Blackberry Tour 9630

To some the Blackberry Bold was just too big and heavy, well, big and heavy for a Blackberry. That was the first reaction I received when I placed the Bold into the hands of several fans last year and it was only after seeing the performance of its large screen, full feature set, and gorgeous interface that those first impressions were forgotten. Then along came the Blackberry Curve 8900, small and slim as ever, but similarly powerful to the Bold and almost as packed with features. Which to buy? Ultimately you’d want both, or a device that exists between the two, a “missing link” berry. Such is the Blackberry Tour.

The Tour travels such familiar ground that if you have read about or played with any of last year’s Blackberry devices, you can quickly size it up in a glance and for that reason this review will be a little short.

The Tour wears the Bold’s tuxedo well. The black casing and chrome accents, especially around the trackball give it the premium sense of elegance to match the new Blackberry interface. I’m especially fond of the new backing design with its chrome logo and almost Art Deco segmentation. It actually suits the overall style better than the faux leather backing of the Bold.

The Tour’s small size allows it to fit very comfortably in the hand and similar to the Bold the keys on the QWERTY keyboard are indented so your thumbs will catch them as you spread them outwards, but offer no resistance when you move your thumbs to the centre.

One downside of crafting this hybrid is the screen. Now sporting RIM’s higher resolution interface, the 2.5” display falls just short of comfort. The main menu screen is fine for navigating features, but the fine print of web sites, Blackberry Maps, and many applications will induce just enough squinting to force you to change the settings for font sizes and display modes and even then it’s not as comfortable as it is to use on the Bold or Storm.

The Tour ranks among the best of smartphones in its feature set, somehow packing most of what you’d want into such a small body, yet each one works remarkably well. The Tour is a quad-band phone, allowing you to use it globally. It has an excellent 3.2 Megapixel camera, supported by a flash, auto-focus, and even image stabilization. There’s a built-in speakerphone, a proper 3.5 mm headphone jack, and 256 MB of internal memory with a microSD card slot for up to 16 GB more.

The Tour can act as a wireless modem, includes RIM’s Blackberry Maps with built-in GPS and a number of enhancements that come with the new RIM interface including a stylish clock, access to Blackberry World for additional apps, and a media player that can be used with optional software to sync with Apple’s iTunes.

Add that to RIM’s signature e-mail and messaging services and you have a smartphone that delivers one of the best experiences on the market.

What’s missing is Wi-Fi, a rather disappointing omission, and one that continues to perplex Blackberry fans as it shouldn’t be a difficult feature to add. It’s potential to shorten the battery life isn’t enough to justify its absence and including it would have only supported the idea of creating a Blackberry that offered the best of past models. Why try to create a Blackberry that delivers the best of all worlds only to fall short on one feature?

Wi-Fi is important, not because it can allow users to switch off their 3G connections and cancel their data plans, but because it can be used to help manage their monthly data usage and keep it under the limits. If you tend to leave your Blackberry on at night while you sleep, best to have it connected through Wi-Fi for free. Why pay for something that happens while you sleep and have no control?

While the Blackberry Tour delivers one of the best Blackberry experiences for CDMA-based networks Telus and Bell, against RIM’s past work it still falls short of the BlackBerry Bold. The gain you get with a smaller form factor does not make up for the loss that comes with a smaller screen and a lack of Wi-Fi support. The Bold is still the best Blackberry on the market.

Five Essential RIM BlackBerry Keyboard Tips and Tricks

1)Rapidly switch back and forth between blackberry application

The most basic way to switch from one BlackBerry app to another is to repeatedly hit the ESCAPE key while inside a program until you to get back to your icon screen. From there, you'd scroll your track ball or wheel to find the next app you want and then click to launch it.

A quicker and more efficient way to go from an active program to another program is to use a shortcut. While inside an application, hold down the ALT key--which is directly below the letter A key--and then click ESCAPE--the button with an arrow reversing directions and to the right of your trackball on 8000 series devices. While holding down ALT, you can then scroll left or right between apps, and you need only release the ALT key to select a program.

