Opinion Needed: Black Pearl 8100 or Curve 8300

[dampeal]

Two choices:

Blackberry Pearl 8100

or Blackberry Curve 8300

Which would you choose and why possibly?


I need a new phone...

believe it or not I'm happy with ATT... out of three providers I've tried ATT allows me to get calls in my home so I'm sticking with them..

but it's time to renew my contract and if I sign up for 2yr again I can get one of the Blackberries above for $30

 

[DivideBYZero]

It all depends on two or three key factors:

8100 Pear 1
- is a great device and has all the functionality of any other BB, but you have a smaller, although still high res, screen.
- 2.5mm Heaphone jack is a minus in my book.
- EDGE only, but in my experience any surfing you do on a 240x260 screen is going to be fast enough on EDGE

8120 - Pearl 2 (if available on ATT, can't be arsed to check!)
- WiFi. It IS useful sometimes. The best feature for me is that all data traffic goes over WiFi at home, rather than EDGE/GPRS.
- 2mp cam. It's still a phone cam, but not a bad one.
- External MicroSDHC. 8Gb is available now, 32Gb promised by end of 2008(mem companies restriction, not RIM)
- 3.5mm headphone Jack. Very useful and with the OS4.3 Media player you can junk your iPod.
- Better keyboard than P1

8300 Curve
- Features as P2, but with no WiFi, unless you're carrier has that model.
- Wider screen res for easier browsing
- Longer battery life.
- GPS version (8310) if you need that
- full QWERTY keyboard, BUT you have to remember that the Curve keys are MUCH smaller than the Pearl.

Other than that they run the same OS and same third party apps.

 

[bigrash]

Definitely the Curve. As much as the pearl is a nice design, I hate that keypad. Plus the curve has a bigger screen which is nice for certain applications (like gps).

 

[zig3695]

pearl2 allllll the way. the curve is still a square phone. the pearl is slim, the pearl2 is supposed to be slim and thin. pearl2 adds wifi, 2mp camera and a 3.5mm headphone jack (its a real mp3 player now). and while i agree i hated they suretype keypad too, i have finally got the hang of suretype and its AWESOME. you have to realize that it will usually figure things out if you just keep typing away...i think i can go just as fast on suretype as i can on a full keyboard phone...

 

[dampeal]

Pearl2 is not available right now..

my current smartphone keeps putting itself into flight mode and it's annoying me, in the middle of a call it'll cut out on me..

I don't want to spend a lot on a phone, but I need a new one and I like having a keyboard, pretty much every phone I've had has had one..

the two blackberries will only cost me $30

or I can get the Samsung Snyc for Free actually, but no keyboard.. but it is 3G...

then there's the Nokia N75 for $20 also...

or the 3125 for $40 with Windows Mobile



dunno.. too many choices...

 

[bigrash]

Originally posted by: dampeal
Pearl2 is not available right now..

my current smartphone keeps putting itself into flight mode and it's annoying me, in the middle of a call it'll cut out on me..

I don't want to spend a lot on a phone, but I need a new one and I like having a keyboard, pretty much every phone I've had has had one..

the two blackberries will only cost me $30

or I can get the Samsung Snyc for Free actually, but no keyboard.. but it is 3G...

then there's the Nokia N75 for $20 also...

or the 3125 for $40 with Windows Mobile



dunno.. too many choices...

I had the Sync for a couple of months, and although it's a nice basic phone, I don't think there's much use for the 3G for that type of phone. 3G is nice on a phone like the 3525 or the Tilt with Windows Mobile for video and other uses, but I didn't find it too useful on that phone. The only use of 3G that I had on that phone is instant email alert from Yahoo.

I had the 3125 before the Sync, and I liked it a lot. You can do so much with WM. I'd get the 3525 though since it's a little more powerful (Tilt is even better).

 

[DivideBYZero]

Originally posted by: zig3695
pearl2 allllll the way. the curve is still a square phone. the pearl is slim, the pearl2 is supposed to be slim and thin. pearl2 adds wifi, 2mp camera and a 3.5mm headphone jack (its a real mp3 player now). and while i agree i hated they suretype keypad too, i have finally got the hang of suretype and its AWESOME. you have to realize that it will usually figure things out if you just keep typing away...i think i can go just as fast on suretype as i can on a full keyboard phone...

P1 and P2 are exactly the same in all dimensions. The P2 weighs about 2-3 grams more, that's all.

 

[onlyCOpunk]

If ATT had video chatting then 3G would sell a lot more phones, but that's neither here nor there.

Check out mobileburn.com they have heaps of detailed phone reviews, and when i say detailed i mean very detailed.

 

[DivideBYZero]

Video Chatting will not sell phones. If I want to call someone on the move I don't want to have to gawk at a screen and make sure the other person can see my face.

3G sells via apps that utilise the bandwidth it offers, such as live mapping, native apps for favourite sites, such as facebook, etc. Webcaming is still marginal on full size computers, there is no reason to expect it to be the killer app for mobile.