Here's a snap shot into my frustration. This is not an uncommon
problem and not the first time I've experienced these kind of woes
from a cell phone, however it's the first time I've had these kind of
problems for a phone that's gotten such rave reviews and praise, The
Blackberry Pearl.

So I got my new Blackberry Pearl home and started checking out all its
options... I immediately noticed the things others have said, this is
a very attractive, relatively fast, phone that is user friendly. That
was until I tried the web browser that comes with the Blackberry
Pearl.

I immediately started to miss the Opera Mini browser. So I went over
to Opera's website and was happy to see the Blackberry Pearl is
supported. I downloaded Opera Mini and then proceeded to use the
Blackberry Desktop Application manager to load Opera Mini into the
phone. The process takes a long time, a very long time as it was
install Opera Mini I noticed it was removing quite a few other
applications (I had not requested to remove anything), about 10
minutes later (yes, it took that long), the phone sort of rebooted
itself. I discover the Opera icon is now available, but the browser
that came with the phone is now gone.

I try to use the Opera browser and no luck... it runs, but it can't
connect. I comb this newsgroup and other on-line resources only to
find that I need to change from WAP to ISP, that sounds familure as I
had to do it on an old SmartPhone I had, the difference here is that
BlackBerry does not have documented how to do this....

So I'm thinking, well this really sucks what next? I call Cingular/
at&t and they are unable to help me, not only that they are rude... So
next I turn to the Blackberry website.... Blackberry.com has lots of
support documents, of course none of them help me and if I want to
contact support for anything I need some kind of subscription
account....

Suddenly I realize: this is what I get for buying a consumer phone
from a company that is entirely geared for corporate products. RIM
(company that produces the Blackberry line of products) has no option
for me.

At this point, I just want back the applications the phone came with,
so I uninstall Opera Mini, it uninstalls just fine, but unfortunately
the Blackberry Browser is gone, and gone are a few other Internet
related apps on the phone.

It's apparent the "Blackberry Desktop Manager" running on Windows XP
is the responsible for this problem as I saw it removing the
applications as it was installing Opera, I questioned then what the
hell it was doing, but I had no choice but to let if finish.

Disgusted, I look for a way to "hard reset" the Blackberry Pearl to
get it back to the condition it was in when it came out of the box.
This option is available on all phones, but not the Blackberry Pearl.

So now it appears due to software engineering problem (the Blackberry
Desktop Manager for Windows removing pre-installed "firmware" from the
handset when using the Application Loader) and a hardware engineering
problem sense the phone has no reset.

To say I'm annoyed is an understatement. Blackberry has an outstanding
reputation in the corporate world and this phone has gotten a lot of
positive press. I suppose if you're the kind of person who will never
install applications like Google Maps or Opera Mini, this phone will
make you happy, but I find lack of a "hard reset" feature and lack of
any kind of support from the manufacture a real problem.

My quest for "the perfect" phone continues... All I really want is a
phone that "just works" that I can also load applications into and
perform some kind of restore to get it back to the state it was in
when I bought it....apparently that's an impossible task for the
Blackberry engineers who spent three years creating the Pearl (which
btw doesn't have a power on button either).

Anyway, if you're a professional thinking the Pearl is a the Lexus of
cell phones, I would just say there are some real problems preventing
this phone from being considered a luxury device. I would classify
these as serious problems that should have been worked out before the
phone went into consumers hands and this device has been out quite a
while.