My company gave me a Blackberry 8830 (thank you!). Despite my pleas, my company is Blackberry only. However, I thought that since the Blackberry 8830 was a smartphone (and a popular one at that), I would be able to customize it to my heart’s content. I was wrong.
As a gadget loving tinkerer, I enjoy finding great new programs for my electronic toys (i.e. phone and computer). By great, I almost always mean easy to use, useful, and, most important, free. Sadly for all the developers out there, I have found almost no reason to purchase most pieces of software. A legal, free alternative is usually viable and available. If there is no alternative, I pay but it is rare that I actually need said software enough to buy it. I just do without.
Back to the berry — I started finding great programs for my phone. Many seemed useful and fun. Of course, the options for the Blackberry 8830 are not as easily found or as good as those for the iPhone. Despite this fact, I was able to find many things that interested me. I downloaded them.
I quickly ran into a problem that many Blackberry owners have found — lack of memory = messed up Blackberry. I soon ran out of memory. Suddenly, most of my messages, past call history, and other important items were deleted. My berry took forever to open up programs. I did not get it. I added a memory card. At least in the 8830, memory cards do not actually help in the memory department unless you only want to store photos or music. All programs are stored on the internal memory.
What did this mean? Simple — my smartphone is a lot less smart than the competitors (i.e. iphone). Besides the normal bberry programs, I have Gmail, Google Maps, Viigo, Beyond411, Wall Street Journal program, and an icon for the New York Times and WashingtonPost. Anything more and my memory would run out.
I can somewhat forgive RIM for shipping my phone with such a minimal amount of memory. However, it is unforgivable on the newer Berrys (such as the Bold and new Curve). On the new phones, memory cards can store programs but this is still ridiculous. Memory is very cheap. For the same price as an 8GB iPhone, you can purchase a Bold. From a memory and program option perspective, the choice is clear (iPhone). Obviously, some people love BlackBerrys but if you want programs that make your phone truly smart – an iPhone or any phone with real internal memory is the winner.
March 24, 2009 at 12:09 am |
I agree. I have the same problem with the curve. Even though I have a 1 gb memory card, the internal memory is small and gets full fast. I have to wipe the device every two months or so.
March 25, 2009 at 9:13 pm |
Azeem — funny thing; right after you posted your comment, my blackberry ran out of memory simply from doing normal tasks. All my previous email conversations, texts, phone log, etc. were deleted. How to wipe — a full reset (i.e. take out my battery). One would imagine, for a business device that is supposed to make one’s life more free from hassles, that they would not have programmed it so poorly. Shame on you RIM. Stop being cheap and add some memory to your phones.