Blackberry Phones and Services in India

[deepakchan]

Originally Posted by akshay1234

oh crap. so i should deactivate my plan.

No you need not deactivate your plan. See below.

Originally Posted by discobiscuit

when i was still a student, I used to deactivate my BB services every time I left the country for the reason quickdraw stated above.
even when you are not using anything on the hand held some data keeps exchanging back and forth at all times (from personal experience)

You just need to go to settings and turn the Data Services "Off". Last time when I went to Singapore, after I boarded the flight, I did this. Upon landing in SG, I used the phone only for SMS and incoming calls. Upon landing in Chennai again, I turned the Data Services "ON" again. And all the mails over the past few days just flew into my BB. And I wasn't charged anything for data when I was abroad. And my battery life was almost 6X.

[akshay1234]

Originally Posted by deepakchan

No you need not deactivate your plan. See below.



You just need to go to settings and turn the Data Services "Off". Last time when I went to Singapore, after I boarded the flight, I did this. Upon landing in SG, I used the phone only for SMS and incoming calls. Upon landing in Chennai again, I turned the Data Services "ON" again. And all the mails over the past few days just flew into my BB. And I wasn't charged anything for data when I was abroad. And my battery life was almost 6X.

forgot about that. lol. or i can just check it once a day or something. any idea what the charges are?

[navin]

guys you are freaking me out. You mean to say that when I travel abroad my cellphone bill will automatically jump 5x just becuase I am getting emails? I dont want to sound like a penny pincher but what I understand from the above posts is that if you have a BB you pay for data services that you do not nesscarily really actively use.

Now I would love to get me emails on the BB (the format on the BB is very nice for almost all the emails I have seen) but what are these charges like. currently I am on a 199 plan and when I get my BB I will get the 7999 annual email plan. Is there a better option from Vodaphone?

[deepakchan]

Originally Posted by akshay1234

forgot about that. lol. or i can just check it once a day or something. any idea what the charges are?

The charges vary from one operator to the other. If you just dig up the site airtel.in or vodafone.in, under the international roaming section, you can find the data rates for various countries. But that is mostly GPRS rates, and BB rates are sometimes cheaper. Take into account the updated on "xxxx xxth 2009", only few operators will update regularly, you can find operators updated as old as early 2008.

Originally Posted by navin

guys you are freaking me out. You mean to say that when I travel abroad my cellphone bill will automatically jump 5x just becuase I am getting emails? I dont want to sound like a penny pincher but what I understand from the above posts is that if you have a BB you pay for data services that you do not nesscarily really actively use.

Now I would love to get me emails on the BB (the format on the BB is very nice for almost all the emails I have seen) but what are these charges like. currently I am on a 199 plan and when I get my BB I will get the 7999 annual email plan. Is there a better option from Vodaphone?

If you really want to use the BB abroad, I would suggest take a Clay Telecom or Matrix SIM Card with BB Services activated, they offer something like 50MB for around 45 Euros which is very cheap comparitively if you roam with your Indian SIM card. Last time, I used my Airtel BB abroad in UK, it was a 15 day trip, and my data charges alone was 9.9k. I refused to take the Clay Telecom before going thinking I will not even be using the 50MB fully, but I was proven wrong. I just used Google Maps rarely and mails downloading 24 hours (no attachment downloads).

[riteshritesh]

Nice info. here on the BB's and plans.
I too have been stung by huge bills on international travel, but my mails are purely work related,so all is fine.
One thing on intl. travel is to shut off 'auto more' function ,so only a part of mail is d/l'ed and you have the option of choosing whether to d/l the rest.

Just for everyone's knowledge, I use a BB 8900 on Airtel's Rs 6999 /year advance rental for unlimited usage.

[shajufx]

A 5 days europe trip with the BB services ON can make you poorer anywhere between Rs.7000 to Rs.15000 only for the email/messenger facility as reported by my neighbour last month. Its not worth the money at all. If you have wi-fi on your BB, lot of things can be done free of cost at many places where accessibility to net is free. This subject was discussed many pages back, also commented by few members like Sam (Yeti) and someone else.

[riteshritesh]

Yeah thats a great way,since many places have free wi-fi or you could subscribe to cheap local wi-fi access to get emails and work your way out to avoid heavy BB usage bill.
If you are visiting just 1 place, you can do a search for hotspots and see the service provider ( for wi-fi) with max. area coverage and subscribe to his service as soon as you arrive.

[mobike008]

A Noobie query. What should a BB user do to avoid this huge expenses if travelling abroad? Just request the SP to disconnect for the period of travel?

[shajufx]

Best and safest would be deactivating the BB service for the time period, as you can cancel your service even with 24 hours notice these days. I have heard my friends suggesting to turn off the data services before travelling, which is a very effective way. My partner spent 1 month in Dubai being on BB service, his bill had an extra 2000 rs than the usual figure, so thats not an excess bill. But this will vary place to place.

[discobiscuit]

my bill went up by over 8k on a 2 week trip to Europe.

I was using google maps excessively :(

[sammyboy]

Originally Posted by quickdraw

Congratulations SammyBoy, you owe me a coffee! Post some unboxing pictures already and how much did it end up costing you?

Surething bro, whenever we meet the "coffee" is on me
Thanks to Nandish, got the phone for just under 15K.

