The Global Positioning System (GPS) was developed by the United States Department of Defence and is now managed by the US Air Force and is readily available for anyone to use free of charge. Yes, free of charge. As a matter of fact, just about anyone could buy a GPS receiver and build a primitive navigation system to tell them where they are in the world (especially with cool services such as Google Maps that have an API). Did you know, for example, that when you buy a handheld GPS navigation system that you don’t have to pay a monthly/yearly fee to continue to make use of the Global Positioning System that the US Air Force so kindly maintains? Interesting indeed.

I have a Blackberry Curve from Telus that conveniently comes with a GPS chip that can be enabled with extra software. In other words, there is a lock of sorts on the use of GPS until you get Telus to unlock the service for you (based on my understanding). Somewhat dissapointing since the last Blackberry device that I owned did not have such a lock (the World Edition). After doing a quick search on the topic, it seems that people have discovered some ways around this unfair lock [keeping in mind that iPhones come with GPS  navigation out of the box]:  http://supportforums.blackberry.com/rim/board/message?board.id=8300&message.id=2119

The other day I took a trip to the Rogers store to check out the BlackBerry Bold. I was hoping that they would have a demo handset ready for me to check out… unfortunately, they did not!

Apple has demo iphones in mostly every store that it is sold. I asked the customer representative at the Rogers store why there wasn’t a demo handset and his response was: “with BlackBerry, people know what to expect.” That was the most lame excuse that I’ve ever heard. I have a BlackBerry and I don’t know what to expect with the Bold. I checked out the online videos but until I play with the phone (just like I would with a laptop at Best Buy — and phones are becoming more laptop-like these days), it would be difficult for me to make a purchase. I know that BlackBerry phones typically haven’t had demo handsets in the past at Rogers stores, but I hoped that when RIM saw the Apple strategy, things would change.

Telus Logo

I’ve been considering switching to Rogers to be able to get the new iPhone. I called Telus to see what it would cost if I canceled my plan. I’m only 1 year into my 3 year contract and so it’ll cost me $500. In other words, getting the new iPhone would cost me $200 (cost of iPhone) + $500 (cancellation fee from Telus) = $700. I’ll be honest, I did consider it for a split second…

Also, it seems that Telus will not be getting the Blackberry Bold. But, the representative who I spoke to did tell me that the HTC Diamond and the Blackberry Thunder will be coming to Telus (but then again, who knows…).

Aydin.

Here is a screenshot of the Gmail integration:

Here is a smaller image:

Aydin.

Bravo Telus!!! That’s not something I’d usually say… but, this is truly a good deal. If you were ever looking to buy a BlackBerry, now is the time… As a promotion, Telus is now giving out the new BlackBerry Pearl / HTC Touch / or HTC S720 for free when you sign up for a 3 year plan: http://www.telusmobility.com/on/plans/pcs/toronto_smartphones.shtml

You can of course sign up for a $15 unlimited email and instant-messaging plan as well. This is a good deal.

Although, I wish that they would let other BlackBerry owners sign up for the $15 unlimited email plan as well (pretty please???)…

Aydin.

Posted By: Aydin Mirzaee

I wrote previously about the fact that Telus is only offering Unlimited Email to owners of the new BlackBerry Pearl and HTC Touch. It seems that the only reason this offering was made was because Bell Canada was doing the same. I heard this the first time when I called Telus to ask them if it was possible for me (I own a BlackBerry 8830) to get the unlimited email plan (they said no)… I heard this a second time when I visited the Telus Store in the St. Laurent Shopping Center. In other words, Telus will not offer anything more to users unless it is forced to do so if the competition offers it too. Granted, this is probably a bit of an unfair analysis on my part, but at the same time, I’m not too happy that only BlackBerry Pearl owners can subscribe to an unlimited email plan

Aydin.

