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By Andy C
My opinion of this product is as per Peter Haydon's review. It's excellent.
However, I just wanted to add a few things:
1. The battery life on this device is outstanding. It arrived on Tuesday and it is now Friday evening and the phone is still on 20% battery - even after the compulsory 'new gadget' constant fiddling. Battery performance usually improves after a few charge/discharge cycles, so I can only see it improving.
2. Unfortunately, the phone doesn't work with my Nokia CK-7W bluetooth car kit. The phone and car kit pair together nicely, but the caller hears a horrible echo on their end of the line. Having had a look around on Google, it seems that this is a common problem with Blackberrys and Nokia car kits with no real solution (the 'echo control' option on the handset did nothing). As a result, I think I'm going to have to get a new non-Nokia car kit. This isn't a massive problem as I'm fairly confident in DIY / car electronics and a new kit isn't too expensive, but if you'd have to pay someone to fit a new kit, factor the extra expense into the equation.
3. As mentioned in Peter's review, the 'Google Sync' app is superb. All of my contacts from Google / Gmail and my calendar entries were loaded onto the phone in a couple of minutes. No errors, no hassle. You can then set it to auto-sync every two hours or manually, as you wish.
I bought this to use with an O2 SIM-only 'Simplicity' tariff. The option to choose a Blackberry bolt-on isn't listed on their website, but you can swap any standard bolt-on for the 'Blackberry Unlimited' bolt-on. Just call up customer services and they transfer it over overnight.
By Peter Haydon (Moray, Scotland)
For:
It looks extremely smart, the display is knock-em-dead bright and sharp.
It feels very solidly constructed, giving an instant impression of high quality.
It does it all. 3G, WiFi, Bluetooth, GPS, autofocus camera - this is the first Blackberry with everything. Add in the most famous and best established mobil email service and there is nothing else to come close.
It sets up very easily. WiFi connection is brilliantly simple, and when you've done that the phone will always access the internet by WiFi whenever your defined network is within range. You can define many networks, I don't know the limit, and when the phone sees one you've defined it connects to it.
Setting up the Blackberry push email service is a doddle. You just have to supply the phone's IMEI and Blackberry pin to create the account, and then you tell it which email accounts to access. All it needs for each account is the email address and password, that's it, no more to do. After that the Blackberry service scoops up all your emails and zapps them out to the phone. This is not just a case of copying emails to the phone, that's easy, this a a fully synched service, so if you delete an email on the phone it is also deleted from the email account. Blackberry have been doing this for many years, and it all works very well indeed.
Please note that subscription to Blackberry Internet Service (BIS)is required for full email functionality, all the major UK networks offer plans inclusive of BIS.
The GPS function works the best I have seen in a phone, enabling me to get fixes to within 3 metres even when indoors, if close to a window. The supplied Blackberry Maps software is effective but looks crude, Google Maps is a much better package and integrates perfectly. When (if?) Google's free turn-by-turn voice navigation is launched in the UK the 9700 will be a perfect platform because the speaker can easily be heard above road noise.
I have mentioned the excellent integration with email, and I can say I have set it up on accounts with Virgin, TalkTalk, and Google. When you sync it with Google you also a get a brilliant link with Google Calendar, and that really is a gold-plated feature. Make entries on your calendar using a PC, and your phone calendar is automatically updated, the reverse is also true. Sure, an Android phone will do the Google synch thing, but it won't match the 9700 on other features and sheer class, and it will always look a teenager's phone.
As our phones have become the cameras in our pockets, it may be worth mentioning that the 9700 has a good one, producing excellent images. The LED flash is inevitably weak, but daylight shots compare very well with those from my previous phone, an SE CyberShot. It is only a 3.2MP unit, but anyone who has much experience of digital cameras knows that pixel count is not the sole measure of picture quality. As a phone camera, it is more than good enough.
It has all the expected smart phone functions, there's no point me trolling through them all because I've probably waffled on too much already. Suffice it say that everything on the 9700 has worked perfectly for me, and it all works fast. There's no delay in opening applications, the operating system is brilliant.
Did I say you can make phone calls with it? How boring, but I feel I should mention it syncs very nicely with your Google contacts list, and editing contacts is so much easier on a computer screen.
Against:
The keypad can feel a little cramped to start with, especially if you have podgy fingers and bite your nails, so stop being a cannibal. Like I can talk!
You will instantly want to protect it the best way possible, so you will be right back on Amazon looking for the perfect case. A leather Blackberry wallet is included, but it does not offer any protection to the top of the phone, and the phone has to be withdrawn from it to be used. The good thing about all Blackberry OEM cases is that they have a little magnet built-in that puts the phone into a power-saving mode, but it can still receive calls and data.
SMS conversations are presented in a thread format, and there is no option to change that. Traditionally, when you sent a text message it was gone from your sight forever, unless you wanted to delve around in the Sent folder. With this phone, the text you typed remains, and replies appear underneath in a Twitter-like way until you delete the whole thread, but of course any incoming text starts a new thread. If you like that style it's probably great, but I wish I could go back to just having a text inbox.
The charging connection is micro-USB, and it is tight, very tight. Sooner or later that socket is going to pull away from the circuit board, I'm sure of that. To avert that hazard, on each bottom corner of the phone there is a contact such that the phone can be dropped into a BlackBerry 9700 Bold Charging Pod (Silver), I'm ordering mine, but for the price I think it should have been included.
Conclusion:
Every feature of the Blackberry 9700 appears to have been thought through by intelligent people, I cannot say how pleased I am with it. If you want to make a fashion statement get an iPhone. If you want a very functional phone delivering unrivalled communications facilities this could be the one for you.
Buy BlackBerry 9700 Bold Sim Free Mobile Phone - Black Now
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