i am a tired blackberry supporter
 

i love my blackberry. i have had one since the 7200 series was the lastest. they always work. i never have syncing problems even back when i was on BIS and had to hard wire sync my calendar and contacts. i am the "tech guy" in my department. i work in a hospital. i work for 8 surgeons and 2 PhD's. it took me about 3 years to convert all the treo users over to blackberry. all but one have been happy. the one is the doc that bought a storm after i warned him, but he had to have a touch screen. it has been a little flaky.

Well this week one of the our docs traded his blackberry in for a palm pre. now he is going office to office showing all the other docs and since they are technology infants they are just giddy over it. [look, you touch the screen and things move and its bright and shiny.]

he bought a third party app so his email and calendar sync (i assume wirelessly). since we use groupwise we are limited a bit on things like this. groupwise is what has kept the iphone (which i like but not ready to give up my blackberry for it, but not for the reason you think) out of the office.

i have just decided to not voice my opinion anymore. i will just let them get their shiny toys and when they break they will have to find their own support.

well that is my rant. i have never done one before. it was mildly therapeutic.

Yeah, you have to almost love the people who have gadget-ADD.

OOH LOOK! Something shiny! A small percentage of them are savvy enough to research and know a devices advantages and disadvantages and know what they are getting into when they switch devices.

Then there are the rest, who jump without looking, then cry. That makes me laugh. Out loud.

I think I need more coffee.

BB's never break?? And new technology is what drives the market. Don't be afraid of it. Palm, Apple and Google have some great ideas and RIM best listen to them, or be left behind.

I don't like the Palm Pre personally because it is a slider phone. I've seen too many of those break. There was a girl who purchased an HTC magic and it broke same day when she opened it and it just kind of seperated. I feel that more unnecessary parts and hinges make the phone easier to break.

I'm glad BlackBerry doesn't make a slider device. Though I'm sure there are some who would like it.

I hate when people get a phone because it looks cool, it should be about your needs and how the device meets them. When I got my BlackBerrry my best friend with her iPhone goes (without any reasoning or back up) "haha BlackBerry sucks!", and then I knew she was one of those people. I stilll love her though.

HTC magic is a slider?

I feel your pain with GroupWise.

However, I support iPhones with Notify Link. Soon will be supporting Android based phones when they release their support for it.

However, Novell is developing DataSync which will sync Android, WebOS, Palm, iPhone, WM, etc, with GroupWise. It is going to replace the GroupWise Mobile Server software. This is rumored to go into public beta in 3 months.

I continue to get questions from my users if they can sync they Droid or Palm Pre with GroupWise. So, this will be music to their ears when we implement it.

Sorry, I meant the Dream! I always mix those two up.

Ahh yes... also known as the Google G1. What a piece of trash that phone is...

I wonder how many who leave eventually come back to the BB? I would surmise it is a high number. We see it here all the time.

I think you have spoken a great truth. When you look at it most of the phones have problems of some sort or another. The BBs (at lease some of them) are least robust and can take some abuse.

I can say personally, I sell a lot more BlackBerrys then iPhones. When an iPhone breaks and they can't get them a new one, I offer other touchscreen devices but they often ask for a BlackBerry. I also notice a lot of people like them for their first smartphone device.

Just what I see daily.

Yes but are you the PAID IT Guy? If your position does not state that you are to provide tech support then I would laugh at them.

On the other hand, if you are paid tech support then you are looking forward to some headaches!

this is hard to explain, but my department doesn't necessarily expect me to solve every issue on a device that i don't use. *example* when we hired some docs that are mac users, they bought me a mac so i could learn the OS and help troubleshoot problems. way way way back when we all used palm pilots, i was given one to learn and use. way back when some docs started using blackberrys they gave me one so i was a user as well and i am able to give much better support. i know that might seem silly, but it really works.

the hospital as a whole has a couple techs that specialize in troubleshooting treo, blackberry, etc. they are the same people who run the bes and used to run some treo server. i am happy that went away. that helped me get rid of the treos in my department.

the pre may end up being a great device, but after years of daily problems with palm pilots and treos i look on palm as an evil company out to make my job way more difficult than it needs to be. some might say that is job security, but supporting all these devices is only about 2% of my job.