BlackBerry Forums Support Community

ArgonNJ · 12-03-2009, 05:54 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by contraria2

yes, they are toys...

Why do I say that? Because when you go to the (iphone, droid et al) forums; the majority of questions are about apps, touch, finger swipes, screens, widgets, music, movies and all other kinds of things that are a lot of fun, but not much to do with someone conducting business. Just because a "phone" has tons of gadgets and widgets doesn't make it a better product than one with less bells and whistles.

I guess the UI isn't important in a business device then. If that were true, and it most certainly isn't, we would still be using DOS on business computers. In fact, I'm old enough to remember how stuffy business types and so called tech writers laughed off the Mac and its graphical interface when it came out. How quickly that changed when Windows came out. Now much attention is given to the UI, in fact, its the major selling point when Apple and MS are pit their OS against each other. To call Android and the iphone a toy because they put work into their UIs is short sighted and just plain wrong. History does in fact repeat I guess.

LunkHead · 12-03-2009, 07:02 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by contraria2

I've had a BB for 5 years. During that time I played with all the new smartphones/PDA's to hit the market, and, yes, they are toys.

Disagree.... I have had BB's for many years as well and I still would not call the Fred a toy.. Is it a BB? Not even close! But the BB is no Fred either....

Quote:

Why do I say that? Because when you go to the (iphone, droid et al) forums; the majority of questions are about apps, touch, finger swipes, screens, widgets, music, movies and all other kinds of things that are a lot of fun, but not much to do with someone conducting business. Just because a "phone" has tons of gadgets and widgets doesn't make it a better product than one with less bells and whistles.

If you check these forums, many of these are fairly large requests / questions posed here as well... That never happened before the BB's became more consumer friendly...

As I stated several times over in this thread... I would NOT use the Fred for a bizz... No way, period, end of story... I (notice I said I) am not running or conducting bizz... I am a regular run of the mill consumer... If I was conducting bizz it would be the BB hands down and without a second thought...

Quote:

It is clear that BB's are made for business. Communication is paramount. Everything else is secondary. On other "phones" there are so many distractions and veils until you finally get to the "business" function.

See above...

Quote:

It doesn't mean there's anything wrong with a droid, iphone or the people that love them.

What's a Droid?? I like my Fred....

Quote:

there is NO way that I would give up the BB. Hands down (for me) it destroys the droid when it comes to business needs and communication.

Agree for bizz purposes...

Kris

contraria2 · 12-03-2009, 11:54 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by LunkHead

Disagree.... I have had BB's for many years as well and I still would not call the Fred a toy.. Is it a BB? Not even close! But the BB is no Fred either....

If you check these forums, many of these are fairly large requests / questions posed here as well... That never happened before the BB's became more consumer friendly...

As I stated several times over in this thread... I would NOT use the Fred for a bizz... No way, period, end of story... I (notice I said I) am not running or conducting bizz... I am a regular run of the mill consumer... If I was conducting bizz it would be the BB hands down and without a second thought...

See above...

What's a Droid?? I like my Fred....

Agree for bizz purposes...

Kris

Hey Lunk,

Why'd you stop giving us running updates? I am curious to hear about your growing love of the "fred."

There are so many things I love about it. But, as mentioned above, I'm not sure I'm gonna keep it.

I think I'll wait till the 12/11 update/fix to make the final decision. I need to see them fix a whole bunch of stuff.

Like:
1. I need Hebrew (websites and emails.)

2. Pictures on google mail and some websites. They show up as a box with a question mark.

3. Cut/copy/paste on gmail. (Weird they didn't include that.)

4. Bluetooth to my car.

PS, how do you like typing? On any of the 3 keyboards. I don't think I can ever learn to type on the 'Froid as fast as I can on my Curve.

LunkHead · 12-04-2009, 09:26 AM

Here is another update on the Motorola Fred (some call it a Driod, I call it a Fred)

I do not think the Fred was ever intended nor is it ever going to be a BlackBerry killer.. BlackBerry has it's place in the world and it does exactly what it is intended to do.

The Fred will never compete with a BlackBerry when it comes to using it as a business tool. It's not even close in my opinion. If you need a business tool then the BlackBerry is it hands down!

