Hey guys


Looks like fido is finally catching up to the rest of the world!

Fido now supports Blackberrys!!! the plans arent that great right now, but after talking to my contacts inside they will be creating new plans for the BB.

Right now all that fido has is the nokia E62 smartphone, with more to come as i imagine!!

wOOt!!

Discuss

Cory Scheuer

Fido offers BlackBerry Connect for the E62 but that's about it. According to Rogers BlackBerry data support department for BlackBerry use you can only use Rogers Wireless but for BlackBerry connect you can use Rogers or Fido.

I'm currently with Rogers but with Rogers owning Fido I don't see Fido's data rates to get any cheaper and if Fido does offer full BlackBerry service down the road I am sure the rates will be similiar to what Robbers is charging. It's a shame that all Canadian carriers charge so much for BlackBerry data packages.

Found this on the website for rates for BB Connect.. Don't look too promising if they decide to offer full BB service..

Blackberry® Connect™ Rates on FIDO (LINK)

BlackBerry Connect E-mail options Monthly
charge
7 MB
$6 per additional MB $40
25 MB
$6 per additional MB $60
200 MB
$5 per additional MB $100

I've been a fido user since they first came out. I am on the original city plan paying $40 per month for unlimited talking. I have been waiting with various degrees of patience for fido to release a blackberry service and now that they have I am underwhelmed. I hope that they provide us long waiting customers with a true plan as opposed to a blackberry connect plan but I think that I have to act on my own, I'm tired of waiting. I think that I will pick up an 8800 when they are released and then sign up for a data only plan at rogers (ugh! Yea, I know that they own fido but still...) I may have to carry two devices around while I wait for fido but at least I can finally start to conduct my business (I'm a Realtor) in a civilized manner. If there is anyone on this site who has some knowledge about how quickly fido will be releasing more bb plans I would be quite interested to hear about it.

Fido won't be releasing BlackBerry's, back in the day it was a known fact that Fido was little more than a pain to the other Canadian carrier and Robbers swallowing them did two things one increased their GSM footprint and two gave Robbers a consumer band to market toys like the Hiptop. Considering Robbers really does favor the corp. when it comes to discounts and promos there are probably far more BlackBerry sales and contracts to be had on that side of the business opposed the Fido camp. With Robbers, Bell and Telus all offering BlackBerry service, if Fido was in the BlackBerry game it would have happened long ago, just my .02...

what is the diff between the reg data bb and the connect?

BB Connect is for non RIM devices like the Nokia E61 which have special software to allow BB mail to go to them.

I wouldn't have such a problem with bbconnect if I was able to pick my handheld. No such luck. I want to use a blackberrry 8800 but I am also looking closely at the upcoming gsm moto q. Neither of these will work with fido today though. For me, I am not going to walk away from a fido $40.00 unlimited voice plan so until fido shows me the love it looks like I have to carry two devices. 1, a small gsm phone (covered) and 2, whatever blackberry or pocketpc unit I want. I just have to make sure that I don't tie into a long term plan, just stay loose and be ready for whatever fido (eventually!?!) comes up with.

Hmm, so my standard BlackBerry Plan works with BB Connect devices (on TMO), but provisioning the other way around doesn't work?

toemaytoe

i know the feeling... my BBs on rogers and i have city fido as well with fido... the plan is way to good to give up and no one can beat it or some close to it... so yeah right now i carry 2 devices and its not that big of a deal... i just use the BB with a data plan and the figo for all voice calls...

and BTW with rogers you dont have to go on a term to be on a data plan you can go month to month, thats what i am doing now. i did this just in case for whatver reason i needed to cancel... BUT right now i have noticed alot of rogers dealers in the lower main land who have awesome deals on the pearl...

just a few days ago i conviences my women to get a pearl and she picked up up for 99 on a 3 year term, and i also got my boss to get one as well and he got his for 75 on a 3 year term... so yeah theres some info for yah!

Cory

Hey Cory, some good points. I'm probably going to pick up any used gsm blackberry through the buy and sell just to get going and then keep my eyes open for a deal on the 8800. I've seen 8700 models selling for around $175 to $200. It's a cheap way to get going. I sure hope that fido introduces more plans soon though...

i hope soon!

it would be nice to have a BB with city fido and have BB data plans so...

also try ebay, i was able to get my 7105t for 100 brand new sealed box, shipped... you never know with ebay

and the data plans are ok with rogers as i'm sure you've looked so yeah...

I am new to blackberry forums, so apologies if I am asking a dumb question...

From what I can make out, blackberry connect is something that runs on a non RIM device to make it work with the regular vanilla BIS. (that assumption may be wrong).

Fido has introduced BIS and sells Nokia E62 running blackberry connect to work on it. Is there any reason that my blackberry 7280 (which I currently use as just a phone on FIDO and would like to get data as well) woudlnt work if I subscribed to the BIS service.

Is there some tweak in the FIDO BIS setup that only allows Blackberry connect devices to connect rather than the real thing.

It does look like the BIS only gives email to the Nokia whihc would be less than ideal.

Finding anyone at FIDO custoemr service who knows anything about the blackberry is impossible to answer a question like this

I recently bought a BB7100t and i wanted to try out the BB service on my fido. I registered for the BB Connect plan and instantly my data and browser were working. I used the BB website and set up my emails to be pushed to my BB. It all worked fine, but i got rid of it since i dont want to pay $40+tax for the BB service. Right now im looking for a way to use WAP on my BB, tho i dont think it is possible. It looks like the BB will not allow anything on it to use WAP directly.

Did you try Opera Mini for blackberry? I have heard some people say it works.