You need to be working in a specific application for that app to be available via the shortcut--in other words, the program needs to have been opened recently or still running. You can always access your Home Screen, BlackBerry browser, Options, Call Log, Messages and a few other apps depending on your device settings.

2) View Event Log Details, Free Up Memory by Clearing the List

Your BlackBerry's Event Log displays your system's recently run events and processes. If you're experiencing a problem with your BlackBerry or having an issue with a specific application or service, information from the Event Log can be helpful for troubleshooting. And it can be a good BlackBerry hygiene to clear out the log, to keep your device running smoothly.

To access your Event Log, go to your Home Screen, hold down the ALT key and then type "LGLG." The Event Log will then appear, and you can click a specific event for more information or hit your BlackBerry MENU key more options. The MENU key has seven dots in the shape of the letter B, and it's found directly to the left of BlackBerry devices with trackballs. You can copy event information using the MENU key and tailor your settings to log only specific types of events.

You can also free up some valuable device memory to help your device run faster by clearing your Event Log. To delete your list of events, hit the BlackBerry MENU key while any event is highlighted and then click "Clear Log." A dialogue box will then pop up asking if you're sure you want to delete the log. Once you confirm the deletion, your log will be cleared. (Donâ¬"t worry, if your IT department is running device management software along with its BlackBerry Enterprise Server, your company likely has its own record of this event log.)

3) Reboot Your BlackBerry Without Removing the Battery

Any experienced BlackBerry user knows that it's occasionally necessary to reboot your device after installing a new app, to solve performance problems, refresh your smartphone's memory or fix other minor issues. One way to do so is to remove your battery door and pull the power pack. After the battery is returned to the device, your BlackBerry reboots. This gets the job done, but it's time consuming to power down the device and then remove and replace the battery--and your battery door won't fit as snuggly if you're constantly taking it off.

The quickest and easiest way to reboot is via another BlackBerry keyboard shortcut. To reboot, simply hit ALT, RIGHT SHIFT and DELETE. The RIGHT SHIFT key is found on the bottom right corner of the BlackBerry keyboard and DELETE key is also on the right hand side and has the letters "DEL" on its face.

After pressing these three keys in tandem, your device powers down, your LED indicator turns red for a few seconds and the reboot process commences.

4) Change Your Signal Strength Display from Bars to Numbers

Most modern cell phones offer up some form of the "five-bars" to display users' wireless signal strength, and the BlackBerry default mode is no different. But if you want more precision than bars can offer, you can change to the numeric signal strength display mode.

The numeric mode shows wireless signal strength in decibels per milliwatt (dBm), a ratio measured power in decibels (dB), referenced to one milliwatt (mW).

To switch from bars to numbers, navigate to your BlackBerry home screen, hold the ALT key and enter in "NMLL." The signal display will then automatically display a dBm value. In general, a reading from -45 to -85 is considered very strong. Any reading that's lower than -85--for instance, -100--is weaker. To switch back to bar mode from numeric, just hit ALT again and retype "NMLL."

The numeric display can be helpful to determine specifics on how much a wireless signal degrades as you move from place to place. (It's also geek chic to read your cellular signal strength in dBm instead of boring old bars.)

5) Bring Up "Help Me" Screen for Device, System Data

Your device's Help Me screen displays useful device and system information like your vendor ID, BlackBerry platform version, OS version, PIN, International Mobile Equipment Identity (EMEI) number (which identifies your GSM device for the telecom carrier), cellular signal strength, free and total available memory and more. Most of this information can be found in various locations throughout your BlackBerry Options, but the Help Me offers a simple way to access all the data on a single screen.

To pull up the Help Me screen, navigate to your home screen and then press ALT, either SHIFT key and the letter H. To return to your Home Screen, hit ESCAPE or open the MENU and select Close.

