My Evaluation of my new 6710

[morser]

I received my 6710 from Rogers AT&T (Canada) about a week ago.

Setting it up was easy. I also set up my home email and other pop3 accounts to go to the Berry using Rim's Web Client. I was expecting it to be hard but now my Berry receives mail from all my pop email accounts. I don't have the Enterprise Software, but i am evaluating this for a company i work for so i will eventually be using that. I haven't tested the personal Redirector yet either but i assume it's the same as my previous 957 i still have.

I went to www.magmic.com and got some small Java apps for it. I could not load them all at the same time through Rim's Desktop software, but got them all in eventually.

The lit up keyboard is just great for darker situations where you need to get that email out. The SMS works good.

The phone is great. Clear. The ear bud works very well too and has a mute on it.

It came with everything i needed. A cradle/charger, a separate travel charger, a holster, cleaning cloth, and powerplug adapters to work in Europe and Asia.

Problems:

-The Web Browser is not functioning yet. But i do have it installed on the 6710 so i can see the options it gives. It looks much more robust than the 957's browser. WML & HTML support with the option to view images from the web page, although they won't look that good on the screen (B&W).

-It has crashed on me, but it just reboots and it's fine. I'm sure that will go away with some minor revision fixes.

-The Radio turns off on it's own. Example, i'll take it out of it's holster and the radio will be just off. that's not good because then i can't get voice calls.... Just a bug too i bet...

-I think Rogers Rapes BB users on their data plan. $40 for .5mb or $60 for 5mb is not many data options. But the Rogers GPRS network is covering 93% of the population of Canada and seems very well constructed i'll pay that. I think the US get's better rates though even after the conversion rate.

[randy38018]

I am currently using a 5810 with T-Mobile here in the US. As soon as they support the 6710 I plan to upgrade. How clear and loud is the built in speaker? One drawback of the 5810 is it is hard to use as a cell phone replacement unless you keep the earbud in your ear all the time. I am not quick enough to find my earbud, untangle the wires, get it in my ear and answer before the call is missed. Is the built in speaker on the 6710 good enough to use on a regular basis?

thanks,

randy

[NJBlackBerry]

I've had a 6710 from T-Mobile (a beta) for a few weeks. I love it. I have pretty much stopped using my cell phone. The phone functionality is excellent and the built in speaker and mic are very good. I haven't even used the ear bud. I hate ear buds. It still has some issues (an occasional reboot) and the browser is average, but serves my minimal needs. The e mail functionality, as always, is superb. Minimal setup at all (no changes to BES, etc.). I am ordering the 6710 from T-Mobile for my entire group. It's great! Battery life is better than the 5810, but still doesn't approach the 957. But it's a great PhoneBerry!!!

[headtailgrep]

Question for you 6710 users:

Does the Pop 3 functionality allow one to reply to any recieved pop 3 email, and the from: address and reply-to: address are set accordingly?

ie: The reciever of the email doesn't know that you are on the Blackberry no matter which account you reply on?

This is already possible on the 957 (Using Sparrow and a third party email server) albeit with limited interface =)

[NJBlackBerry]

Headtailgrep - can't answer any of those questions. I don't use POP3 at all... Sorry.

[Sonic Mobility]

I've been using the 6710 and it is good, but some of my team were in Waterloo recently working with RIM and wait until you see what is coming down the pipe! Wow!

[mdfe]

I've never used POP 3 either. The one thing we've noticed with the 6710 is that coverage is not that good compared to my 957. I have to go outside to make cell phones and I think that's giving my wife a complex :-)

I think the browser's download speeds are much quicker but that just gets me to unuseable websites faster.

[Sonic Mobility]

We are seeing increasing coverage for GPRS, but Mobitex has pretty good reach right now. It won't be long though and you will have the GPRS coverage exceeding the Mobitex coverage.

As far as surfing web pages on any WAP type browser, I agree with the last poster. Most web sites simply don't present information in a format that makes browsing from your RIM practical. That's one of the reasons why the software that we built for the RIM is an application you load right on the RIM. Using the browser opened up too many security, performance and user interface problems.

[imonkey]

headtailgrep. This is my first posting:) But I wanted to tell you that the Pop account functionality for the 6710 does exactly that. When you reply to a message it is sent as the pop account that received it.

tootls

[schang]

re: that comment on increasing availability of GPRS across the u.s....it will be there, but i think it will be awhile before its coverage availability matches that of Mobitex...that took many many years to build up Mobitex infrastructure everywhere...it'll still be several years before GPRS is that prevalent, esp. outside of major metropolitan areas, where demand for high-speed wireless data access is not that high.

[cgautreaux]

How did you get them installed? I keep getting fatal error.

[Mark D. Rejhon]

>>"We are seeing increasing coverage for GPRS, but Mobitex has pretty good reach right now. It won't be long though and you will have the GPRS coverage exceeding the Mobitex coverage."