I think a ton of people are having issues with the Fred for a couple of reasons. I think the main reason is that many are using applications that are called task killers. They are under the assumption that they need to kill tasks that are running in the background to free up memory.. Killing these tasks will and is causing other applications to force close, the device to reboot, and or slow down to a crawl as it seeks to reload what it needs.. Many have no clue that the Android / Linux OS will automatically close things as it needs the memory for other things. These task killers that are being used close everything the application wants. If they would just let it be the OS will close only the parts of the unneeded app that is required to free up memory. I hope that made sense but many are contributing to their own frustrations by using these so called task killers when they are not needed and will only cause other problems.. If they would just let the OS do it's job they'd save a ton of headaches..

Next, the Fred is a 1st generation device and is the 1st to use the Android 2.0 OS. As with any 1st generation device / OS early adopters will face issues. This goes for any device, name brand, or OS... BlackBerry's are no different here. Every new OS, every new device brings with it the headaches that early adopters face...

Now onto the my new and updated review of the Fred:

I am still loving it. I am getting a little better on the keyboard but I am probably 3 times faster on a BB keyboard. I can't see using this for long email or if you have to reply to numerous emails a day..

Phone quality is excellent and my email polls and works as it should..

Likes: Widgets on the main screens... I love them because they give me instant updates to the things that are important to me. I have a sports widget that updates the scores of my favorite teams. I have a news widget that updates the days news, I have a Pandora widget that lets me vote or FF a song right from the main screen, I have a weather widget that updates and give me a extended forecast right from the main screen, and I have a calendar widget that show my upcoming appointments..

Other likes: This thing is fast! No delay whatsoever when loading applications ect.. It scoots right along and I have not had a single crash or force close yet... It boots in about 30 seconds (my Tour takes like 8 minutes to boot)... The screen is gorgeous.. I have never seen a screen on a device look like this thing does.. HTML email looks as it should and the browser renders just as the browser on my home PC does... AWESOME!

Dislikes: The keyboard... I am spoiled by the BB keyboard and I can't ever see my speed on the Fred getting anywhere close to my speed on the BB..

I don't like that the screen blacks out when on a call. Sometimes when I remove the device from my ear the sensor does not pick this up and the screen stays blacked out. Since there is no dedicated call / end buttons on the Fred I have to wait for it to catch up so I can end the call via the touch screen...

Other dislikes: Battery door.. It's not bad but the way it connects to the device I can see it slipping off... Notifications... I wish there were more options for the notifications...

Finally:

Over all I am still loving the Fred... Users have to know it's a 1st generation device and a 1st generation OS.. Early adopter mode applies and expect some bugs / issues... Also, if people would quit using them stoooooooopid task killers on it, I think 90% of their problems would go bye-bye...

Kris

LunkHead · 12-04-2009, 10:14 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by contraria2

Like:
1. I need Hebrew (websites and emails.)

2. Pictures on google mail and some websites. They show up as a box with a question mark.

3. Cut/copy/paste on gmail. (Weird they didn't include that.)

4. Bluetooth to my car.

PS, how do you like typing? On any of the 3 keyboards. I don't think I can ever learn to type on the 'Froid as fast as I can on my Curve.

1. No clue when / if that will be available..

2. I have no problems with images on email or web..

3. You can copy/paste from gmail... Open device to use the physical keyboard mode... Hold down the shift key, then use your finger to highlight the text. Text is automatically copied to clipboard.

4. No clue...

As stated above, I am getting a little better typing on it but I am probably 3 times faster on the BB as opposed to the Fred...

Kris

LunkHead · 12-04-2009, 01:20 PM

The Blackberry bug is again biting me... My son wants to go to the Verizon store later and check out the Curve 2..... He might want to exchange his Eris for it possibly since we are still within our 30-day trial period...

I will play with it (the Curve 2) again and see.... Man-o-man, what to do tennis shoe.....?

Kris

contraria2 · 12-04-2009, 01:32 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by LunkHead

1. No clue when / if that will be available..

2. I have no problems with images on email or web..

3. You can copy/paste from gmail... Open device to use the physical keyboard mode... Hold down the shift key, then use your finger to highlight the text. Text is automatically copied to clipboard.

4. No clue...

As stated above, I am getting a little better typing on it but I am probably 3 times faster on the BB as opposed to the Fred...

Kris

Thank you.

