The BlackBerry Thread: Hello? Is anyone here???

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Inspect Your Gadgets > The BlackBerry Thread: Hello? Is anyone here???

Diafthora: Sep 22, 2003; All I wanted to do was introduce him to Mr. Axe

Replying from previous thread:

big mean giraffe posted:

Socialscope lite's the way to go imo. So much better than anything else I used.

I have yet to try Socialscope since its invite only right now, and I don't have one

It was actually what I wanted to try first before Ubertwitter, so if anyone has an invite or something, I wouldn't mind giving it a try

# ¿ Jun 22, 2009 04:32

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# ¿ Apr 28, 2024 18:49

Diafthora: Sep 22, 2003; All I wanted to do was introduce him to Mr. Axe

Oh hey, I never knew about Palringo, so thanks a lot for that, OP

To contribute to the recommended apps list, here's some of my favorites:

Free apps:
Capture It: Simple little program that lets you take screenshots of your current screen.

Google Sync: Syncs your BB's contact list and calendar with Google's

Viigo: RSS reader, stocks, news, weather, shopping, entertainment. Its pretty much newspaper for your BB. They're also supposed to include a Twitter feed in their next version.

Slacker: Its an alternative to Pandora. When it was mentioned in the last thread, it was version 1.0. They're at version 2.0.2.0 now.

I Love Blackberry: App that keeps track of how often you use your BB.

Weatherbug: I prefer this over BBWeather. It also shows you the current temp of your location when you highlight the app, so you don't even have to open it.

Paid apps:

Telenav: Audible turn by turn GPS navigation. Best navigation app for the Blackberry, hands down. If you're on AT&T/Sprint, its simply AT&T Navigator or Sprint Navigator. Its $9.99/mo, but their site has other options as well. I travel a lot and I probably use this more than anything else. Definitely worth the price if you want true GPS on your phone. First 30 days are free.

Texas Hold'em King 3: Pretty self explanitory

What makes this great is that there's online play that even lets you chat while playing. Probably the biggest time waster for me. Costs $5.99

Documents To Go: Its essentially Office for your BB. You can view/edit all standard Office files. Can read PDFs too. There's a 30 day free trial, but this one's not cheap. Its $69.99 for a non-expiring license or $49.99 for a year. Definitely recommended if you're a professional and read a lot of emails with attachments. Since its a PDF reader too, makes for a good eBook reader as well, I guess.

# ¿ Jun 22, 2009 05:03

Diafthora: Sep 22, 2003; All I wanted to do was introduce him to Mr. Axe

Iron Beagle posted:

I am so surprised by the great battery life my new Curve 8900 has been getting!

Are you also running the latest firmware? I, and many others, have found that the latest one right now has greatly improved the battery life from previous versions as well. It should be 4.6.1.231.

# ¿ Jun 25, 2009 08:48

Diafthora: Sep 22, 2003; All I wanted to do was introduce him to Mr. Axe

Iron Beagle posted:

I'm running 4.6.1.114

I assume 4.6.1.231 is one of the firmwares you need to manually flash to your phone? I always see those popping up over at Crackberry but never put the effort in to really figure out how to do it and if there are any pitfalls to doing it. Even better battery life sounds like a killer reason to update though!

I'm still running off my first charge, this is great. 15% left and I'm going to see just how far I can push it.

Its really simple to do, really. You just need to install the latest Blackberry Desktop manager, which is on BB's website, then download and install the firmware you want. Once that's set up, run BB desktop and plug in your BB via USB. It should automatically detect and tell you there's a new firmware to install. Just follow the instructions and let it do its thing automatically. It also creates a backup of your current BB settings, contacts, messages, etc. so you won't lose it. Takes about 15 minutes of just leaving it alone.

# ¿ Jun 26, 2009 06:37

Diafthora: Sep 22, 2003; All I wanted to do was introduce him to Mr. Axe

Burden posted:

I'm looking for a program that I can put on my computer that will allow me to see my blackberries screen on my computer. I don't need to control the blackberry from the computer just see it on the computer screen. Does anything exist like this?

What are you trying to do exactly? I don't think its possible, but RIM offers a Blackberry simulator program if you just want to see what it may look like: http://na.blackberry.com/eng/developers/resources/simulators.jsp

That should work pretty well unless there's something specific you wanted from your phone to be displayed on a computer.