Memoryup for BlackBerry

MemoryUp Pro is a powerful mobile RAM boosting tool and Java virtual machine (JVM) management application specially designed for smartphone users. It is a handy memory optimizer tool that will keep your smartphone running fast and efficiently. MemoryUp analyzes JVM RAM, recovers and re-allocates those not currently needed, and thus optimize the working performance of our mobile phones. MemoryUp is able to maintain a RAM big enough to let us enjoy ourselves without any unexpected pause due to insufficient memory.MemoryUp can reclaim lost resources and put them to better use. By reclaiming resources, the smartphone does not need to access the hard drive frequently.www.emobistudio.com will let you experience the wonderful use of your BB The program gives you a variety of configurable options so you can decide what settings are right for you. For example, you can have the program run at startup to give you an initial boost, or you can tell it to force the device to use a larger cache. These are things that might be needed by some and not needed by others, I think MemoryUp - Mobile Memory andRAM Booster simply makes BlackBerry device run smoother. It goes in and retrieves wasted memory, defragments it, and frees it up for use by programs that really need the memory.This auto "boost" feature runs in the background, constantly liberating memory that gets wasted by programs and so on. The program can even warn you if you should reach a critical point.

Blackberry Pearl 8100 Typing Shortcuts

The following shortcuts can be used when typing text in an application:

To type the alternate character on a key, hold the Alt key and press the character key.

To type an accented or special character, hold the letter key and roll the trackball left or right. Click a selected character.

To type a symbol, press the Symbol key. To view more symbols, press the Symbol key again. Type the letter that appears below the symbol to enter the corresponding symbol.

To insert a period, press the Space key twice. The next letter is capitalized.

To capitalize a letter, hold the letter key until the capitalized letter appears.

To turn on NUM lock, hold the Shift key and press the Alt key.

To turn off NUM lock, press the Alt key.

To insert an at sign ( @ ) or a period ( . ) in an email address field, press the Space key.

To type a number in a number field, press a number key. You do not need to press the Alt key.

To type a number in a password field, hold the Alt key and press the number key.

To type a letter in a number field, hold the Alt key and use the multi-tap input method to enter the letter.

To switch typing input languages, hold the Alt key and press the Enter key. Select a language, then release the Alt key. Note: To allow this functionality, on the Language screen, verify that the Use Input Method Shortcut field is set to Yes.

To select a line of text, press the Shift key and roll the trackball.

To select text character by character, hold the Shift key and roll the trackball left or right.

To cancel a text selection, press the Escape key.

To cut selected text, hold the Shift key and press the Delete key.

To copy selected text, press the Alt key and click the trackball.

To paste your cut or copied text, press the Shift key and click the trackball.

Top 20 Blackberry Tips

1. To move the cursor in a different direction, hold the Alt key and roll the trackwheel.
   
   
2. To type an accented or special character, hold the letter key and roll the trackwheel. When the desired character appears, release the letter key.
   
   
3. To switch to another application, hold the Alt key and press the Escape button. Continue to hold the Alt key and select an application. Release the Alt key to switch to that application.
   
   
4. To exit a screen or dialog box, press the Escape button.
   
   
5. To change an option field, hold the Alt key. Click a value.
   
   
6. To move directly to an item in an options list or menu, press the first letter of the item.
   
   
7. To select a check box, press the Space key. To clear the check box, press the Space key again.
   
   
8. To select a line of text, press the Shift key and roll the trackwheel.
   
   
9. To cut selected text, press the Shift key + the Backspace key. To copy selected text, press the Alt key and click the trackwheel. To paste text, press the Shift key and click the trackwheel.
   
   
10. To capitalize a letter, hold the letter key until the capitalized letter appears.
    
    
11. To insert a period, press the Space key twice. The next letter is capitalized.
    
    
12. To insert the at sign (@) and periods in an Email field, press the Space key.
    
    
13. To reply to a message, press R. To forward a message, press F. To reply to all, press L.
    
    
14. To move to the top of a screen, press T. To move to the bottom of a screen, press B.
    
    
15. To move down a screen, press the Space key. To move up a screen, press the Shift key + the Space key.
    
    
16. To turn on CAP lock, press the Alt key + the Right Shift key. To turn off CAP lock, press the Right Shift key.
    
    
17. To view sent messages, in the messages list, press the Alt key + O. To view received messages, press the Alt key + I. To view SMS messages, press the Alt key + S. To view phone call logs, press the Alt key + P. To view voice mail messages, press the Alt key + V.
    