It seems to be already the case in Canada -- the Canadian GSM/GPRS coverage maps (http://www.shoprogers.com/store/wireless/coverage/overview.asp) show more square kilometers of Canadian territory with LIVE GSM/GPRS than USA territory! (And Canada only has 1/10th the population) There's a complete blanket in the whole Toronto-Montreal corridor. Full day's drive! Not even Mobitex is that continuous. In fact, it's continuous all the way from Windsor-Hamilton all the way to Quebec city - nonstop GSM/GPRS coverage - 2 day's drive!! I believe GPRS already VASTLY exceeds Mobitex at least in Canada!!

http://www.attws.com/images/maps/gsm-nat.gif
(It's pretty obvious in this image - On certain routes, it is possible to drive halfway across Canada with always-on GSM/GPRS!!)

"The new GSM/GPRS network currently reaches OVER 85% of the Canadian population and as such, is available to most destinations across Canada and the major corridors that connects those destinations."

[Update: The coverage maps on Rogers' site is only Feb 2002, so the AT&T one is a little more recent. Seems Rogers is a bit behind in updating their website coverage maps. This 85% might be 93% now, from this June articlearticle (http://www.newswire.ca/releases/June2002/26/c0090.html) - "The launch of the Rogers AT&T Wireless GSM/GPRS network was the most aggressive deployment of next generation technology in the world" and mentions coverage of digital now equals analog coverage in Canada!]

(That's 85% of population, including non-metropolitian, which is better than "93% metropolitian population" that Mobitex loves to claim)

There's actually good Mobitex coverage in Canada. I can drive for a full hour at 80 kph (on a quiet traffic day) with continuous Mobitex reception from rural fringe to rural fringe. I had Mobitex blackberry reception when I went camping about half an hour away from Montreal last summer. (1-2 notches out of 5, but good enough to get my emails after a while) So Canadian Mobitex isn't bad.

However in a short period of time, Rogers really blanketed the country with GSM/GPRS better than AOL blanketed us with "1050 hour free" CD's. GSM/GPRS covers quite a lot of rural ground and even the drives BETWEEN the major Canadian cities! There are a few dead spots where Mobitex reaches but GSM/GPRS does not, but generally there's a much bigger blanket of GSM/GPRS right now in Canada.

It's not all perfect - some people complain about weak GSM/GPRS spots, but Rogers has been unusually agressive in 2.5G rollout in the last few years. Coverage by other carriers may be better for certain areas since the cell transmitters by all the carriers are in different locations but in overall 2.5G coverage, Rogers

[Mark D. Rejhon]

morser,

Rogers once had advertised a $50 unlimited GSM/GPRS data plan if I remember correctly;

I don't know what happened to that now. I think that would be reasonable pricing. (Same price as the unlimited 950/957 plans)

UPDATE: I found it. A $50.00 Rogers unlimited GPRS data plan still exists, but only when I put a Treo 270 in my shopping cart and go all the way into specifying my plan options. It LOOKS like Rogers is not advertising this. However, I can't see anything for the Blackberry. Maybe you can get this for your Blackberry by special request!

[Sonic Mobility]

Last I checked, Rogers was still offerring the $50.00 unlimited GPRS data plan, but it was for 6 months only, then it reverts back to a volume model.

With regards to GPRS vs. Mobitex coverage in Canada Rogers has been extremely agressive. They certainly have vastly exceeded the Mobitex footprint, however, they still have a little work to do on getting the network reliability of the Mobitex network! (Just a few bugs to work out with GPRS).

[morser]

Mark D. Rejhon, Thanks for the info.

I am currently on the $40 plan but i know i'll have to switch to the $60 plan for the amount of emails i have alone....

Rogers 6710 users: keep you eyes peeled at http://www.rogers.com/blackberry . The Rep in my area called me to mention that there is an SP coming out for the 6710 and it will be posted there. It should make the OS more stable i'm told.

[morser]

I bet you can't tell us what is coming downt the pipe but i hope it's a colour Java device :) They are long overdue for that...

[headtailgrep]

What about roaming to the US? Any rogers customers successful with that?

Rogers is giving me the same bullshit as usual regarding GPRS roaming.. "no agreements"

completely lame, it better work or i'm going to tear them a new hole.

[Sonic Mobility]

You can roam in the US with the AT&T network. It is pretty seamless. I've done it lots. The problem is getting it to latch onto the AT&T network. When I pass through Seattle (and some other locations), it tries to roam onto the Cingular network. You can manually override, but half the time when you are in manual mode it won't detect any network at all.

As far as 'no roaming agreements' this isn't the case. You roam with AT&T. So don't sweat that. They just have kinks to work out. You should be able to specify which network is your preferred network and it should pick that up, because obviously Cingular isn't going to give us service!

[headtailgrep]

Yes.. well Rogers needs to update their customer service reps, they are all very clueless regarding roaming in Europe (especially) and to a good degree the USA.

[Sonic Mobility]

Clueless customer service reps from a carrier? You must be joking!:D

In general the carriers are semi-knowledgeable about their voice packages, but just don't get data...