# ¿ Jun 29, 2009 00:29

Diafthora: Sep 22, 2003; All I wanted to do was introduce him to Mr. Axe

Burden posted:

Basically I need to be able to take screen shots of my screen. I believe Rove mobile made something but I don't think so anymore. I am willing to pay for it as well. It doesn't have to be free.

I mentioned Capture It earlier, which does exactly that. It takes a screenshot on the Blackberry itself and saves it in your pictures folder. More info and download link here: http://www.blackberrynews.com/2008/11/15/capture-it-grabs-blackberry-screen-shots-on-device/

That article says its version 1.0, but the OTA link included in that article is no 1.4.

# ¿ Jun 29, 2009 01:39

Diafthora: Sep 22, 2003; All I wanted to do was introduce him to Mr. Axe

kliksf posted:

Lately I've noticed my 8330 curve starts responding really slow. Like I'll roll the pearl over to an app I want to use and it just sits there for a few seconds then it moves. This wouldn't bother me too much but it even happens when I'm trying to answer the phone. The phone rings, I click the green button to answer the phone and it takes up to six seconds to actually register that I clicked the answer button. The only apps I've downloaded and use are the Facebook app and the BuzzMe app. I pretty much don't use it for much else than as a phone and camera and occasional mobile facebook photo uploader. Depending on how fast I'm able to get to the phone, the delay from the time I click answer to the time the voicemail kicks in has actually caused me to miss a couple calls. I've tried turning it off and turning it on, that doesn't work and I've tried removing the battery and plugging it back in and that seems to help for a day or two but then it's back to lagging on everything I do. Is this common or do people know a simple fix for this?

You might want to check that your phone has the latest firmwares. Sounds like it has a memory leak that often times are fixed with a firmware update. I had this on my old 8100 and updating the firmware helped. I'm not sure what the latest for your model is, but its probably easy to find or someone else can tell you.

# ¿ Jul 16, 2009 10:04

Diafthora: Sep 22, 2003; All I wanted to do was introduce him to Mr. Axe

I just found out about Sensobi and would love an invite if anyone has a spare one

Diafthora fucked around with this message at 11:05 on Nov 12, 2012

# ¿ Aug 24, 2009 04:27

Diafthora: Sep 22, 2003; All I wanted to do was introduce him to Mr. Axe

On the topic of browsers, according to Crackberry, RIM just acquired Torch Mobile.

http://crackberry.com/research-motion-acquires-torch-mobile

# ¿ Aug 25, 2009 04:22

Diafthora: Sep 22, 2003; All I wanted to do was introduce him to Mr. Axe

I have my phone set to vibrate, and the alarm still goes off but nothing else does.

# ¿ Aug 29, 2009 21:09

Diafthora: Sep 22, 2003; All I wanted to do was introduce him to Mr. Axe

If you have Google Voice, you can have text messages sent to that, then just open the Google Voice app for Blackberries to check your messages using data.

# ¿ Sep 25, 2009 11:04

Diafthora: Sep 22, 2003; All I wanted to do was introduce him to Mr. Axe

ynotony posted:

I just got a new bold and am having a weird issue with Google Maps and my GPS. It takes a long time for the GPS to find me, which would be fine it it defaulted to cell tower location, but for some reason when there is no GPS it says my location is my old address.

It could be a coincidence, but it literally says I'm exactly at my old apartment. I have no idea where it is getting that address from. I have no favorites set, and like I said the phone is brand new and I just installed google maps. It gives me the big blue 100m circle around the dot for error as if it were using cell towers, but the blue dot is centered exactly my old apartment.

Even more [tinfoil] is that my old apartment building was huge, and the blue dot hovers right over where my unit was, which is not where google mark the address. I've never had a gps phone before.

Have you tried doing a manual GPS refresh? Go into Options > Advanced Options > GPS. Press the menu button and hit Refresh GPS. Best to do it when you're in an area with an open view of the sky. Try going back into Google Maps again after doing this and see if its any better.

# ¿ Nov 30, 2009 13:18

Diafthora: Sep 22, 2003; All I wanted to do was introduce him to Mr. Axe

OS 5.0.0.411 just got leaked for the 8900, 9000, and 8520. From what I've been reading so far, its a solid release. Check http://www.bbleaks.com/ for more info.

