2. Blackberry Pearl Features: Discussion

Forget the standard BlackBerry look. This is a black and chrome designer statement in a truly tiny package, but the screen is less than half an inch smaller (diagonally) than before and it's clear, bright and colorful. The 240 by 260 resolution is good for photos and Web pages as well as email, especially if you shrink the font size from the default.

The ambient light sensor adjusts both the screen and the glowing trackball to make sure they're bright enough to see without wasting unnecessary power, although we expect that switching the trackball to flash in different colors when you get a call will take a little more battery.

There's no scrollwheel but the Pearl's trackball looks cool and works well.

The trackball is fun to use but it's also very practical; smoother and more pleasant to use than a joystick and more flexible than navigation buttons. You can scroll horizontally and vertically (though not diagonally) or zoom in and out when you're taking a photo; you can also press it to select an icon, get a context menu, play and pause music and so on. Whatever application you're in, if it feels logical to press the trackball, it will probably do something useful. The trackball rolls smoothly but with enough feedback so you know how far you've moved it; you can also tweak the acceleration if you can't get across the screen fast enough in BrickBreaker or you keep missing the IM icon on the front screen.

On the left side of the trackball are the dial and menu buttons. To the right of trackball you'll find the cancel and disconnect buttons. This is a logical arrangement because you drive everything from menus or by clicking the trackball rather than with softkeys. It's a change for BlackBerry users who are used to the scroll wheel, but very usable.

The sides, top and bottom of the case aren't cluttered with buttons; just up and down volume controls on the right, mute on the top and two 'convenience' buttons one on either side of the case. Initially the convenience buttons are set for voice dialing and the camera, but you can easily switch them to launch other applications.

On the side is a lanyard hole. The Pearl is light enough to wear around your neck, but RIM is really pitching it at people who want to add phone charms. On the back are the camera, mirror and flash, plus contacts for the optional desk charger (which can also charge a second battery if the 3.5 hours talk time and 15 days standby aren't enough for you).

Connections and one 'convenience' button.

Volume, the other 'convenience button' - and the lanyard hole; with the mute button on top of the case that's all the controls.

Switching from a scroll wheel to the trackball saves some space in the case; shrinking down the keyboard does the rest of the work to make the Pearl a good size to fit in your hand. Like RIM's other 'candy bar' BlackBerries, this is a QWERTY keyboard squeezed onto just 20 keys including Space, Delete and punctuation. Most keys have two letters on them but you don't need to tap them repeatedly to get the right letter (unless you're entering a password). Like predictive texting but with fewer collisions between words, the Pearl's SureType technology suggests the word it thinks you're typing, with alternatives to pick from if it's wrong. This version learns from your corrections and looks at surrounding words for context. It's far from perfect and typing on a real QWERTY layout will always be faster - especially as the keys are so small - but it works better than you'd expect once you force yourself to treat it as a keyboard and type with both hands, well thumbs.

The keys have enough action and travel to make typing reasonably comfortable as well. Built-in shortcuts speed up typing and save a lot of frustration; press and hold to get a capital letter, type two spaces for a period and skip apostrophes altogether because the BlackBerry puts them in for you automatically. When you're in a field that should be numbers the keyboard switches automatically (and the same for password fields).

If all of this isn't enough, the BlackBerry has a full set of phone features; speakerphone, call-waiting, caller ID-with photos if you've put them in the address book-conference calling and voice dialing. This works best with contacts from the address book but you can speak a number, have it read back to you to check and dial without ever touching the keyboard. You can record voice notes for yourself as well. Choose from MIDI and MP3 ringtones, including any music tracks you've loaded onto the phone. You can even use your favorite track to wake up with the alarm.