Hello,

I am trying very hard to grasp this whole blackberry thing. I have an 8100 and I need someone to tell me the story. You guys seem to really know whats up so I am posting here.

I dont get this service book thing?

I dont understand why I dont have a web browser icon?

I dont understand how to add email without going through the enterprise thing.

What are all these things like blackberry web accounts and blackberry email accounts.

Why does my phone seem all locked down and I cant use any web features without doing something?

What is this whole pin thing?

All I want is to browse the web, and check a couple gmail accounts. I dont want to pay for some expensive blackberry plan I wont use. Do I need such a plan to make my phone get on the web?

I am very savvy on GSM "phones" but very lost when it comes to blackberries.

Please dont flame me too bad...

I've had my 8100 all of 3 days, so I may get some of this wrong, but here ya go:

Service Books are simply the links from your email addresses to your BB. You indicate that you want to check a couple of email accounts, so you would have to set those accounts up with your Blackberry Internet Service (BIS) so that they get pushed to the BB. Your service provider should have given you a website to go to in order to set this service up. Gmail accounts work beautifully with these phones.

A PIN is the unique ID number that every BB device has. Its on the box your phone came in, and also on your phone under Options--Status.

You can't use the Blackberry end of the phone without a data plan, I don't think. If you don't want to pay the extra money for the media service, you basically paid for a gadget you don't intend to use.

Your phone is "locked down" because it sounds like you don't have a data plan, so none of those features associated with the wireless internet are available. You have a regular cellphone at the moment.

You didn't specify your wireless carrier, so I can't be sure what your plan offers. I am with Cingular/AT&T, they do not offer any phones that can browse internet/check email without purchasing the separate data plans.

That being said, if you don't want to pay for a data plan, you won't be able to use the phone's best advantages.

Welcome to the forums, I hope this helped.

You made two threads... so I'll reply twice with the exact thing!

Do you have a BB Data plan..? No I'm not refering to the regular internet plan that providers give you but a BlackBerry data plan. If you don't have one then you won't be able to have a web browser, send MMS or use internet at all. There is no pay as you go thing unlike other phones so yeah unless you have a data plan there is no using internet through your phone. Service books are just things they send you to enable your browser or different web features. Unless you do have BES then the enterprise server wouldn't be any help to you.

Hope it helps, welcome to the forums... I'm hungry

Wirelessly posted (BlackBerry Pearl: BlackBerry8100/4.2.0 Profile/MIDP-2.0 Configuration/CLDC-1.1 VendorID/100)

The piece of the puzzle you are missing is that a lot of the blackberry "magic" occurs on servers run by rim themselves. That's why you have to have a blackberry specific days plan. Your phone doesn't go check your imap mailboxes itself, the servers do that and send the emails to your phone. That's why it seems locked down. Enterprise customers run their own blackberry back end, that's why that option is there but no option for internet browsing.

I'm posting from my phone so I know I didn't answer all your questions but will follow up in am to see if I can help more.

good luck