# ¿ Dec 9, 2009 04:19

Diafthora: Sep 22, 2003; All I wanted to do was introduce him to Mr. Axe

rndm posted:

What are the visual tweaks? Are there screenshots of the sms threading?

You can find a lot of screenshots by doing a GIS: http://images.google.com/images?q=blackberry+5.0+threaded+sms&btnG=Search&hl=en&rlz=1C1GGLS_en-USUS292US305&um=1&sa=2&start=0

There's some buttons that are added to things that require a Next, Continue, etc. It basically looks snappier and more pretty. One thing I loved a lot was that you can now set the phone to ring and vibrate at the same time! This was previously only achievable with 3rd party apps. Also, you can now individually assign different ringtones for SMS messages too!

There's a list of other neat stuff I noticed:

With BBM 5.0, you can choose to add SMS contacts to it, so you can have threaded SMS conversations within BBM.

Music, Pictures, Videos, etc are now all their own separate folders and there's a Files viewer. I also have a thing called Audio Postcard, which I haven't used yet, but I'm assuming its just something that lets me record myself and send it to someone as an MMS.

I run a ton of 3rd party apps, and the only one I found that doesn't work with 5.0 so far is Palringo. Beejive works fine, however.

If you go to Opions > Advanced Options > Wireless Update, it seems like for future OS upgrades, you can simply do it OTA.

So yeah, there's a ton of new stuff! Also, I'm using an 8900 and I upgraded from 4.6.

Edit: One more thing, there's also visual voicemail! Enabling this will depend on your carrier, however. I'm using T-Mobile, and to add it for T-Mobile, you need to add the free visual voicemail feature to your account. This used to be possible for the 8900, but they've since changed the policy. To add the feature, log into your my.tmobile.com account, change your phone to the 9700, regardless of what type of BB you have, then click on Change Services under your current plan and add the free visual voicemail service. This should work if you have any BB that currently has 5.0 with the Visual Voicemail feature. Once you've added the service, restart your phone and/or resend your service books and it should work.

Diafthora fucked around with this message at 00:15 on Dec 10, 2009

# ¿ Dec 10, 2009 00:11

Diafthora: Sep 22, 2003; All I wanted to do was introduce him to Mr. Axe

Godinster posted:

Yeah it's the one thing I'm having to get used to. It's a shame Opera Mini 5.0 beta 2 doesn't work on the 9700 since the BB Browser still blows.

Bolt Browser is an awesome alternative too, if you wanna give that a try.

# ¿ Dec 10, 2009 04:43

Diafthora: Sep 22, 2003; All I wanted to do was introduce him to Mr. Axe

ButtonyQuotient posted:

I've just realized something new (and not all that great) about my Tour. Does anyone else have the problem that, when they open email, the text is huge? And I mean, huge. I don't know how the hell that works. My font isn't sent to be huge, and I don't know how to change it. I didn't set it to be huge, promise!

It didn't do this when I first got the phone, either. Weird. Anyone have this happen?

Don't have a Tour and not sure why that would happen, but you can change your font by going into Options > Screen/Keyboard and it should let you make it smaller

# ¿ Dec 12, 2009 20:11

Diafthora: Sep 22, 2003; All I wanted to do was introduce him to Mr. Axe

There's also the Google Mobile App, which is awesome. Its pretty much just a google search that will look for things in your area. Plus you can speak into it when doing searches.

# ¿ Dec 17, 2009 20:20

Diafthora: Sep 22, 2003; All I wanted to do was introduce him to Mr. Axe

Godzilla07 posted:

Made a few edits to the OP. I'll put up a new Future Devices section sometime this week. Also, any app recommendations from anybody? I'm thinking of putting up Loopt and Yelp up in the OP.

The Crackberry App Store is pretty cool as an alternative to the default BB App World. I find myself checking that more often than the official one.

Another neat free app I use is Start Me Up. Pretty self explanatory. It starts up apps automatically when you boot up/restart your device. Saves the hassle of having to do it manually.

Also noticed that Shazam isn't already on the list. :-p It'll listen to whatever song is current playing and tell you what the name/artist of it is. For example, say you hear something on the radio and don't know what its called, or hear something in a restaurant, etc. It can be useful for time to time. The free version has limited tagging, and the paid version lets you search for similar songs after it determines what you're listening to. It works pretty well.

