Hi,

I am planning to get a blackberry 8800 soon, which will be my first blackberry. My problem is that, I will be traveling to Europe quite a lot (will be using pre-paid SIM cards from local providers there), and I am a bit hesitant about the e-mail service...

From what I can understand, Cingular has a Blackberry Enterprise Server which pushes "new" email onto these devices, and this gets activated when you sign-up for the data service from Cingular. But, what happens when you go to Europe? As you won't be on the Cingular network anymore, your email won't get pushed? And, what happens if you discontinue your service with Cingular?

Also, is it possible to install an email client that supports regular protocols like POP3 / IMAP / SMTP?

In summary, can someone please explain technical aspects as to how the email service works on it?

Thanks.

BES will push email to a device regardless of the carrier network it's on. I wasn't aware that Cingular had its own BES and hosting is definitely not automatically included with their data plans. Please note that your carrier's data plan and BES hosting are two separate things. I personally wouldn't trust Cingular with BES hosting...

Your real issue is that I doubt you'll find a carrier that offers Blackberry data on a prepaid SIM. You must have a Blackberry data plan to receive email.

Hi Takeshi,

Thanks for the explanation. But, if Cingular is not providing it, aren't you supposed to pay for this BES service? Does it come free or included in the price of the device? Is it free for life?

Also, this Blackberry data plan is another thing that confuses me? What is the difference between this and a regular GRPS data connection / plan? What makes it special? And, if I go to say UK, do I need to get a line that supports this?

Thanks.

You get a BlackBerry Internet Service (BIS) with any BlackBerry plan. Essentially it's a push account like the BES service, plus a service that checks your pop/imap accounts (up to 10) every 15 mins and pushes the messages automatically to your device.

The BlackBerry plans are different because they provide you access to this service. If you are in the UK, or anywhere else for that matter, you do need to be on a network that supports BlackBerry.

I did a search but didn't find a place to put this question so I dump it here since it t least relates to email. Can someone help me understand the "more" funtion for emails? I have it set to automatic but I have to constantly click the scroll ball and tell it to retreive more when I have a long email. What is "automatic" supposed to do?

Cingular DOESN'T provide BES, no carrier does. However, a BES plan just provisions your BB to be able to use it on a BES server which you will be responsible for. So anywhere you go, you would need to be on a carrier that has a BES plan so they can provision your BB. I have the BES plan with cingular, but then I pay extra to have a hosted exchange with BES server, $19 a month.