Posted By: Aydin Mirzaee

If you are like the other 8 million people around the world that have BlackBerries, you are in luck! RIM has recently added an integrated Facebook Application to its popular mobile phone. The BlackBerry Facebook application is based on the Facebook Mobile API, which is still fairly new.

To be honest, I am very impressed and delighted by RIM’s move to integrate Facebook into its phones. If you have a BlackBerry, just go to m.facebook.com (on your phone) and you will be given the option to download this application.

Aydin.

Posted By: Aydin Mirzaee

Telus finally gave me a replacement BlackBerry. The first one I received was defective and so they graciously replaced it. The new phone works just fine. I’m finally happy

Aydin.

Posted By: Aydin Mirzaee 

About a couple of days into life with a BlackBerry I realized that the mobile internet features don’t always work. This was slightly disappointing; but, being the nice guy that I am, I brushed it off. Then there was the massive outage. I learned that a lot of people were affected by this and so I remained on the sidelines once again. But even for the nicest of guys, there is a threshold that if crossed will force action. I called Telus (my provider) and demanded an explanation. After about 2 minutes on the phone (and 18 minutes of being on hold: yes, Telus customer support seems to be horrible – thumbs down to them – although, thanks to the headset that came with the phone, I was able to stay productive) I was told my handset was defective.

Learning that I had a defective handset, I went to two different Telus stores that just referred me to other places. Finally, the Telus store at the Rideau Center (in Ottawa, Canada) went ahead and ordered a handset for me. My handset arrived after two days. I went to pick it up but they wouldn’t give it to me since I had my phone for under 30 days. They said that if the phone was under 30 days old they would not replace the handset and would have to replace everything (i.e. everything that came in the box and not just the handset). This was fine by me; but of course this would only work with an original receipt. After finding the receipt and taking it back to them, they said that since I bought the handset from a reseller of Telus and not the company directly, I would have to go back and deal with the place through which I made the purchase. Off to the Billings Bridge Mall…

Now, Michael Hutchinson who is the store manager at the Telus location here is a nice guy and ordered another handset for me. It’ll be here next week. Looking forward to it. I am hoping that I can finally use the phone without interruption…

Conclusions

- I had a defective Blackberry (has RIM ever heard of Six Sigma???).

- Telus customer support is aweful (why is it so hard to talk to a customer representative???).

BTW,

I will call Telus and complain as I’m not paying this month’s bill with the type of service they offered me.

Aydin.

Posted By: Aydin Mirzaee

The Good:

I have to admit that when I first got the brand new BlackBerry 8830, I was very excited. The 8830 is a CDMA phone but can also connect to GSM networks when you decide to roam globally. This essentially means that if you plug in a roaming SIM Card from a trusted supplier like Celtrek (http://www.celtrek.com):

you will be able to travel abroad and not pay ridiculously high roaming fees. You’ll get to make your phone calls for about 90% less. Amazing? yup

Other than the world phone functionality that the new BlackBerry 8830 offers, it also has push email, access to the internet, native mp3/video player, IM services, etc… All good stuff. The interface is also very simple to navigate.

The Bad:

a) Well, there is no camera which is a downer. Why not?

b) For the two weeks that I’ve had the phone I’ve experienced downtime almost every day. This is ridiculous. I don’t think I’ve had one day without any downtime. There are constantly delays in receiving email and I can’t access the internet a lot of times. I get errors like “The service is currently not available. Please contact your service provider.” or “you do not have enough network coverage to process the requested service.” How dissapointing

c) For about 100 bucks/month that I end up paying for the phone, I get about 100 daytime minutes, unlimited incoming calls, and a measly 4 megabytes of data. There’s not much I can do about the low data offering. Fortunately, there is something I can do about the limited daytime minutes thanks to bOK (http://www.bOKnow.com).

The great thing about bOK is that I can use it to make ridiculously cheap long distance and international calls while in my roaming area.

My Question at the end of the day is, does everyone get so much downtime on their BlackBerries? If so, how is it tolerable?

Aydin.

Posted By: Aydin Mirzaee