Hi.

Remember me?

I've been busy. Preoccupied. But most importantly I have a new toy. It's one of the best perks about working in the corporate world. New toys. Now I understand why men get giddy about these things and if you were to ask them which is more exciting - the thought of sex or a new electronic toy - it's the only thing that actually makes them pause for a millisecond before answering.

But really, you're here to find out if this thing is worth the cash. Let me give you the non-techie, chick opinion on it.

Who Is This "RIM" Group of People?
Sometimes, I hate acronymns, especially when I don't know what they mean and THEN they are overused by a group of arrogant...well never mind...:).

RIM stands for Research In Motion. That's the name of the company that designs and manufactures Blackberry's. In case you care, this company has been around since 1984.

What It Is
A Blackberry is a wireless, hand-held device, about the size of a hand-held calculator (or PDA for you techies), that is a one-stop shopping piece of electronics, integrating email, internet, text messaging, cell phone, your calendar, contacts, and probably...a bazillion other things. I did check, it does not provide free maid service but perhaps, in the next release...

My particular Blackberry came with the hand-held unit, a holster, charging unit for my car, electric charging unit, ear piece, and cradle for my desktop (to sync contacts with outlook).

The Audience
Right now, the main focus is marketing these puppies to corporate and government entities (you know - cash cow type of mentality). Of course as an individual, they seek you out too although I doubt that you'll have a bazillion sales people tracking you down at your every free moment.

How I Was Lucky Enough To Get One
We have a new executive team who was used to having these Blackberry devices around. They seemed to do a collective gasp when they found out that we hadn't implemented it. You know, it became like one of the "#1" priorities once they found out how naked they'd be...

Our current policies within the company, is that certain individuals, with the approval of their supervisors, can have these things. The deal is though, that you must give up your current cell phone and any pagers to get it (I practically threw my cell phone back at the phone chick - that's how much I hated it).

By the way, certain individuals are those, like myself, who are expected to work 24/7, regardless of health, religious holiday, or geographical location.

How Easy Was It To Set-Up?
Now here's the kicker. I didn't install it. Noooooooooooo. Are you kidding? The technical services folks who sit just a few feet away from me would probably threw themselves on the floor in a fit of laughter if you asked them "could I install this".

At least in our corporation, two of our entities take care of installation. Our desktop personnel do the actual installation of the software on to the desktop/laptop. When my buddy Vic came into my office, it took him about 15 minutes to get it set up/installed/synchronized.

The second individual was our telecomm chick who actually worked with AT&T to switch my cell phone number to my Blackberry while at the same time, initiating service for my new toy. It seemed like her interaction with the AT&T people took forever.

When Vic synchronized it with my laptop, my email on my Blackberry (what was in my "inbox") was on my new toy, as well as my calendar, and my contacts.

Now, the nice telecomm chick gave me the manual and showed me how I could go about customizing things. This is an area that I'm getting to be very good at :).

The Juice
One of the things that is very important to me is the ability for anything electronic in my possession to have a long battery life. I'm finding that my Blackberry stays charged for about 4 days without needing re-charged as long as I don't spend an inordinate amount of time on the phone part. Simply writing and sending email, I can go for days without recharging.

The Screen
The screen isn't all that bad but what it can make it even better for you is customizing some of the fonts. I like 'em big and bright so I've set mine accordingly. The backlight comes in handy when you're in the dark :). My only complaint with it is that it snaps off in a milli-second if you haven't moved your mouse.

The Keyboard
I never thought I could get used to typing with my thumbs however, it is much easier than it looks. You'll find a shift key and even a cntl key. Your "mouse" is on the side of the unit and after some initial awkwardness with working it, it became second nature for me to use.

The Applications
I have one complaint about the applications loaded on to my Blackberry - specifically - the internet browser. It comes with the "M-Life" browser and honestly - it's just a piece of crap. It's clunky when you want to try and do a search, utilizing it's own search engine or even trying to navigate to a site that you know.

I love the email feature. I get my email (what seems like) instantly. Just in case I don't think it's moving quick enough, there's an option where I can have my Blackberry reconcile my handheld to my desktop mailbox immediately.

The Phone
I seem to get much better reception than I did with my previous cell phone. My biggest headache is that sometimes, I don't get the ear thingie close enough to my ear, so then I don't hear what I need to hear. This is solved by plugging in the ear piece that comes with it. Most of the time, this is the only way to go. The only thing better would be if my ear piece was wireless. But hey - I hear that's in the next release.

One big detraction - no speaker phone feature.

The End
I'm sure that there's a lot more technical stuff that people spout off in reviews about electronics however, I'm just a girl who has a toy and wanted to tell someone how neat it was.

Reasons To Get This Thing
* Portable
* Easy to use
* Allows you to multi-task (gotta pee? Well girls, you can do two things at once....)
* Nifty ways to customize things like tones, ringers, notifications
* Instant email
* Great phone reception
* Great way to track your thoughts (via the memo area)
* Makes ya feel important

Reasons To Not Get This Thing
* You become addicted. Worse than chocolate.
* The frickin' browser is lame.
* The boss expects you to be at his beck and call 24/7. Yes, I am the beck and call girl...
* Thumb cramps when you spend too much time on it.
* The annoying people who don't know how to NOT use their Blackberry in a meeting....

Recommended: Yes

Amount Paid (US$): 250.00