Those four items are important to me.

When you open websites, do you always get all the pics? Same with email? Often I get a box with blue question mark in middle. From other forums, I've learned, I'm not alone...

That copy/paste in gmail is SO inferior to the bberry way.... If I were to make the droid my new - and only - phone; the learning curve

would kill me.

I dunno...I'm just gonna wait till 12/11. I hope the update will make the decision easier.

contraria2 · 12-04-2009, 01:34 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by LunkHead

The Blackberry bug is again biting me... My son wants to go to the Verizon store later and check out the Curve 2..... He might want to exchange his Eris for it possibly since we are still within our 30-day trial period...

I will play with it (the Curve 2) again and see.... Man-o-man, what to do tennis shoe.....?

Kris

The Curve 2 looks GREAT! Loved everything about it while fooling around in the vzw store.

The only reason I haven't gotten it (yet), is cause the Tour 2 should be coming out soon.

LunkHead · 12-04-2009, 01:41 PM

I do not like the keypad on the Tour.. I find for me at least the keypad on the 8330 is awesome... I will need to get some play time in on the 8530....

Ahh.... Now I am struggling.... Keep my Fred or go with the Curve 2... I love the Fred but as usual I always end up missing the BB....

Darn it!!!!!

Not real sure about the Curve 2 though... The reviews have been rather underwhelming...

contraria2 · 12-04-2009, 01:45 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by LunkHead

I do not like the keypad on the Tour.. I find for me at least the keypad on the 8330 is awesome... I will need to get some play time in on the 8530....

Ahh.... Now I am struggling.... Keep my Fred or go with the Curve 2... I love the Fred but as usual I always end up missing the BB....

Darn it!!!!!

Not real sure about the Curve 2 though... The reviews have been rather underwhelming...

Hmmm

Where'd you see those reviews? What's not good about em?

Yeah, I love the 8330 KB. And, yeah, the Tour is a more difficult one, but looks easily "learnable."

Now you're making me more confused

holden · 12-04-2009, 01:45 PM

One user at work jumped in and bought the phone. His complaint was that he could not open Word, Excel or PDF (Another Blackberry Cool thing)
He gave up on the phone. I have not had the opportunity to lay with the phone at the local Verizon store but that sounds like fun!

LunkHead · 12-04-2009, 06:14 PM

Once again I have lost my mind.... Exchanged the Fred for the 8530 today.... I guess I am just a BB junkie and no matter how much I like something else the BB pulls me back to it....

So no more Fred updates from me......

If anyone wants my new PIN.... PM me...

Kris

Dubdub · 12-04-2009, 06:43 PM

Oh my. You left the dark side for the berryside again?

LunkHead · 12-04-2009, 07:07 PM

Ya... I know I am a freak!!!

jsconyers · 12-04-2009, 07:31 PM

This thread needs renamed from Motorola Droid to The Fred to BlackBerry 8530 to Just Confused.

LunkHead · 12-04-2009, 08:32 PM

Me not confused.... Or am i???? LOL...

Seriously... The Droid was awesome but I have been using BB's so long I guess they are in my blood... No matter how much I liked the Droid it could never be a BB...

I went to the Verizon store and played with the Curve 2 some more and liked it more than the 1st time I played with it...

It does feel like I am holding a feather when compared to the Droid...

BallHawk3 · 12-04-2009, 09:16 PM

Verizon is doing a heck of a job marketing. Everyone is talking about the droid.

The droid is just another Android phone. (not saying android is bad). There is a handful of variations right now.

Talk about good marketing!

Why can't sprint or t-mobile hire these marketing people?

zero7404 · 12-04-2009, 11:35 PM

it's not a bad device after messing with it @ the store for some time....i liked youtube playback it was fairly smooth.
but still, that keyboard is just sad.....
only thing i do not like about touch screen keyboards is having to look at the keyboard while typing.....i noticed the droid and eris had some kind of vibrating feedback, which was ok, but still have to look @ the screen when using the virtual.

i'm ok with my storm, but i feel my next fone is going to be an n900......

i'll start a thread when i get one (possibly soon)....

dc/dc · 12-05-2009, 01:16 AM

This thread is now full of win!

ArgonNJ · 12-05-2009, 11:43 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by dc/dc

This thread is now full of win!