    
18. To move to the next item, press N. To move to the previous item, press P.
    
    
19. To type numbers in a number field, press the number keys. You do not need to press the Alt key.
    
    
20. In the Calendar, to change to Agenda view, press A. To change to Day view, press D. To change to Week view, press W. To change to Month view, press M.

Text and Messaging Shortcuts for the Storm

-To copy and paste text from one location to another, lightly touch a finger to the Storm's screen at the start of the text you wish to copy. Then hold that first finger in place while you touch the end of the text with another finger. The text in between your digits will then be selected. To copy it, click the BlackBerry Menu key, scroll to "Copy" and click the screen. To paste, follow the same instructions but pick "Paste" instead of "Copy."

-To quickly search your messages for all mailings from a specific contact, find a message from that contact in your Messages application and then gently hold a finger on screen directly over the contact's name. After a few seconds, all messages from that contact appear on screen.

- To quickly search your messages for a specific subject line, or to track a thread, find a message with the desired subject line in your Messages application and then gently hold a finger on screen directly over the subject line. After a few seconds, all messages with that specific subject appear on screen.

-To precisely navigate to the middle of a sentence, or even a specific word, while typing on the Storm, gently press your finger on the Storm's screen on or around the text or character you wish to edit. Then, with your finger on the display, but not clicking it, slide your finger around until it's exactly where you want it and then let go. The specific character or set of characters will then be highlighted for easy editing.

-To delete multiple messages at once via Storm, open your Messages app and gently hold a finger on a message near the top of the list you want to delete. Keep that finger in place, and then touch another message further down the list. All the messages between your two fingers will then be highlighted. From there, you can click the Delete Messages key at the bottom or the screen to do away with the selected messages. Or you can continue to select older messages by keeping one finger on the selected messages and scrolling down. When new, unselected messages appear beneath your current selections, touch any of them to select it and all the messages between it and your previous selections. Again, hit the Delete Messages key to trash messages when you're ready. To unselect messages at any time, click the BlackBerry Escape key.

-Rapidly scroll through messages by sliding a finger sideway while reading an e-mail or text. Slide your finger to the left while in an open message to skip to newer messages; and slide to the right for older correspondence.

Storm: Navigation Tips and Tricks

-To scroll downward in a message or while viewing a Web page, place your finger lightly at the bottom of the screen--but don't click--and drag upward. To scroll down a full screen's length, slide your finger up rapidly.

- To scroll up, place your finger lightly at the top of the screen--but don't click--and drag it down. To scroll up a full screen's length, slide your finger down rapidly.

-To zoom in on a picture or a Web page, tap the screen lightly twice--but don't click it. (The BlackBerry browser also has zoom in/out options; two separate magnifying glasses for zooming in and out sit at the bottom of the browser screen.) To zoom back out after zooming in, click the BlackBerry Escape key until you return to the original view.

-To "pan," or move around while viewing a web page, hold your finger on the display--but again, don't click--and drag it in the direction you wish to move.

-To quickly switch between active applications from the Storm home screen, hold the BlackBerry Menu key until the Application Switch ribbon appears on screen. Then lightly touch the ribbon and move back and forth to scroll between available apps. To select one, click the screen when a specific app is highlighted.

-To jump from the Storm home screen to the main icon screen, put your finger on the home screen, just above the app dock, and click once. (You can also simply hit the BlackBerry Menu key while on the home screen to access your icon page.)

Storm Image and Audio Tips

-Scroll through images just as you would messages, by sliding a finger horizontally across the Storm's display. Slide your finger to the right while viewing an image to see newer images; and slide to the left for older pictures.

