iPhone vs Blackberry Pearl

I had a Pearl for about 8 months before I got the iPhone on iDay. It's been a love/hate relationship with the iPhone, and there are many times I've wished I still had the Pearl, but I've come to terms with the iPhone's shortcomings and have tried to focus on the fact that it is truly an amazing "multimedia device with a phone".

My big cellphone wish was for a true mobile email client that was Mac-friendly, and the iPhone, for the most part, delivers. I wasn't quite as happy with the iPhone email until I set up Gmail IMAP service. This totally changes the email experience on the iPhone. In my opinion, it is a MUST! All my email gets forwarded to my Gmail account, where it's filtered, sorted and arrives on my desktop Mac and iPhone in perfect sync! Beautiful. I DO miss the Blackberry push email, but the iPhone checks every 15 min, which is really fast enough! (There is a way to shorten the polling time if you have Terminal access to your iPhone.)

I DO miss the size and weight of the Pearl... it truly disappears in your pocket, and I think the reception and earpiece/speakerphone volume was better. The biggest thing I miss is the ability to tether the Pearl to my MacBook, which came in very handy at times. I also liked the Voice Dialing. Some have had problems with syncing BB's using PocketMac, but I had NO issues whatsoever (Hint: use a "powered" USB socket to connect the BB to your Mac). That said, it is a beautiful thing to watch the iPhone sync with your Address Book, Mail, Safari bookmarks, Music, Video, etc! (Notes and ToDo's will come soon. (Please!))

So, I am still ambivalent about the iPhone vs. Pearl... but, for now, I'm sticking the the iPhone. The iPhone plan in the US is also $20 cheaper per month than a personal Blackberry (BIS) plan.

Wow! What a well thought out and intelligent post. It's everything I'd expect from a Dell user.

I see the BB8800 series as professional, the Pearl and the Curve as all around user. The iPhone as all around and never intended for professional use, at least for "now" than again maybe never.

Been there done that for B8800 and the 8820, I agree with the other posters mention of the GUI for BB, I really did not care for it either. iPhone give me what I need as is and the monthly cost for the basic package, great, just what fits my needs and budget.

Try the iphone for 14 days and the bb for the trial period, get a temp number and do your own testing, take what you read here with a grain of salt but I cannot stress enough do YOUR OWN testing.

Tethering is when your computer uses your phone's internet connection to surf the web, either via BlueTooth or a cable.

Yes, tethering is when the phone links to your MacBook via USB or Bluetooth, and uses the cellphone's data service to connect to the internet. The iPhone cannot do this. The Pearl (and a LOT of other cellphones) can.

I don't think the Pearl or Curve (Which would be my 1st choice as an iPhone alternative!) are 3G yet... otherwise you would be able to tether your MacBook and achieve near Broadband speeds! Surfing or emailing from the MacBook via EDGE is great in a pinch, though!

Have you looked at the Nokia N-95. That's pretty much the most feature-laden phone that isn't a "brick". It's actually smaller and lighter than the iphone, just a little thicker. 3G, Wi-Fi, 5 Megapixel camera, Symbian OS with lot's of PDA functionality and Apps, Mac-freindly, etc. and costs just a little more than the iPhone. Could be a good alternate choice for you?

chrisasha wrote:
What is IMAP and why is it a good idea?

IMAP is one of the two open protocols for email. (Excluding Microsoft Exchange, IBM 's Lotus Notes, and other proprietary protocols.) The other is POP3 (Post Office Protocol).

POP3 is what most people still use. It was designed when storage was expensive and people had only one computer (or shared a computer). When you "get" mail with POP3 it is downloaded to your computer and deleted from the server that received it from the Internet. Thus, if you have read the mail on your desktop, later, when your iPhone connects, it won't be able to retrieve that mail and vice versa. Because most people have multiple devices now it is possible to leave the mail on the server after it is downloaded (that's an option in mail setup). But this is a kludgy solution because it clutters up the mailbox and requires you to read (and delete) messages more than once.

IMAP (Internet Message Access Protocol) is a different concept. The master copy of any received mail remains on the server. You have a choice of reading it from the server when connected to the Internet using a web client such as Squirrelmail, or "syncing" the mailboxes on the server with your local "client" (PC, Mac, smartphone, etc). The advantage of IMAP is that the master copy of all mail is in a safe place, and you can sync it with multiple devices like your phone AND your PC and have it on both. If you delete it on one client it will be deleted on the others. Another advantage of IMAP is that you can create folders on the server that are replicated on all clients that access the mail. Thus, if you move mail from the INBOX to another folder (e.g., ACTION ITEMS) on one client that move is reflected on the server, so the item will be in the new folder on all of your clients when you next sync them with the server.

chrisasha wrote:
Thanks for the excellent IMAP vs POP mail explanation.
So, here's my dumb question... I currently use a POP3 email address (for private stuff) and also a web based email address (for work). If I was to set up an IMAP address, could I forward all my private POP mail to that address and then what???

Yes, you can forward POP mail to an IMAP account. If you reply, however, the reply will appear to come from the IMAP address. There may be an exception: Gmail now offers IMAP access, and GMail is designed to be a forwarding address. One of its features is to make any replies to forwarded mail appear to be from the original address. I'm not sure if this works using their new IMAP service, but I think it is likely that it does.