Blackberry Vs. Iphone

Time for a new phone, I went in today and left pretty confused. I like and need a decent day planner and the Blackberry seems to have that covered, then I picked up the Iphone and surfed You-tube.. Not sure what way to turn here, I use my phone a lot, and I am not terribly easy on them, but could learn to be.
Any ideas of which one is a better phone?
This has to have been asked before.

Are you going to get the data plan along with the phone? If so I would get the iPhone. I just upgraded from a Blackjack I to a Blackjack Epix and love it. I use my phone to sync with our corporate Exchange server (calendar, contacts, email) and since its Windows Mobile Edition it fits the bill great. There are also some wonderful features on the phone, on of which is of course being able to surf Youtube! :laughing: Even if you're not going to get the data plan the Epix supports WiFi as well, so you could still use data syncs.

Personally I'm not a Blackberry fan. Granted I've never had one, but I just don't see them as being as flexible as the Blackjacks or the iPhones, escpecially when it comes to third party applications.

The killer for me is that with the iphone, one cannot replace the battery if it runs out - you must charge it. I am always out and manage to run my bberry battery down - but I have two spares that I can just pop in...

Also, the battery life on the iphone is pretty lousy - expect to charge it every night if you use the wifi a lot. The 3G just sucks the juice right out!

Also, this sounds weird but was a pain in the *** on the iphone: you cannot take a picture and mms or text it to another - you have to email it. The bberry will let you send a pic via text or mms.

With that said - here is the bottom line:

If you want a media device and planner - get the iphone.

If you're main need is email - get the bberry.

I've had both and stuck with the bberry as my priority is email and I find it a more simple device to use.

I have a Blackberry Bold and surf the net all the time, I also chat in IRC and SSH into my web server when something needs fixed.

the iphone is nice but the BB seems a bit more solid.

I initially had no interest in the Iphone, they had one set up and running in the store and I pushed the youtube button, for a guy who is destined to have dial-up forever due to my remote location of my home (cells work fine) I was pretty impressed with the speed, but I don't want that to influence my decision too much, although it would be fun.
I just need a phone and a decent planner, the planner being second in line of importance. Does one or the other sync with a desktop version? I loved my old Palm Pilot for that reason.

the iphone rocks
first off it has great internet surfing abilities

great camera for a phone

great email if you have one of the supported email servers (gmail, mac mail,yahoo...)

it has youtube

it has hundreds of useful aps and thousands of fun ones

a calendar

itunes

accelerometers that can tell when you have the phone at your ear and turn off the screen to save battery and to prevent accidentally entering something

loud speaker phone

bluetooth

great little switch on the side to easily silence it

Superdave said:

the iphone is nice but the BB seems a bit more solid.

Click to expand...

+1

"More solid" is a perfect way to describe it.

I love my iPhone. With the 3rd party apps it just gets better and better. The apps have only been around for a few months, so I expect better and better apps to come along, as well as current apps being improved on.

My favorite thing is checking for application updates and watching my apps mature and get better with each update.

You can sync the iPhone with windows mail and or MS outlook. I just upgraded from the iPhone to the iPhone 3g. I really like them. I had a BB and found it to be a pain to operate. The iPhone can suck down the battery but there are several plugin type batteries out there if you use it that much.

I'm generally happy with my iPhone, and it's actually exceeded a number of my expectations. But as a phone, it sucks. I've had more reception problems in the two months I've owned it than with all of my previous phones combined. Granted that may have as much to do with AT&T's network, but since it's the only carrier option...

I thought I'd mention that battery life on the iPhone has seemed to improve with the 2.2 update. There were a lot of bugs with the iPhone 3G early on, so you really need to look at info since the 2.2 update. With 2.2 there should be less dropped called, less crashes, bettery battery life, etc.

I know in my area there is now more 3G service than there was 2 months ago. AT&T has been working to improve their network due to the booming iPhone sales.

As gorn mentioned you can get external battery packs if you need more time. You can charge it from any USB port, so as long as you're around a computer you can keep the battery topped off. Or you can charge it in the car, etc. If you use it heavily it's like using a miniture laptop. Mine always gets me through the day on a full charge.

I currently carry and support one of the variants of the Blackberry Curve. It's far better than the Treo that I used to carry and support, that's for sure. If I use the BB to listen to music when commuting then I typically drain the battery down fast enough to require that I charge it pretty much every evening. If I don't do this I can get away with charging it twice a week. Also, if you plan on attaching it to a BES server for email access from your work you will need to pay an additional service charge, usually, on top of the data plan and voice plan. Without it you cannot connect to a BES server, though you can surf the Internet with a normal data plan.

The iPhone has a better Internet browser and multimedia access if you can connect to the Internet to begin with. One of the aggravating things that I have found about the iPhone (and it could have been from lack of knowledge about its use) was that I could not connect it to a Gmail account despite being able to surf the Internet. It wanted to connect using WiFi and we were in a place that didn't have a free WiFi. Strange.

I use my iPhone to connect to my Gmail and it works on Edge, 3G, and WiFi.

If you get a Windows based PDA phone with bluetooth or WiFi you can use the phone to connect your computer to the net. It will be lots faster than dial-up. I've done it with my Samsung i760 through Verizon.

Roger

The iPhone is a phone that I am liking more and more the longer I use it. Everything it does, it does gracefully. Call quality is good. Typing, once you get used to the autocorrect feature, is amazing. The calendar app is one of the most polished I've ever met (as a former Palm user). The browser, while not totally perfect, is more than adequate and I have typed a good number of posts on the forums using it. And with all the polished apps and games coming out for it, the iPhone just gets better and more useful with time. The iPhone developer community is really vibrant.

I have dropped my iPhone quite a few times. There is a crack in the glass on the top and bottom but luckily not on the screen itself. There are no scratches, despite the fact that I do not use a case. I have seen iPhones with completely spiderweb'd screens that still worked perfectly, display-wise and input-wise, just with cracked screens. Be gentle on it, but it is surprisingly more forgiving of accidents than you would expect. Last week I saw a woman drop her iPhone off a table while juggling a pizza slice and she brushed it off and it seemed fine.

I poked around on a BB for awhile. Nicely made and excellent keyboard, but the interface felt very clunky from an iPhone user perspective. Certainly gets the job done for many users but having owned my iPhone for a year now all other "smart" phones don't feel all that smart, just antiquated and outdated.

carrot just summed it up nicely.
The iphone is more than the sum of its parts. find someone who knows the phone well to show you its possibilites and you might be amazed.
apple scored a home run on this one.

PCC said:

One of the aggravating things that I have found about the iPhone (and it could have been from lack of knowledge about its use) was that I could not connect it to a Gmail account despite being able to surf the Internet. It wanted to connect using WiFi and we were in a place that didn't have a free WiFi. Strange.

Click to expand...

The original iPhone before a couple of firmware updates did have issues with Gmail. Gmail is now built in to the software and connects flawlesly. There is a setting where you can tell it not to access random WiFi hotspots if you don't want it asking you if you want to connect. I live in an area that is supposed to be just out of 3G area. I have no problem with 3G and find that it is significantly better than the first gen connection.

iPhone for the win! The APPs really make the phone, tons of accessories/aftermarket support.

As a frequent diner, I love using yelp to find the best resturant at my current location, and Opentable to make a reservation (you can even have flowers waiting for you at your table

I used the bubble level app to level my xmas tree stand. I use NY Times/AP Mobile news apps 2x day for the latest news updates.

btw AT&T now offers free wifi for you at Starbucks and McDonalds with your iPhone plan.