BlackBerry Pearl Flip 8220 Phone, Black
Posted by adminAug 6
- Blackberry’s first clamshell smartphone with dual LCD screens and SureType hybrid numeric/QWERTY keypad
- Wi-Fi capabilities for T-Mobile’s Hotspot @Home service for unlimited nationwide calls; compatible with T-Mobile’s MyFaves service
- Connect with up to 10 personal and work email accounts; 2.0-megapixel camera; Bluetooth stereo music; MicroSD memory expansion up to 16 GB
- Up to 4 hours of talk time, up to 360 hours (15 days) of standby time
- Includes: handset, battery, charger, wired stereo handsfree headset, USB cable, Blackberry Desktop software, 256 MB MicroSD memory card, quick start guide
Amazon.com Product Description
Enjoy all the communication and connectivity features you’ve come to expect from a Blackberry phone–including email served up by the BlackBerry Internet Service and a full menu of messaging options (SMS, MMS, and IM)–in a new clamshell form factor. The Blackberry Flip from T-Mobile also brings support for T-Mobile’s Hotspot @Home service, which enables you to make calls from the GSM cellular network and then seamlessly transfer them to your Wi-Fi networ… More >>
BlackBerry Pearl Flip 8220 Phone, Black
I start by saying the last cell phone i owned was a motorola startac.
I was hoping someone would add a review of this phone before i bought it.
But no luck. So far i have been very impressed. the suretype takes some getting use to, and sometimes i think it would be faster to just use multi tap mode. the features are nice and the the phone is very customizeable. (changing wallpaper, icons, mving icons etc.) The web browser works very well. I have many wi-fi connections around me but they are locked systems so i changed the settings to detect mobile first. it goes much faster. it lacks a gps system. maps are available but it doesn’t show you where you are. i got the browser/e-mail option and mapquest is available through that. storage is expandable to 16gb but i have only found 8gb cards. the simple word,excel,ppt are nice features. the screen does well for it’s size while using those. the browser zoom in feature comes in very handy. The camera is a nice extra. Extra being the key word. I’m used to digital slr and 8mp so 2mp is just an extra to me. works well for it’s size though. the roller ball seems “cheap” but i’m a guy and like things “tough”. the phone comes with a 256mb card. recommend getting bigger. that’s just not enough to hold music and documents. The speakers are loud. very impressive. voice dialing tries to make a good go of it. it takes some getting used to though if your not used to speaking clearly and slowly. I’ve had the phone for only two weeks now but sure am enjoying figuring out what all it can do. I have only been disappointed in the fact that the screen could have been made bigger given the size of the flip and space available. but i guess they needed room to show the blackberry logo and the t-mobile logo. the contact book is very impressive. you can add more information about someone than you care to know i think. over all it seems like a good smart phone with key features that you’ll actually use rather than wonder why they are there. i’m still looking for a compatible e-reader for .pdb files though. hope this review helps. ps, haven’t had problems with the battery either.
Rating: 4 / 5
I upgraded to the flip from the blackberry pearl 8100, which I used for 2 years. After reading a lot of lukewarm and in my opinion, nit-picking reviews on the flip, I bought this phone anyway, and I’m pretty happy with it. I think this is an excellent phone which no one is buying. I upgraded because I had problems with the 8100 trackball, which would pick up a lot of dirt and become unresponsive. Also, I wanted to take advantage of the new blackberry features, such as wi-fi calling, great looking new OS, expandable microSD memory, and 3.5 mm headphone jack, which let me use this relatively small blackberry as my smartphone and mp3 player. Great email control, document editing, functional “leisure” features and small form factor made this the optimum choice for me above phones that were larger (Bold) or were lacking in email capabilities (iPhone). Are there things I wish were better? Sure (web browsing is slow, though better on wi-fi and for playing around it doesn’t compare to the iPhone, par for the course with RIM), but overall, this phone has been underappreciated and its “lagginess” has been overstated. Finally, it looks pretty slick–I like the clock that appears on the external screen as well as the ability to preview messages without opening the phone.
Rating: 5 / 5
This is my first Blackberry phone, so I don’t have anything to compare it to except the standard cell phone that I had previously, which was a Sony Ericson (great phone also by the way).
There are some real drawbacks with this phone, such as the limited Edge Network, which definitely doesn’t compete with the T-Mobile’s standard network as far as coverage. I deducted one star for this, because this is an area of weakness that should be improved. That is really the one thing I wish I was different, but the benefits of this phone far outweigh that drawback. To be fair, I’ve talked to people with other Blackberries and this is a problem with the Blackberry network, not this particular phone.
Why I love this phone:
It’s a Blackberry, so the features on the phone are impressive.
1) The phone is beautiful, thin and light.
2) The screen on the outside and inside show a vibrant high resolution image.
