February Tech Review - Blackberry 8700c

I love the new Blackberry 8700c and I want to tell everyone from the start - I wasn't always a BlackBerry fan. I used to make fun of Blackberry units and their users... the "CrackBerry" comments didn't originate from me, but I threw the term around pretty frequently.

Before the 8700c I owned a Treo 600 and then a Treo 650 and I was dedicated to the fight against the BlackBerry. The 600 was pretty weak, but the 650 was a beefy smart phone that did everything and more than I needed. It worked like a charm and allowed me to change the way I carried and used my mobile phone - I was liberated!

Then on a late night drive from Los Angeles to Scottsdale the unthinkable happened. After a pit stop at a McDonald's I mistakenly placed my Treo into a cup holder that had just the slightest amount of condensation from a Coca-Cola... and my Treo was gone. Dead. I was devastated.

The only thing worse was having the boneheads at Sprint tell me I didn't buy the insurance on my phone and that I would have to pony up another $500 for a new unit. Unhappy, but satisfied that I was only a synch away from having my entire world "right" again, I was dealt the knockout blow... they didn't have any in stock.

BOOM I hit the mat. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 and I was up off the ground. Dazed but not unconscious I took the first "regular" phone off the shelf and left. I never got used to it. I didn't know how to program it and didn't want to learn. I wanted my Treo and I wanted it NOW. After 12 days of frustration and wandering around lost in the technology wilderness I took the phone back and headed to Cingular Wireless to cross over to the "dark side" of the CrackBerry.

I walked into the store and was immediately greeted by a sales person. (At Sprint I always had to sign in and wait, so this was an improvement. Maybe things wouldn't be so dark after all.)

I inquired about the new Blackberry 8700c and if they had them in stock, "yes we do" was the answer. I hadn't heard that at the Sprint store very often so I didn't know what to say. "You do? I'll take it." That was it. I was buying.

The 8700c has not disappointed. It is lighter than the Treo and the overall footprint is smaller than the Treo without the dopy antenna at the top. The screen is crisp and bright - very bright. "How many megapixels Tom?" I don't know, just remember crisp and bright.

Speaker phone - check. Contacts - check. Calendar - check. Camera, video recorder and MP3 player - nope. Question though... who cares? The Blackberry is my business communications tool. I fooled around with the camera on the Treo, same with the video recorder and MP3 player. After figuring them out, I never used them again. Ever.

Now if your business does call for snapping a quick picture of something or recording a quick video then the Treo 650 is the bomb. It's just not something I need or ever used. I have a Canon Powershot SD400 for my pictures and my Nano for my music. No phone needed.

Two other great features of the Blackberry are the scroll wheel and the clip on case. The scroll wheel truly makes the 8700c a one-handed device. I can check email and make quick responses with one hand. Same with text messages. I can answer phone calls and check missed calls (and then return them) with one hand. You could check with the Treo, but responding was a two handed function which means you can't drive and answer email at the same time.

Finally I dig the carrying case. It works. It knows the phone. It hangs up calls. Best of all it was FREE. I went through three carrying solutions with the Treo and finally just didn't use one.

Bottom line - buy the Blackberry 8700c. It's only available at Cingular which bothers me, but I moved for it and you can too. Don't count Treo out for long though. Rumor has it that Palm will be pushing out a number of new models and one of them is bound to match the 8700c. I've also heard of some lawsuit that may threaten Blackberry users... anyone have anything on that rumor?

TK