I now own the BlackBerry Bold

RIM BlackBerry Bold

I visited the AT&T store today to see a man about a phone.  My phone, actually.  I had them take a look, but their unsophisticated eye told me the phone was toast.  Unfortunately, AT&T doesn’t offer repair services like Verizon Wireless does, so I was assed out of options.  The way our life is, my wife and I are a tag team, and not being able to reach each other is a no-win scenario.  If I’m in a bind, she has to pick up the kids, etc.  Too bad we don’t do those push-to-talk “BEEP. Go for Joel!” family wireless plans.

There was no point in waiting, so I opted to go for the BlackBerry Bold smartphone.  It has a number of improvements over the Curve 8300:

• a sharp LCD TFT display
• great multimedia performance
• HSDPA 3G
• an updated BB OS
• Wi-Fi
• improved email (HTML!)

The biggest problem was using an American Express gift card, which we tried to use last week at Amazon.com, but it didn’t go through.   I spent a good 45 mins at the store, repeatedly on the phone with American Express representative “Ivan” (who incidentally was so sitting in a call center in India, and so wasn’t named “Ivan”.)  We tried and tried, but we couldn’t get the transaction to go.  AMEX kept reporting that the balance was zero, and the AT&T sales rep blockheads couldn’t find the right merchant ID.  In the end, the AMEX rep couldn’t remove the temporary block on the card account, so I couldn’t use the gift card.  I would have to wait 7-10 business days for the block to be removed.  Sigh.  Well, whatever.  I still needed the phone.

So, hassles aside, I’m the proud owner of the BlackBerry Bold.  I tell you, the Curve lasted me about 1.5 years, which fits my average.  Every cell phone has lasted just under a year before disintegrating into dust in my very hands. AT&T’s policy allows upgrades/renewals every 18 months, so this is about right for me.