I’m done with Blackberry
For several months now I have struggled to get my Blackberry’s calendar to sync with iCal on my Mac. This is true with both Missing Sync and PocketMac for Blackberry. Today, my Blackberry started to chew up my address book — both in my computer and on the device. Hard to believe but it erased all but three contacts from my computer and nearly 200 from itself. Fortunately I had a backup.
I spent hours on the phone with Blackberry support today… hours! We worked through a number of troubleshooting options using PocketMac and eventually resynced the address book. Then, feeling lucky, we moved on to the calendar. After about 40 minutes of stalled calendar syncing we discovered that my Blackberry was systematically erasing all of the appointments in iCal. It was hard to say who was more shocked, me or the support tech who sounded amazingly stressed when we made the discovery. Luckily, I had a backup of iCal, too.
RIM has made it quite clear that they are far more committed to supporting their Blackberry devices on the PC platform.
I have a 7190 and a Pearl. Both are officially for sale.
March 25th, 2008 at 10:32 pm
Get a US friend to buy you an iPhone and mail it up to you. Best decision I ever made. :-)
March 25th, 2008 at 10:37 pm
Mark that sucks big time. I had big problems with PocketMac that taught me to backup my calendar and address book. Since buying Missing Sync my pearl and Mac make sweet data love (Ewww!)
So where are you going from here? Palm, Windows mobile, paper base gtd?
March 25th, 2008 at 10:45 pm
Adios Blackberry.
What are you going to buy instead?
Iphone?
Tim
March 25th, 2008 at 10:56 pm
I’m leaning on the iPhone. Besides being an amazingly powerful device that offers the best of convergence and usability, reports suggest that it is the only smart phone with a commitment to complete cross-platform support.
@daryl… Missing Sync never got my calendar working and has not yet responded to my request for a refund.
March 25th, 2008 at 11:41 pm
I’m a Nokia guy. I’ve yet managed to break one! Symbian is not as easy to use as some other options out there, but it’s very flexible and syncs with Mac perfectly out of the box (well, at least after you download a free iSync plugin).
March 26th, 2008 at 7:33 am
It always amazes me the different behavior of software on similar platforms.. You and I have a very similar setup, and you’ve had nothing but headaches, and I’ve been far luckier.
i’ve not had anywhere close to these kinds of problems, and I do a 3-way sync: mac bb LotusNotes…
what keeps me away from the iphone option is the fact that you have to hack it to use it in Canada. One quick decision by Steve Jobs or Ted Rogers turns it into a very expensive brick.
the good thing is you’ve scared me into doing more regular backups..
good luck with the next option…
March 26th, 2008 at 9:01 am
I’m with Bob on the iphone I need my phone/calendar to work all the time, no hacking or tweaking. But the other issue with the iphone it the same problem as the touch, ical only syncs that calendar, not the to dos. iCal is my life, I need it to work on the iphone, exactly like it does on the Mac
March 26th, 2008 at 9:46 am
I’m not really worried about my iPhone getting bricked by Apple or Rogers. There is an enormous community of iPhone “liberators” that will find a solution around whatever firmware changes come in the future. I’m also not sure Apple really cares to brick iPhones. An iPhone is not a DVD that is ripped by one person and distributed to millions through bittorent, it is an premium product that need to be legitimately purchased be each individual user. Apple is appropriately compensated for every iPhone sold whether it is hacked or not.
I also believe that I have not done anything inherently wrong. I didn’t steal this iPhone, I bought it in a real Apple Store with real money. I continue to be a loyal Rogers customer and pay my bill on time every month as I have for years. I feel that AT&T in the US is the only one that is loosing out on this unlocking practice. Perhaps the real issue is that AT&T needs to come to Canada and bring the iPhone and unlimited data plans with them. That might shake things up.
The only “buyer beware” issue with the iPhone is that you spend $400 on a device with no service warranty. Apple will not service your iPhone or replace your battery or your faulty headphones if your phone is not “activated” and therefore assumed to be hacked. That was a risk I was willing to take but others might not be as comfortable with that arrangement. I simply made the decision that for $400 I didn’t want to miss out on (in my opinion) the consumer product of the decade. I have spent more money bigger risks than an iPhone.
My only complaint is that the iPhone does not sync To Dos or Notes with my Mac. This is a huge oversight in my opinion but not a deal-breaker. We all know that sooner than later this shortcoming will be resolved in the near future by Apple or a third-party developer.
March 26th, 2008 at 9:51 am
Now why would Mark’s tale of woe leave me smiling? Maybe cuz it’s reassuring to know tech glitches & software headaches attack indiscriminately - even the guys who know what they’re doing get hit.
For what it’s worth, I love my Motorola RAZR, and have never had a problem syncing iCal or Address Book with my Mac. Even my clunky old iPod Photo works as promised. But when it finally dies, the iPhone or maybe just an iPod Touch will be tempting…
March 26th, 2008 at 11:14 am
According to the OmniFocus forums, there is a script available that allows you to sync your projects, contexts and inbox with ToodleDo and then with your iPhone.
I recognize that this solution is OmniFocus specific. However, it suggests to me that there are workarounds for getting your to do lists on to your iPhone — overcoming Apple’s very significant oversight.
March 26th, 2008 at 11:35 am
I find my desk works well for me. When I’m available for phonecalls and emails, I sit at my desk. When it’s important to listen to the person who’s talking to me, pay attention to or engage with the real world around me, etc, I don’t.
March 26th, 2008 at 11:48 am
Good find Mark, but if given a choice of online todo tools/services I would suggest http://iwantsandy.com or http://www.rememberthemilk.com/ Both have killer iPhone, twitter and Gmail integration.
April 28th, 2008 at 6:39 am
Personally I was done with any offline syncing solution from day one - that just doesn’t work for me.
What I am using however is google sync from google.com/mobile which from all testing syncs my calendar with my google calendar reliably. This is not a push sync but the changes seem to make it there within an hour or so which is better than nothing and I can force a manual sync over air if I need a change to be pushed out urgently.
If only there was something similar for contacts syncing :(
August 30th, 2008 at 4:34 pm
I’m having the same trouble as Mark. But it worked flawlessly (almost) when I first tried it with Pocket Mac. Then I downloaded some Google apps and presto…Suddenly Pocket Mac doesn’t work with my Curve 8330. SO I get rid of Google and nothing is ever the same again. After tons of problems and the erasure of my entire iCal -( I shoulda backed it up) and on the line with RIM doing every conceivable thing, they finally admitted that this phone isn’t right and to get a new one since it’s under warranty.
I’m almost positive Google fried it but can’t be sure.
My husbands 8830 syncs perfectly with all, even after monkeying with the program in the system prefs and uninstalling and installing it a million times.
Needless to say I’m now suspicious of Google apps and get how important the backup is. Live and learn….
August 30th, 2008 at 4:36 pm
oh yeah, when it started acting weird, it first started doing odd things with my contacts, then when that was worked out, the calendar started not being recognized.
I don’t want to get the iphone since A T and T is poop.