I recently purchased a BlackBerry Pearl 8120 from Orange for a freelance writing project and chose this particular smartphone because I had never used one before. Three later I am glad… glad that I had never used one before.
I was ready to write a review of the Pearl, but really cannot be bothered. It is slow, frequently stalls and in comparison to the Curve 8520 feels basic and from a time when smartphones were slow and didn’t do much well at all.
Part of my frustration with the Pearl came from having to deal with Orange- two days of calls and five promises that BIS had been set up got my juices flowing until eventually on the third day it appeared. Everyone was polite, but seemingly had no idea of what they were doing and this left a very poor first impression of the company to me. My very first mobile phone was with Orange many years ago and the service was delightful; every agent was multi-skilled and all too willing to help. Compare that with today where talking to each agent leaves the impression that their training was given to them on a post-it note.
Anyway, I digress. The strange thing about the Pearl is that three days later I kind of like it. The keyboard is surprisingly useful and the software takes care of almost every word I input. Despite its small size I can respond to emails very quickly and can fully understand why people like this phone so much. However, for an extra £60 the Curve 8520 offers better battery life, better call quality, a better speakerphone, a better camera, a bigger screen, a better keyboard, better OS, faster performance, more memory and an overall feel of a phone that you can rely on. It is a complete no brainer to me to say that the 8520 is the option to go for.
Like many BlackBerry’s the Pearl will be employer supplied and so most users will not care what it is like in the real world, but there is much better out there and better means being more productive. The diminutive size of the Pearl does offer many advantages though and it is one of those devices that can do an awful lot in the smallest of spaces. At its current price point it is still a bargain, but one which could do with some spicing up in the near future. Chances are that that will happen very soon.