Diafthora fucked around with this message at 20:21 on Dec 23, 2009

# ¿ Dec 23, 2009 20:19

Diafthora: Sep 22, 2003; All I wanted to do was introduce him to Mr. Axe

Casual Yogurt posted:

Can someone recommend me how but more specifically where to get my ATT wireless branded 7290 unlocked?

cellunlock.net is a pretty good site to check out.

# ¿ Dec 24, 2009 05:18

Diafthora: Sep 22, 2003; All I wanted to do was introduce him to Mr. Axe

Godzilla07 posted:

Whenever Sprint feels like it. RIM runs their OS updates through the carriers. They give their OS to the carriers and then the carriers do their own testing. If you want 5.0 right now, install a 5.0 beta which is what I'm doing on my 8900. The only 4.6/4.7 devices that have had official 5.0 updates are the Storm 1 and the Bold 9000. The 9000 just got its update 2 days ago.

8900 just got an official 5.0 on a couple of carriers today.

# ¿ Jan 7, 2010 05:53

Diafthora: Sep 22, 2003; All I wanted to do was introduce him to Mr. Axe

You should be able to adjust the volume buttons on the side of your phone during calls to make it louder or softer. Its pretty loud and clear when its up all the way.

# ¿ Jan 16, 2010 21:58

Diafthora: Sep 22, 2003; All I wanted to do was introduce him to Mr. Axe

Beaver Patrol posted:

My 9700 isn't getting calls, it's going to straight to voice mail. I gathered from Google that to turn it off I have to disable Do Not Disturb, but I can't find the option and I don't think it's even on the 9700. Is there another option on the 9700 like it that I just haven't found yet, or do I have to go into Bell to get it checked out?

Go to Profiles > Advanced > select a profile and edit > Phone > and choose Yes/No for DND mode at the bottom. At least that's how it is for my phone, not sure about the 9700. Should be the same.

# ¿ Jan 18, 2010 11:11

Diafthora: Sep 22, 2003; All I wanted to do was introduce him to Mr. Axe

nerdrum posted:

http://nimbuzz.com/en/

It's free, works on 5.0 and I currently have Facebook, MSN, Yahoo, Aim and skype all on my 9700 without a hiccup.

edit: also I have 30 app's and 9 games on my setup with 80 megs of space left

How is this compared with Beejive?

# ¿ Feb 4, 2010 06:51

Diafthora: Sep 22, 2003; All I wanted to do was introduce him to Mr. Axe

belle of my ballz posted:

I'm going to preface this post with. gently caress blackberry, gently caress them in the rear end

That said, anybody know of any good apps that allow you to keep track of your hours worked ( for billing purposes) and will allow you to export them to excel?

Is there any way to make Opera Mini the default browser. I'm tired of opening links in emails in the bag of dicks that is the blackberry browser.

Anyway to get the email client to properly open emails that aren't plain text ( HTML, pictures). The iPhone could do this 3 years ago.

The charger when plugged into my storm wiggles while the same charger plugged into my Tour doesn't. Whats the deal with that? Both are under a month old.

E: Whats this whole application memory thing, it says I only have 100mb or so left when I have 16GB worth of free memory

Its not free, but check this: http://www.telenavtrack.com/tnt/products/tnt/#a5
There's different tier plans, but you need Basic to do the timecards, I think.

The memory is your BB's internal memory, not what's on your SD card. I'm assuming you're looking at the available space for when you download an app, which is only stored on the internal memory itself

# ¿ Feb 18, 2010 09:01

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# ¿ Apr 28, 2024 18:49

Diafthora: Sep 22, 2003; All I wanted to do was introduce him to Mr. Axe

jerman999 posted:

I'm looking to pick up a Blackberry...want the 8830 World Edition so I can easily make calls and send emails when I'm in China/Greece/abroad. Current carrier is sprint and would be moving to the data plan.

Why are they like 40 bucks on Ebay now?? Is there a new edition that I missed? Something wrong with the phone?

8830 is like a 2 year old model now or something. Their best available right now is the Tour, and the Tour 2 is coming real soon

Edit: ^^^ I should probably read the last post before replying. Didn't pay attention because it wasn't quoted :-p

# ¿ Mar 2, 2010 00:01

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Inspect Your Gadgets > The BlackBerry Thread: Hello? Is anyone here???