-To zoom in on an image, tap the screen twice--don't click. Or you can also zoom by clicking the screen one time. Zoom out by hitting the BlackBerry Escape key.

-To "pan," or move around while viewing an image, hold your finger on the display--but again, don't click--and drag it in the direction you wish to move.

-To quickly search your music library for all songs from one specific artist, find a track by that musician or group in a list of songs, and then gently hold a finger on screen directly over the musician's name. After a few seconds, all songs from that artist appear on screen.

BlackBerry Storm Keyboard Shortcuts

The BlackBerry Storm is touch-screen-based, and as such, it lacks a physical keyboard; however, three types of on-screen, virtual keyboards are available to users: 1) RIM's SureType keyboard, which is a QWERTY keyboard with more than one letter/number on each key (available only in portrait mode); a multitap keyboard that resembles the keys on a traditional cell phone (portrait mode); and a full QWERTY like the one found on your computer keyboard (landscape mode only).

To switch back and forth between keyboards in portrait mode, simply click the BlackBerry Menu key whenever a keyboard is displayed, and click "Enable Multitap" or "Enable SureType."

-To quickly bring up the Storm's onscreen keyboard, swipe a finger upward from the very bottom of the screen to the middle.

-To quickly hide the Storm's keyboard, swipe a finger downward from the top of the keyboard to the very bottom of the device's screen.

-Accented, or "special," characters can be typed via Storm in both portrait (vertical) and landscape (horizontal) views. To enter in a special character while in portrait or landscape mode, such as an ï, bring up the on-screen keyboard, depress the "i" key--but don't click it--and a number of options appear on screen, one of which is ï. To choose that character, simply click it on screen.

--To activate number lock, bring up the onscreen keyboard and then hold down the "123" key for about two seconds until a lock appears on that button. The number pad will then stay on screen until you either hide it or tap the "123" key again to return to the normal keyboard layout.

--To activate capital lock, bring up the onscreen keyboard and then hold down the "Shift/Arrow Up" key for about two seconds until a lock appears on that button. The number pad will then stay on screen until you either hide it or tap the "Shift/Arrow Up" key again to return to the normal keyboard layout.

-To change text input languages, hold the Storm in landscape mode, bring up the virtual keyboard and click the "Globe" key found directly to the left of the Space key. Next, scroll to the desired language, highlight it and click the Storm's screen to select.

BlackBerry Pearl

The BlackBerry Pearl smartphone is one phone which is not to be missed out if you are looking for a multi-functional device. It offers almost everything you'd like to find on a mobile phone and more.

Texting with the Pearl: The Pearl has been often called a 'texting' phone, i.e. a smartphone that offers more convenience when used as a messaging device. This feature is courtesy of the keypads that are easy to glide through, making the entire typing experience very intuitive and you can text long messages without tiring your fingers. It uses the SureType keyboard which is not the latest offered among the BlackBerry range of smartphones, but it is one of the easiest to use. Emphasis has been laid on easy recognition via the keypad and the silver colored ones represent the house numbers. The screen display automatically adjusts itself according to the ambient light, allowing users to read the screen with ease. The standard resolution is 240 x 260 pixels which cannot be described as the best in this segment but then for the price it carries, the Pearl does seem amply capable of displaying web pages with all the necessary details and the images are defined with strong color hues. Further, since the font size is adjustable, more web pages can be viewed when searching through lots of data.

Other Recommendable Features: The BlackBerry Pearl is MMS-friendly and capable of shooting videos and recorded images have minimal fading effect. Another nice add-on is the WiFi and it does not compromise upon speed when downloading heavier web pages. Further, the Pearl supports stereo Bluetooth via A2DP support, enabling users to enjoy stereo sound wirelessly via their Bluetooth headset.5mm audio jack gives users the freedom to use their personal headphones for maximum listening pleasure. Its texting capabilities get another boost in the form of the BlackBerry Messenger which helps communicate among BlackBerry users. It supports both POP3 and IMAP4 and has an impressive talk time of 240 minutes. Memory expansion options are particularly recommendable with the single micro-SD card slot that also supports high-capacity SDHC cards of up to 2GB.

