I think this is in the correct forum.

I am trying to get my sister in laws Blackberry working correctly. I believe it is a 6210.

Her service is with Cingular.
When she first got it she accidentially set it up for Tmobile. I dont know that much about cell/blackberry software/firmware. But it seems to me that it may have been flexed/flashed/setup with the wrong software (may be using the wrong terminology).

Here are the 2 problems:
(1) She can recieve texts messages from other phones and from email accounts. I believe she can recieve MMS messages as long as nothing is attached. If there is a picture attached she does not get the picture.

(2) She can not get her email from her email account (roadrunner) fowarded to the blackberry.

We both spent time on the phone with cingular tech support. The got the blackberry working after setting it up wrong but they could not get it to recieve pics or have the emails fowarded.

Any Ideas?

so the handheld is not set up on Cingular with a BIS account? you should be able to sign into the BIS account and add the road runner address - it will poll every 15 mins

if you want it real time then set up a forwarding rule from the road runner site to forwrd a copy of the email direct to the @mycingular.blackberry.net address - not sure if this is possible to do as i don't have a road runner account.

as for the issue w/ MMS messages 'fraid i have no ideas there

The blackberry is now set up on Cingular and works for cell calls, text messaging and all that. She bought it off of ebay (pretty sure) so I dont know if it was flashed or unlocked so it could be used on any carrier. I dont have a blackberry so I am not very familar with this stuff. I told her to let me install teh software and set it up for her. She went and did it on her own and screwed it up.

I think when you do the initial set up you go to t web page and choose your service? She, I guess didnt read the entire screen or accidentially continued withthe set up for Tmobile. Of course it didnt work right and she called Cingular and they had her call Tmobile to "release" it from their system so the Cingular tech could set it up to work on Cingular. He was not 100% successful I assume because she could never recieve emails from her account and never recieve mms messages with a pic attached.


If I take a pic with my camera phone and send it to her she does not get the pic. She can have emails fowarded from roadrunner to the blackberry but for some reason only about less than 1% of them get to the blackberry.

If I send an email from my roadrunner email account to her @mycingular.blackberry.net account she will get it as long as nothing is attached.

I think that the whole issue has to do with it initially being set up incorrectly. Maybe some files or firmware from Tmobile got loaded on there that is incompatible with Cingular?

Can you check and make sure she has a BlackBerry Data Plan on her account? Without a BlackBerry Data Plan all she'll have is voice and text.

I'm pretty sure she does. I'm checking with her to be sure.
How do I check her firmware and all that?

Where can I find a explination of what flexing and flashing is?

Flexing and Flashing are terms for updating the software on the Motorola phones. Complicated and fairly difficult.

Updating the OS on the BlackBerry is easy (and I don't believe it is the problem here). RIM writes all of the code and you can run T-Mobile code on a "Cingular" BB, etc.

Check out this thread on how to update the software on a BlackBerry...
BlackBerryOS 4.x Download FAQ - UPGRADE DOWNLOADS

You do not need flexing, flashing, firmware upgrades. The basic functionaly of the device that you have problems with should work with any version of software.

If you are concerned with software that is installed on that blackberry, download latest offered by the cingular and during installation tell it not to backup emails, data, or applications which were installed separately. You should end with clean software running on device.


The easiest way to check if blackberry has data plan is to send PIN to PIN message from that blackberry to another blackberry, or to itself. If that message arrives and sender receives delivery confirmation, your device is known to RIM and to cingular.

Thanks for the explination on that.

She says that she does have a blackberry data plan.
She does send pin to pin messages. Not to me though since I dont have a blackberry.

So what could the problem be if software is not an issue?

I have no idea if Cingular supports MMS; I know T-Mobile does.
Has she set up the e-mail (using the Setup Internet E-Mail option) on the BB?

Call Cingular and tell them delete her account.

Login to Cingular BIS Web page and create new account.

In account, add blackberry email address. Blackberry should receive welcome message saying new email address was added.

Send few emails to blackberry email address. They all should arrive.

Ask her send email from blackberry to you. You should receive it.

If not, contact Cingular again. You may be confusing them with all that MMS and attachment issues. A simple problem description with steps you have taken can help Cingular support fix issue much faster.

I have Cingular for cell service and they support MMS. I mentioned that because thats how my service/phone sends pictures. I assumed it was the same for BB's. I think she set it up like that. I'll ask if she did.

If she does this will she lose anything? (stored emails, etc.)

another thing to try is to go to cingulars webpage and download the latest OS (4.1). also, if the blackberry is in fact a 6210 it has a monochrome screen and probably doesn't even support pictures.

Good point. I will find out about that also. Actually I do think she has pics on there but she loaded them from the computer. I'll ask none the less.

I missed the point that it's a 6210.. Very limited functionality...

There is no v4.1 for the 6210 - the latest version is BlackBerry Handheld Software v4.0.2.93