3) The phone come with a sync cable so you can easily sync you contacts, schedule as well as load music from your I-Tunes!
4) The speaker phone is phenomenal!!! The sound is CLEAR and LOUD. I don’t really like to be holding a phone up to my ear all the time or have a bluetooth hanging on my ear. I don’t even use my bluetooth usually in the car, but instead put the phone on speaker and slip half the phone in the visor. I work at home so I can easily speak with clients on speaker.
5) This is the only qwerty phone I know of that comes in a compact flip size.
6) Picture quality is great and I comes with a flash.
7) The phone plays stereo sound from the music library you can upload to the phone through the included headphones.
9) You can save battery life by programming the phone to go to sleep at night. I programmed mine to powers off at 11PM and back on at 6:30AM.
10) ***Now for the #1 reason I love this phone…drum roll please…WiFi network calling. For an extra $10 per month, you can have unlimited calling as long as you are in a WiFi area. I’m able to work from home and call clients all around the county though my WiFi system all day with no deduction from my minutes. The calls are crystal clear and I can take calls from my clients without ever worrying about my minutes. This represents a huge savings and convenience…absolute gold! Even the iPhone with all it’s bells and whistles doesn’t offer this.
I’ve had the phone for about two months now and it’s been wonderful. I think the best thing I can say is the decision to buy this phone should be based on your lifestyle. For me, this is the best phone I could have bought.
Rating: 4 / 5
My previous phone was the Blackberry Pearl and the switch to this Flip phone wasn’t a big change other than the fact that it is sluggishly slow. Especially when I type with it, the text does not appear in real-time while I type my SMS text messages or email. Scrolling is awfully slow as well. If it were possible I would have upgraded the RAM on this phone!
Also, this phone doesn’t have distinct features. You can get the LG Shine CU720 Phone, Silver (AT&T) or one of the new Sony Ericsson TM506 Black/Chrome/Amber Phone (T-Mobile) for cheaper with the same main features: Camera, video, voice recording, web browsing, music player, 4 hours talk time and so on.
Disregarding the slow processing this is a great phone to have. It runs the newest Blackberry OS. You can also use the light during video recording as a REALLY bright flashlight. Another great feature is when receiving SMS text or email, you can briefly read it on the external display without opening it. That way you know if it’s from someone important. It’s also got a 3.5 MM headphone jack making it a MP3 player to go, however I wish they put the jack on the bottom or top for ease of pocket placement.
Rating: 3 / 5
Let me start off by saying that one of the reasons I’m giving this phone 5 stars is because I got it for $30 at Costco on a new 2 year T-Mobile contract. Second thing: I really wanted an iPhone (still do) but after carefully reviewing how much my family plan from AT&T was going to cost vs. T-mobile, I decided to go with this phone.
I had never owned a BB before getting the Pearl Flip, and was pretty sure I wouldn’t like it after reading these reviews. To my surprise, I really, really enjoy using it.
Good things:
- Good, solid phone (reception, sound, call software, etc.)
- I thought I would not like the UI + trackball (I crave the touch screen) but you can tell BB has put 1,000,000s of cumulative hours into this design. I really like the trackball action.
- Bonus: really fine MP3 player (3.5 headphone jack (yes!), excellent sound (better than my son’s iPod Touch IMO), very good software)
- Texting on this keyboard is very easy once you get the hang of it (took me ~ 2 days)
- Surprisingly solid video player. I rip content from DVDs using HandBrake on my iMac then transfer them to the SD card)
- Overall fast response from the OS. I have *not* experienced bug-i-ness with this phone. Not with the browser, email client, contacts, nothin’
- Love the size & the flip. Goes in my pocket easy and I don’t worry about scratches.
- Screen though small-ish, is beautiful in terms of color & brightness
- WiFi works exceedingly well (good range, no bugs)
- T-Mobile is cheap compared to nasty AT&T contract monthly cost (my family plan + extras is $25 cheaper than AT&T) though I’d have 3G with AT&T
- Email support is just plain sweet
- Google mobile apps rock (maps is the best – even using only cell tower triangulation)
Mediocre things:
- Edge only
- Browser is somewhat lousy compared to Safari on iPhone. Not unusable though.
- Browser via edge is meh (though mobile-oriented web sites work pretty well) – I use Opera Mini when using WiFi and that’s actually a pretty darn good browser experience
- Some video gets choppy if you don’t compress it down well. Once compressed correctly however, it works well.
- Camera is not great, even for a 2MP smartphone
Bad things:
- No 3G
- No GPS
- Very smudge-y
Summary: I would fight someone who tried to take this phone. Total fisticuffs. For the price it’s darn nice comms device. I’m not gettin’ the harsh reviews left by some others. I wonder if an OS patch had fixed some bugs before I got it.
Rating: 5 / 5