BlackBerry Bold or iPhone 3G: Which fits your corporate attire?
Smartphones are the best gadget for any corporate user. However, to select the one, fit for their corporate personality, is hard to choose from the crowd.
The article is a feature by feature comparison between BlackBerry Bold & 3G iPhone that are label as best Smartphone available in the market.
Apple iPhone 3G
The iPhone is an internet-connected multimedia Smartphone designed and marketed by Apple Inc, which lacks a physical keyboard, but the multi-touch screen renders a virtual keyboard when necessary. It functions as a camera phone, a portable media player and an Internet client. The Apple iPhone 3G is known as the Smartphone that is best in multimedia.
BlackBerry Bold
The BlackBerry Bold aka 9000, the first 3G BlackBerry, launched in the U.S. in November of 2008, is a mobile phone data device, which is considered as one of the best in BlackBerry series.
Comparison of features:
Microprocessor: BlackBerry has 624MHz Intel PXA270/Marvell Tavor PXA930 processor, up from 312MHz, whereas iPhone has Samsung ARM 1176JZ(F)-S v1.0 620 MHz under-clocked to 412 MHz, 32-bit RISC processor.
Operating System: Bold runs BlackBerry OS 4.6, whereas iPhone 3G has iPhone OS 2.2.1.
WLAN: BlackBerry has 802.11a/b/g plus good GPS, typically a tradeoff with BBs, while iPhone supports Wi-Fi 802.11b/g.
Resolution: BlackBerry has 480 x 320 resolution screen with 65,000 colors, whereas iPhone sports 480×320 px, 3.5 in (89 mm), 3:2 aspect ratio, 262,144-color LCD touch-screen.
SMS/MMS: In the Apple iPhone 3G Smartphone, you can only send SMS. Where-as in the BlackBerry, you can send both SMS and MMS.
Memory: The memory that is installed in the Apple is 16 GB where as in the BlackBerry it is 64MB only. In BlackBerry, MicroSD expansion is available where as in Apple it is absent.
Screen: The Apple has a touch screen and whatever information you are inputting has to be done through that, where as a BlackBerry comes fully equipped with a QWERTY keypad. In the Apple phone the size of the screen is 3.5 inches where as it is 2.5 inches in the BlackBerry.
Camera: In both devices, the resolution of the digital camera is 2 megapixels.
Speakers: The Apple comes in with speakers that are built in. The BlackBerry also comes with inbuilt speakers, but they also come with a 3.5mm stereo jack.
Battery Life: The life of the battery of the BlackBerry is higher than the Apple phones battery life as there is no touch screen and resolution of screen is less.
Location support: BlackBerry has Gokivo Navigator and iPhone provides Google Maps.
Discussion
As usual, you cannot get all the features in one gadget, for e.g. in the BlackBerry the features like the alarm clock; calendar, digital zoom is available where as such features are not available in the Apple. Also, you can do cut and paste text between apps in BlackBerry, while iPhone lacks it. One more thing you miss in the iPhone is opening a zipped attachment, which is present in the BlackBerry Bold.
But, the 16GB memory, rotational ability, touch screen, use of accelerometer for motion detection, Safari browser’s support, larger screen and easy apps downloads from the application store makes it better Smartphone than any other.
The most important function for a corporate executive is E-mailing. BlackBerry has become the Lotus Notes of the mobile world for providing secure e-mail anywhere on the move.
Also, the iPhone works directly with Exchange, so you can e-mail, e-mail folders, calendars, and contacts all flowed effortlessly among the iPhone, laptop, and server. The configuration was trivial.
It is important to note that BlackBerry Enterprise Server (BES) supports Novell GroupWise and Lotus Notes, while both of those servers support the iPhone only through Web clients, limiting their integration with other iPhone apps such as Contacts and Calendar. Thus, BlackBerry supports more e-mail systems, even though you have to add a dedicated server to get that support.
In the security front, organizations running BlackBerrys can trust as if a BlackBerry is lost, IT can wipe all of its data and render it useless over the air. Apple also provides more iPhone security capabilities than most people realize, but it still does not have the depth of messaging and device security that the BlackBerry does.
Mobile Media And Iphone Ringtones
The summer of 2007 saw the introduction of the new generation of mobile multimedia interactive cell phones with the release of Apple’s iPhone. Crammed into a package only 4.5″ inches and weighing less than 5 ounces, the Apple iPhone offers users so many features the company offers video tutorials to help customers learn all the things it can do for them.
Contained just within the phone functions are such pro-business features as call conferencing and merging, hold feature, caller ID and the ability to integrate with other cell networks. The iPhone offers voice mail listings without having to access the actual Voicemail and one can pick and choose between calls rather than have to move through them sequentially.
Due to the popularity of ringtones, it was only a few months before Apple upgraded to ringtone functions. By partnering in this feature with iTunes, users can custom design their own ringtones from purchased songs through the iTunes network or the Apple GarageBand software. These ringtones can then be used not only to alert one to an incoming call but can be associated with specific alarm and notification features as well.
Text messaging has been made easier with the implementation of a virtual keyboard on the touch screen. For increased accuracy the texting program includes such aids as predictive word capabilities coupled with automatic spell check and correction and a dictionary that allows you to add words as needed to help it understand topic related jargon, names and special purpose words and phrases. The virtual keyboard has been made a bit larger than previous attempts at this virtual technology and, with two-way orientation, is at its best in landscape position.
As well as superb telephonic utilization, the Apple iPhone has the capability to access e-mail clients through both IMAP and POP3 servers. Both Yahoo and Gmail offer a program for access from the iPhone and by mid 2008 are planning to upgrade to sync with both Apple’s mail application but with Microsoft ActiveSync to connect with Microsoft Outlook and Entourage. The e-mail capabilities include HTML acceptance for graphical e-mail that can include digital photographs and graphics and can embed pictures in outgoing mail as well. Portable Document Files (PDF) as well as Word and Excel documents can be attached and viewed on the iPhone screen.
With a picture being sometimes more informative than any amount of verbal description, the iPhone does have a two megapixel digital camera onboard and the output can be copied directly to an e-mail. The iPhone does not, however, offer video camera functions.
The Apple iPhone was originally released with the Subscriber Identification Module (SIM) card locked into the AT&T network exclusively. However it did not take long for hackers to find a way to unlock the card for use on other networks and now nearly a fourth of the iPhones sold in the United States are not registered with the AT&T network. While originally designed to block the multimedia and web access functions without an authorized subscription; this too has fallen to the hacker’s craft and various software programs and modification cracks have emerged to free the access to these features outside the AT&T network.
These features make the Apple iPhone a powerful business asset even without even beginning to discuss the many other multimedia and web accessibility features that have made the iPhone worthy of Time magazine’s Invention of the Year award.




