Ducati Sporting Club UK > General > Idle Chat > Smartphone: iPhone, Nokia, HTC, BlackBerry?...

[WeeJohnyB]

I have a Blackberry Pearl, old money by new models standards but I think it's great, good batterly life, good reception, quick to type, great sync with my notes email and diary anywhere in the world including Cadwell lower paddock! I seldom use the web on it but have always found it a bit cumbersome.

I know three people who have returned their Blackberry Storm as too difficult to use, they just couldn't get on with it and gave up.

I see people using iphone on the train for their emails and I have done 3 in the time they have done one on the touch screen dragging things about the place.....looks very sexy but a keyboard beats it for functionality imo.

In saying that, I am not techno - I still carry my old ipod, one of the first ones out and I still use my old Nokia brick phone that I have had for about 5 years now - it does calls and text and that's all I need from it and it means my tariff on TMobile is tiny.

WeeJohnyB

[crm250]

Bold is ok, not that great to use, still suffers from poorer battery life than pearl / curve.
Storm the current firmware is far better than launch. nice to work with, dodgy accelerometer, and not too bad overall.
I still use my faithfull 8820 pearl by choice, good battery, small size and light, and has wifi unlike the 8810
for non blackberry devices i have used E50, E51, E65 etc etc infact all the proper E series nokias before they dropped blackberry connect.

If you just want to read your mail with the odd quick "ok" type of reply then any of the E series are ideal.
For a bit more of an essay or attachment viewing then it has to be a blackberry.

Windows smartphones or palms are ok with imap or pop, or even if using exchange push, but battery life suffers unless you get it to sync every 30 mins, unlike blackberrys pushed as i like my mail instantly (infact even before it gets into your outbox if with o2)

o2 do a nice blackberry pay as you use bolt on, which is 2.25 per meg or something, and even kicking the arse out of your mail you wont do more than 2 meg a month in just messages and text.

Vodafone's BIS bolt on is 7 quid or so same as o2 if i recall, but using vodafones BIS service is a bit hit and miss in terms of speed which is a shame as i prefer thier network over o2's but for pure performance with blackberry BIS or BES o2 wins hands down.

As you may have guessed i have worked with blackberry since oh day1 when o2 launched it back in 2001 in the uk. Microsoft sync has its place, but blackberry is secure and does what it says on the tin.

[TP]

Windows mobile sync can also be secure, depends on the provider - the same as blackberry, it's no different. Windows mobile/outlook supports push mail the same as blackberry - there's no difference. In fact from a corporate point of view Exchange and Systems Centre Mobile Device Manager has some features that Blackberry can't compete with yet.

From a device point of view, and bearing in mind Tonio isn't connecting to a corporate push mail server, be it blackberry or windows based, the HTC HD is the hands down winner IMO. Most providers, apart from Orange it would seem, do an unlimited data plan fairly cheap which would be good for email and developing on the fly. Orange bundled data is not expensive but I wouldn't go calling it cheap yet.

Having said that, now that you've got a business Tonio it would be worht investigating what business tariffs you can get from various providers and this deal *may* sway your handset choice. If I was in your shoes though, I'd pick the HTC HD all day long.

[Travis]

We have iPhones at work and they are fantastic; I have to say that it is the most fantastic invention. It's really intuitive and has the benefit of being able to have extra applications added. As it comes, it has:

- Full email
- 3G and WiFi connectivity
- Full web browsing (although not Flash-based sites)
- Camera (only two mega-thingies, but the software makes for great snaps)
- Full iPod... this makes your other MP3 music gadget redundant
- Image library
- Calendar
- Note pad
- Access to 1000s of games and apps
- Google Earth

Can't think of any major downsides

[Tonio600]

Originally Posted by Travis

Can't think of any major downsides

- Average camera (not that I am too bothered about that).
- Doesn't do copy / paste.

