up where old one did, in US i would take it into the carrier store and theyd fix it free as part of the setup. isnt there a way to set calendar to default to the one you want in calendar, options on your model?

[sam_b77]

thoughts:
rebooting: i have read on here on posts by people much more knowledgeable than i am that it is a result of the bb os security -- a security that puts all the other big competetors to shame. a small price for privacy, security when consider how close society is to a completely mobile financial life: nfc, banking...

i trialed a truly nice pdf app repligo reader. did wonders for pdf on my 9650. not in budget for now, but definitely on my wislist. didnt like beamreader,and havent trialed paid docs2go, which also has a pdf reader, so no idea how it is. you might trial any of the 3 and see if they make the difference.

paying per app vs sharing on more than 1 device: some leases include gas in rent, some don't. are various licensing approaches in pc as well, some sw is licensed for up to 3, some is per machine, some is per person. some include free updates but not upgrade to next full version, others are lifetime... in case of bb apps, some are per device, some per person and can move them to next bb, some will allow you to move them to other os as long as its still you... developers are attempting to make a living in a variety of ways and it is what it is.

i believe you didn't note that using playbook w bb smartphones, you dont pay for another 'phone line/phone service'. a major savings. which is why playbooks arent featured in phone co stores, they dont make $ off them for 2 yrs the way they do with the others.

not in australia so dont know how things work there, but in us if new phone didnt sync / pick up where old one did, in US i would take it into the carrier store and theyd fix it free as part of the setup. isnt there a way to set calendar to default to the one you want in calendar, options on your model?

The carrier people go to the same blackberry.carrier.com website to switch your device. Same world over. All you need to do is setup your account on that or ask the carrier for your user and password and you can do it yourself.

[Frosty_Power]

Good writeup. On point 14, you can set your calendar default in the general calendar options to default to your gmail account.

[hurds]

Great write up. I'm kinda in the same boat except had the iPhone for 2 years (3Gs then 4) and now I just got my first BB. Still noticing the differences but am surprised by how similiar they are. Definitely agree iPhone is better for games (although I have a PB too which I use for mobile games now) but see my BB as a way better communication device. Talking to people makes me feel like they are right next to me.. also having grown up using physical keyboards theres something natural about it, and honestly a bunch of other reasons already come to mind. Either way now I have the best of both worlds since I still have my bb as a phone and pretty much everything except gaming and then my iPhone to use for its ecosystem, they just came out with iTunes U which seems pretty sweet

[asw7474]

By the way, although I like Apple products, I am not a 'fanboy' and definitely am not appreciative of the legal proceedings they are taking against everybody. Whether they have a case or not is irrelevant, it just leaves a bad taste in my mouth. Like a giant bully flexing his muscles just because he can.

Thanks for the pdf reader app suggestion, I'll give it a try.

[world traveler and former ceo]

good article .. thanks!

[jbeachy]

In response to several comments about a PDF reader. Several years ago on a Curve 9330 I gulped and paid the $79 for the whole Docs2Go suite and that license has tracked me through multiple OS and device changes and RIM's purchase of DataViz.

The D2G PDF reader is very competent, has nice zooming and paging capabilities, and in general does anything I want in a PDF reader - except it seems a little slower to load than the BeamSuite trial I'd used at one point. if I'm not mistaken, the full D2G suite now ships with OS 7.

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