Conclusion: This neatly-packed mobile phone can be your substitute for handling office work on the go, as it is equipped to handle all the basic requirements like handling emailing, scheduling meetings or editing documents (Word/PowerPoint/ Excel/PDF). BlackBerry Pearl may look simple in design, but it serves its purpose well as a function-oriented phone.

Blackberry Bold or Nokia E71 - which one is better?

Released within a month of each other, the Blackberry 9000, better known as the Blackberry Bold (May 2008) and the Nokia E71 (June 2008) are obvious rival smartphones from these perennial rival smartphone makers as they look, feel, and function very much alike.

Both devices are just about equally sized, at 114 mm x 66 mm x 14 mm for the Blackberry and 114 mm x 57 mm x 10 mm for the Nokia. And both weigh just about the same with the Blackberry weighing in at 133 g to a slightly lighter Nokia's 127 g.

Both devices have a QWERTY keypad occupying the bottom half of the face of the device with a small display screen (2.6 in on the Blackberry, 2.36 in on the Nokia) above it. Interestingly, the display screens on each device possess a quality superior to that of their counterpart. The Blackberry has better resolution, at 480 x 320 pixels to its competitor's 320 x 240 pixels; but the Nokia has more colors, at 16 million to its competitors meager 65,000.

Then, for a matter of simple preference, the Blackberry Bold's primary navigation is a trackball whereas the Nokia E71 uses a 5-way scroll key. Also a simple matter of preference, the Blackberry runs on the Blackberry OS, the Nokia on the Symbian OS.

Other similarities amongst these two candybar competitors are their built-in GPS with mapping capabilities (the Bold using Blackberry Maps, the E71 using Nokia Maps - each coming preinstalled), as well as voice dialing, photo calling, video calling, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth v2.0 with A2DP, and speakerphone. They also both operate on AT&T's EDGE network and support HSDPA and 3G.

Also, both devices sport microSD card slots for expandable memory up to 8 GB, though the Blackberry has more more internal memory, at 1 GB to the Nokia's 110 MB (both devices have 128 MB onboard RAM though). And both devices have a USB v2.0 port, though the Nokia also has a microUSB port.

In terms of multimedia features they each have built in digital cameras, but the Blackberry Bold's is only 2 megapixels while the Nokia E71's is 3 megapixels. Both cameras, however, have LED flash and video recording capabilities. Both devices also have a built-in MP3 player.

Also worth noting, along these same lines, is that unlike the Blackberry (or most smartphones, for that matter) the Nokia does not have a standard 3.5 mm headphone jack but rather a 2.5 mm audio jack, making headphone and speaker compatibility a bigger issue with the Nokia. The Nokia, however, has an infrared port while the Blackberry does not.

You can view Microsoft Word, Excel, and PowerPoint documents on both devices, but you can only edit them on the Blackberry.

The battery on the Bold gives up to 5 hours of talk time and 310 hours of standby time. The battery on the Nokia gives up to 10 1/2 hours of talk time in 2G or 4 1/2 hours in 3G, and 410 hours of standby time in 2G or 480 hours in 3G.

Deciding between these two devices is a tough call, and may come down to extraneous features such as the availability of preferred 3rd party apps. Or you may just prefer the Blackberry operating system to Symbian. You may also lean towards the Blackberry Bold if you want to be able to edit Microsoft Office docs, though you might lean towards the Nokia E71 if you'd rather take crisper digital photos. Really these two devices are quite comparable.

How To Delete Application on Your Blackberry

First, go to Options.

Then, go to Advanced Options.

Finally, click on Applications.

You’ll see a notice that your BlackBerry is building an applications list. On the other end you’ll see a big huge list, containing core applications and some things you might not recognize. It goes without saying, but I’ll say it anyway: if you do not know what it is, do not delete it.

Scroll down to find the application you’d like to delete. Once it’s highlighted, hit the Menu key. You’ll see a number of options, but all we’re interested in now is the obvious one: Delete. Click it, and you’ll get confirmation. Click Yes, and it will delete the application.

