OT: phones

So I have a Blackberry. I mentioned “cold-dead fingers” before. Crackberry is appropriate. It just works. And works really really well. That is, unless you have Verizon Wireless 8830 World phone. They issue you a GSM card. They activate it for you. What they can’t do before you leave? Test it.

I am over in the UK with a non-working BlackBerry 8830 phone. Don’t get me wrong, the phone (CDMA) works well in the US. But not in the UK. The GSM SIM card isn’t interacting well with the guts of the phone or something like that. What makes it worse is that they cannot test it in the states. They can send you the card. They can activate the features. They can take your money. But they can’t test it. Well, ok, they could, if they set up a very low power GSM transmitter in their shipping area with a test card. Then they could test it. Or, better still, since the phones are made overseas anyway (in GSM areas most likely) they can be tested there. Where I am going with this. I like the Blackberry. Going to keep it. I have the Nokia E61 up and running. Going to keep that. When my Verizon contract expires, I will likely switch providers. I need to know that the phone just works. Verizon is unable or unwilling to test its phones. This is, IMO, completely unacceptable. Verizon’s support people were great and as helpful as possible. But the end result was disappointing. And it reflects upon the fact that their customers are the guinea pigs. They can’t guarantee the phones to work. Damn good thing I did not rely on them and brought a backup unit. Damn good thing I did this.