The BlackBerry smartphone brand is owned by Canadian company Research in Motion, and was launched in 1999 with an emphasis on integrating excellent messaging features. BlackBerry has always been popular with professionals and until recently were the phone maker of choice for the US government.

Reasons to choose BlackBerry:

  • Excellent range of business and security features
  • Nearly all BlackBerrys feature easy-to-use QWERTY keypads
  • Exclusive access to the popular BlackBerry Messenger service

Benefits

Virtually all BlackBerry phones come with physical QWERTY keyboards and this design has become synonymous with the brand in the popular imagination, with many similar phones from other manufacturers often being referred to as "BlackBerry-style phones".

This has made BlackBerry phones popular with people who do a lot of typing on their phone, either through SMS, email or instant messaging. BlackBerry phones have built up excellent features in these areas making them excellent messaging phones.

In its early days BlackBerry was one of the first smartphone brands to try and incorporate features that were found in other devices such as PDAs, and were also one of the first phone manufacturers to introduce email support.

Email

All BlackBerry phones come with excellent email support including push email, so that emails can be delivered directly to your phone. BlackBerry phones can support up to 10 personal email accounts at the same time including popular web based email clients such as Live and Gmail, and also support corporate email accounts with BlackBerry Enterprise Server.

BlackBerry Enterprise Server

BlackBerry phones are particularly well suited to businesses thanks to BlackBerry Enterprise Server. This allows BlackBerry handsets to be integrated into a company´s email system and is one of the main reasons that BlackBerry is popular with businesses and professional phone users.

BlackBerry Enterprise Server can sync your BlackBerry phone with a Microsoft Outlook, Novell GroupWise or IBM Lotus Notes email account and also comes with support for Microsoft Exchange.

BlackBerry Messenger

One of the most loved features among BlackBerry users is BlackBerry Messenger, an instant messaging client available exclusively for BlackBerry users. Each BlackBerry device comes with a BlackBerry PIN, and users can chat in real time with others by entering their PIN into BlackBerry Messenger. With BlackBerry Messenger you can see when other people are typing and make use of emoticons and profile avatars.

BlackBerry Messenger can also be used in conjunction with apps from BlackBerry App World, allowing you to share your favourite apps and music with friends, and with social networks such as Facebook. You can also send files such as pictures and videos directly to your friends through BlackBerry Messenger.

With BlackBerry Messenger Music you can easily share with BBM contacts music you are listening to, or keep up to date with what your friends are listening to. You can create a BBM music profile of up to 50 songs and also listen to songs in your friend´s BBM music profile too. You can also send songs and music playlists to friends via BlackBerry Messenger.

BlackBerry App World

BlackBerry phones feature their own app store, known as BlackBerry App World. Here you can pick up many excellent games and apps to enjoy on your BlackBerry phone, and share newfound apps through SMS, BlackBerry Messenger or social networks like Facebook and Twitter. BlackBerry phones also feature Super Apps, which are more integrated than standard apps or offer a social experience.

Apps can be purchased through BlackBerry App World via PayPal, credit card or by adding purchases to your monthly phone bill (on selected networks).

BlackBerry Protect

BlackBerry Protect is an app that will help you to locate your BlackBerry device and protect data stored on it should it be lost or stolen. This can be especially important if your BlackBerry phone is a business phone and contains sensitive business information.

BlackBerry Protect allows you to back up content from your BlackBerry phone including SMS messages, calendar entries and web bookmarks so that you can retrieve them should you misplace your phone. Information is backed up wirelessly to an online server that can then be accessed from other devices.

You can then log into the BlackBerry Protect website and remotely lock your BlackBerry phone, preventing other people from accessing its contents. Alternatively, you can use this same service to remotely wipe information stored on the phone and any microSD data card contained in the phone. You can use the latter service if you are certain that you will never see the phone again.

You can also use the service to display a message on the phone´s homescreen giving instructions to whoever may be in possession of it on how to return it to you. As well as this, you can use the phone´s GPS system to locate the device on a map.

Your phone may have been lost or stolen in public, but sometimes you may simply misplace it in your own home. Phoning the device can help you locate it, but if you have left it on silent this is not really an option. With BlackBerry Protect you can get your BlackBerry phone to ring at full volume to help you locate it, even if you have previously left it on silent mode.

Backing up your information to BlackBerry Protect also makes it easier to transfer this data over to a new BlackBerry device. Instead of manually entering all of the information into a new phone you can simply download it from the BlackBerry Protect website, making it exceptionally easy to upgrade to a new BlackBerry phone.

BlackBerry Presenter

BlackBerry Presenter is a peripheral device that you can purchase to use with your BlackBerry smartphone to help deliver presentations. Simply plug the Presenter into a projector or monitor and activate the relevant software on your BlackBerry phone and you can be presenting Microsoft PowerPoint or PDF documents in minutes, directly from your phone! The BlackBerry Presenter is supported by a selection of BlackBerry smartphones.

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