Afterward you’ll be prompted to reset your BlackBerry. If you plan to delete multiple applications, say no. Say yes after the last application you’re going to delete. A reset clears the application out of device memory.

How To Transfer Data Between BlackBerry Devices

All you need to get started are two mini USB sync cables (like the one that came with your BlackBerry,) the Desktop Manager software and the two BlackBerry smartphones. (Note: If you're transferring data to or from a device with a micro USB port, you'll also need a micro USB sync cable.)

Step One: Get BlackBerry Desktop Manager, Launch the Program

First things first: You'll want to download or install RIM's BlackBerry Desktop Manager software, if you haven't already. To do so, either insert the BlackBerry user tools disc that shipped with your device and then install the software, or visit RIM's website and download it manually. The latest version of Desktop Manager is 4.6., though earlier versions should do the trick, as well.

After installing BlackBerry Desktop Manager, launch the program by clicking on the desktop icon created during installation. (If you chose not to create a desktop icon, locate the application in your computer's program files and then launch.)

Step Two: Connect Your Existing BlackBerry, Select Device Switch Wizard

Next, connect your existing BlackBerry smartphone--the one storing your personal data and applications--to your PC using the USB sync cable, and then close any unrelated dialogue boxes that appear. You know your device is connected when your BlackBerry PIN appears in the bottom left corner of the BlackBerry Desktop Manger screen, next to Device connected (PIN).

When the BlackBerry is connected to your PC and Desktop Manager, choose the Device Switch Wizard option. On the following screen, click Switch BlackBerry devices.

Step Three: Configure BlackBerry Device Switch Wizard

The Switch BlackBerry devices screen displays three columns: Current device ; New device ; and Options . The first field below the Current device heading should be labeled PIN and the value within should match the PIN digits in the bottom left corner of the application screen. If not, open the drop down menu beneath Current device and select the PIN associated with the connected BlackBerry. If your device is password protected, you'll also need to enter your passcode.

Because you new device is not yet connected, we'll ignore the middle column for now.

The Options section lists a number of options related to the device data that you wish to transfer to the new device. For example, you can choose to transfer all device data and options, as well as all third-party applications. Or you can pick just device data or only third-party apps. There are also options for updating existing applications--if updates are available--and you can manually select which apps you wish to transfer. (Note: Some applications are OS-specific, so an app that works with BlackBerry handheld OS v4.3 may not function correctly on a device running OS v4.5.)

Step Four: Transfer Data, Apps from One BlackBerry to Another

When you've specified what data and apps you want to transfer, click the Next button in the bottom right corner of Desktop Manager to proceed. A variety of progress bars will appear on screen as Desktop Manager scans your device and copies its contents for backup. This will take a few minutes, so be patient.

When the backup process is complete, another dialogue box appears asking you to select your new device. At this point, connect the new BlackBerry that you wish to transfer data and applications to and select the corresponding PIN from the drop down menu. Again, you'll need to enter in your passcode here if your device is password protected. Then hit OK. Another set of progress bars then appears to scan the application configuration on the new BlackBerry.

If you checked the Options box for Allow me to select applications to add or update option , a list of all the applications on your existing BlackBerry appears. You can then choose which apps you want to transfer from the old device to the new. To remove an app from the list, simply uncheck the box next to that application. When you're finished, click Next.

Patience comes into play again at this point, as it can take anywhere from five minutes to half an hour to complete the process. So sit back, grab a soothing beverage perhaps, and decide what to do next with your new smartphone.

Two factors worth noting: After transferring personal data and apps to a new BlackBerry, you'll likely have to log back into any programs that require a user name and password, so you may want to have your login information handy. Second, it's not uncommon to come across application errors when attempting to transfer apps from one device to another--especially if those devices are running different OS versions. The simplest way to proceed after receiving an app error is to remove the problem application from the list of programs that will be transferred using the instructions above. Then you can simply download a fresh copy of the problem app at a later time.