Am attaching a few pics of the 8520.

I am still waiting for the BB plan to be activated so this is strictly a very basic overview of the phone.

Some observations so far from a BB noob:
The build quality of the phone is fantastic.
The music keys at the top is a good touch.
The voice quality seems to be better than my e51 (oh btw retained it as a backup handset)
The trackpad is fantastic to use.It responds to touch very well and has settings for sensitivity.
It has 5 games inbuilt, which makes for good time pass.
The camera, though 2MP is pretty good with a 5x zoom.
I wasnt sure if I would be able to use the keypad easily as the buttons are small, but using it is a breeze for me.The curve in the keypad makes it easy to use.
The speaker is loud enough for my use, and music sounds good.
There are equalizer settings for the headset, which I am yet to try.

Though I am using the BB for the first time, I was able to adapt myself to the new menu very easily. I dont think I am going back.

There are a zillion options for everything so will take some time to explore them but I never thought moving to BB would be so seamless and comfortable.

The manuals that come with the phone could really be better. They are extremely basic and hardly give any info. I have been reading up this thread and the crackberry forums to get to know more.

Will write more as I keep exploring.

I am toh loving it baba.

[malgudi]

Finally I am looking to get myself a blackberry & have certain questions where I would appreciate help:
1. Need to decide Between Bold(9000), Curve (8900) & 8520. Whats the main difference among these.
2. I have got a price of Rs 20490 for Curve 8900(B&W) without any plan & Rs 22990 with Lite plan (Rs 299 Plan for 1 year included and B&W). Is this deal good? or should I go for 8520 from Airtel at 16000 for Handset + lite plan?
3. Over & above this 299 plan I need to get a voice plan. Confused on this. How does the rental work then? 299 + Voice Rental + Voice Usage?
4. Will I be able to access my Company mails on BB? How do I go about doing this?

[mobike008]

Originally Posted by malgudi

Finally I am looking to get myself a blackberry & have certain questions where I would appreciate help:
1. Need to decide Between Bold(9000), Curve (8900) & 8520. Whats the main difference among these.
2. I have got a price of Rs 20490 for Curve 8900(B&W) without any plan & Rs 22990 with Lite plan (Rs 299 Plan for 1 year included and B&W). Is this deal good? or should I go for 8520 from Airtel at 16000 for Handset + lite plan?
3. Over & above this 299 plan I need to get a voice plan. Confused on this. How does the rental work then? 299 + Voice Rental + Voice Usage?
4. Will I be able to access my Company mails on BB? How do I go about doing this?

1. Without any doubts, Bold is the best of the lot
2. 8520 with Lite plan is the most VFM
3. If your on Airtel already, you just need to pay Rs.299/Month X 12 months additional for the Lite Plan. Everything else remains the same ( your calls,sms,any other package that you already subsribed to etc.)
4. If you have company authorization you can acess your company emails too. Ask your company system admin for enabling this on your new BB phone.

[riteshritesh]

Answers in Bold.

Originally Posted by malgudi

Finally I am looking to get myself a blackberry & have certain questions where I would appreciate help:
1. Need to decide Between Bold(9000), Curve (8900) & 8520. Whats the main difference among these.

Bold has 3g which is pretty much useless, provided you plan to use MTNL/BSNL. Bold is big, so if you are a small fellow like me with tiny hands, the bold is going to be oversized. Has a 2 MP cam and outcome is not great.

8900 has a 3.2 MP cam and the outcome rocks. Is pocketable and manageable for tiny people.

Both have trackballs for scrolling, whereas the 8520 uses a trackpad.

8520 is a scaled down version of 8900 with many frills like better cam., better screen not included.

Above are just some basic points of differentiation.




2. I have got a price of Rs 20490 for Curve 8900(B&W) without any plan & Rs 22990 with Lite plan (Rs 299 Plan for 1 year included and B&W). Is this deal good? or should I go for 8520 from Airtel at 16000 for Handset + lite plan?


20490 is really good for the 8900. I got mine for 25 6 months ago.
As far as possible, don't buy from the service provider,since the handset could be locked. So check for that part, whether it is unlocked or locked to any provider.

Airtel has a 6999 /yr advance rental plan for unlimited email + browsing. Look into that too.
With the 299 plan, you can just get emails and use messengers. No browsing.

The 8520 from Airtel is going to be locked to airtel. Check if you can get an unocked one from elsewhere.

3. Over & above this 299 plan I need to get a voice plan. Confused on this. How does the rental work then? 299 + Voice Rental + Voice Usage?

There are no plain data plans, so you need to have a sim card with some voice plan ( select lowest with no caller id etc) and then only they can activate your BB Plan.

4. Will I be able to access my Company mails on BB? How do I go about doing this?

You can set up 10 emails id, provided they are pop/imap hosted mails. For exchange hosted mails ,check with your company IT fellow if they have BES support for Blackberry's. If yes, then you need to select BES plan from Airtel and not the BIS plans.

[quickdraw]

You cant ask for a comparison between devices that are priced 15k, 20k and 30k.

Feature wise the 8900 is tops (camera/price)
The Bold is desirable, has a larger screen but bad camera.
The 8520 is a cracka deal!

Go through previous pages.