[couchcommando]

I have just had my work phone replaced with an htc touch diamond, as a phone it is rubbish complete rubbish. The battery goes flat in a day and it isn't as easy as a normal phone to access contacts, answer the phone or basically use as a normal phone.
On the plus side I can use it to browse the internet and collect any e-mails from any account and it does that quite quickly, however I am going back to my old phone as I need it to be a good phone with good battery life first and foremost

[Tonio600]

I love that threat

Ok guys, what would be the best reason not to buy an iPhone for my small business? You can't reply:

Originally Posted by Tonio600

- Average camera (not that I am too bothered about that).
- Doesn't do copy / paste.

Because I actually don't care

BB really don't do it for me, they just look too serious and too boring. I don't wear suits, at least not everyday.

HTC, well I'm not sure about the overall quality of the thingies.

[JPM]

Depends if you want to send lots of emails Tonio, touchscreen isn't the way ahead for typing IMO I've used the iPhone and the BB Storm and compared to a keyboard I can type probably 5-10 emails before I complete one on a touchscreen.

Copy/Paste - You don't realise how useful that is until you don't have it

Inability to switch applications on an iPhone, so for example you are replying to an email and need to add someone's contact details from your contacts, you can't save the email and again no copy/paste to add them.

[JPM]

Originally Posted by TP

Windows mobile sync can also be secure, depends on the provider - the same as blackberry, it's no different. Windows mobile/outlook supports push mail the same as blackberry - there's no difference. In fact from a corporate point of view Exchange and Systems Centre Mobile Device Manager has some features that Blackberry can't compete with yet.

From a device point of view, and bearing in mind Tonio isn't connecting to a corporate push mail server, be it blackberry or windows based, the HTC HD is the hands down winner IMO. Most providers, apart from Orange it would seem, do an unlimited data plan fairly cheap which would be good for email and developing on the fly. Orange bundled data is not expensive but I wouldn't go calling it cheap yet.

Having said that, now that you've got a business Tonio it would be worht investigating what business tariffs you can get from various providers and this deal *may* sway your handset choice. If I was in your shoes though, I'd pick the HTC HD all day long.

Wrong Tony sorry, BlackBerry is the only true push email device that uses a central infrastructure, it compresses each email and browsing also so if you're concerned about your tariff it beats WM device hands down, as such this also increases battery life way over 100% on a WM platform (by an independent test also) finally it's secure it's the ONLY approved email solution for UK/US government use (think you might of seen Obama kept his BB device recently) and the latest incarnation of WM (6.1) recently failed CESG (government) approval again, let alone Frauhofer certification in Germany (Government) etc etc.

Back to BB though, currently there are the following devices in the market place

Pearl 8810 (includes GPS)



Pearl flip 8220 (as above but flip phone)



Curve 8900 (newest phone available incl GPS and WiFi)



Storm (Voda only "click"screen) - **** NOT SIM LOCKED THOUGH****



Bold (3G, Wifi, GPS....)



The storm is OK but is a consumer device (touchscreen) so far 90% to consumer in market, similar to the iPhone,/HTC, new firmware release a week or two ago to address certain issues.

Pearl 8810 like a normal phone but also BB enabled either BIS/BES
Pearl flip as above

Curve 8900 the latest phone, my personal device at the moment, great bit of kit, good battery life cracking screen , wifi/GPS not 3G

Bold does it all, you can even Bluetooth to your laptop and use it as a 3G modem, BUT because it does it all the battery does suffer (still over 24 hours) but by disabling what you don't use (Bluetooth/Wifi/3G) etc you can vastly reduce the power consumption, new firmware was release last week and should address battery life and will be available on the carriers website.

Note - make sure you have at least 4.5 code loaded on the devices to get the latest features, Bold/8900/Storm all come with 4.6/4.7 out of the box.

Oh plenty of apps out there including Google mail (calendar sync - I use this myself), GPS, Tube maps, travel info, iTunes playlist sync and not that I'd imagine you use SAP but we are the preferred partner for deploying SAP to the mobile workforce, and $150M has just been handed out to developers to create more 3rd party apps.

[ali]

I love my iPhone, but for business I'd have a Blackberry Bold without question. I don't have one but that's because I prefer clients to have to really make an effort if they want to speak to me!

I would also point out that ownership of a Blackberry of any kind has a direct, and fairly unpleasant, effect on your social skills.....