BlackBerry Pearl 8130 User Reviews

This was my very first smartphone, and it was good while it lasted. But when it's bad, it's horrible. It freezes everyday more than once a day. I have great difficulty running apps like facebook and twitter. At first the phone wasn't able to send picture messages, but they made an update for that, but it freezes every time I try to send a picture message. This is my forth Blackberry pearl, and I cannot wait until I can upgrade, because I'm switching to android as soon as possible! Don't waste your time or your money.

Well, its been along time since I had this phone. The phone takes good 2.0 megapixel pictures. The camer a settings are sparse. Web browsing isnt the best, but it gets the job done. The SureType QWERTY keybaord might not be for everyone. It took me 3 days to get the hang of it. The keys are raised above the surface. They have a nice shape to them. The phone is made of plastic.The screen is nice and vibrant. You can customize the phone too. You can donwload apps that are useful and download different OS skins. They are pretty neat.

This phone is the best phone I've ever had. I have 81 phones and the Pearl 8130 is the best one out of all of them.

I really love this phone! It's my second blackberry and I don't know how I ever lived without it :) .. I have two email accounts set up on it and in the morning it's so much quicker to check it on the phone than it is on the computer. It's not slow, doesn't freeze up, and has a good amount of memory for what I need. The only thing I'm not totally crazy about is the camera, but thats it! Texting isn't too bad once you get used to it..

this phone is the best when you first get it!! but then after a week and a half, it slows down. my phone started freezing, and at one point in time, it wouldnt show me my pictures or songs on my phone, from my memory card but the pictures and songs came up when i plugged it into my computer!! one day my friend was playing with the trackball and it came out and fell in a sewer, that was my fault and his, but there is no backup if you loose the trackball.. i got a new blackberry 8130 and it froze and did the same thing the first phone did.... including the trackball falling out!! i almost forgot to mention that ppl on my other end could hear noises in my background louder than they actually were and neither phone could ring loud. if i put the phone on loud, it would vibrate and then ring low (and the low ringer is barely heard)

The phone would be mint if it didnt have a trackball on it!! As soon as the trackball goes on your phone: your phone is useless!!!I would not recommend any blackberry with a trackball on it! This would have been the 3rd time i would have had to send my balckberry away for a new one so they credited me to getting a new cell phone and I am trading mine in for a new blackberry storm, so we will see how that turns out!!  
 
Also, the other 2 times i had to send it away was due to a blown earpiece speaker!! how does that happen really?????
OVERALL DONT BUY A BLACKBERRY WITH A TRACBALL ON IT!!   You are asking for TROUBLE

I've had my phone for 9 mos now.  I had problems with the track ball sticking, the battery not holding a good charge, phone calls being erased from time to time; but I took it in and had it replaced and have not had any problems with the replacement phone and I've had it for 5 mos.  The keys are small, but you get used to them.  You can switch between applications and I can type a text at the same time I'm on the phone.  I can also easily turn on the speaker phone while I'm on a call.  I haven't had any problems navigating through the features of the phone.  It's an over all great phone.  I'm happy with it and would recommend it to others from my experience.  I wish it would sync wirelessly with my outlook instead of having hooking it up to do so, but that's the only thing that I can really complain about.  I can't complain too much about that since it's a smaller intro phone and I knew that when I purchased it.  There are reasons you pay less for this phone.

I really like that this phone is small, however I realized that my previous dumb phone was easier to use.  First, the keyboard keys are really tight.  I don't have big fingers, so I don't know how anyone who does would be able to use this phone.  The smart keys on the side of the phone are really sensitive, so the phone is always accidentally going to voice dialing or the camera turning on. No dedicated speakerphone, so you can't switch to speaker if you are checking a message of viewing your phone book during a call. Problems syncing with bluetooth - I have yet to be able to do it with my Voyager 520. Have to manually change time zone; does not give message notification when not in the home screen; when used with Sprint service cannot talk and text at the same time; no way to remove the application button from the 6 short cut keys displayed on left hand of the screen, voice command doesn't work well.  Trackball can be tricky.

not gonna lie. this was such a great phone for me. i went from this phone to the curve, and i miss my pearl so much. nice slim design. great sound. loved it!

the internet comes in handy many times but i hate how it's so laggy sometimes and when i want to go back a page, it ends up just bringing me to my regular blackberry menu. also, i had problems with the memory stuff so my phone would once in a while erase my call logs and text messages. i'm just waiting until the blackberry storm gets out! hopefully i won't have the same problem with that phone. also, it takes FOREVER when you take the battery out and turn it back on (i have to do this after all texts get erased AND this sucks 'cause all my texts and logs get erased when i get a text from someone so i can't read the one that i had just gotten so i have to take the battery back out in order to start receiving messages again. pain in the assssss!).and this phone is so sloowwwww. it's honestly just a piece of crap.

I was SSSOOO excited to get my new blackberry pearl 4 months ago. At first, so far so good, but give it a while. As a school teacher, I am not able to always answer my phone. I rely on my missed call log, text, etc. in case I miss the phone. Even after purchasing a new media card (twice, 5GB ($60) and 1GB ($35), having my phone replaced after the speaker stopped working, while I was out of town, and a number of other "memory" problems, I am just NOT satisfied. I hear the same complaints from many other PEARL owners and they seem to not want to compensate for the problem. On the verizon network I spend and average of $190 a month on service that I just don't get with this phone. Now I am going to have to spend more money to purchase a full price phone outside of my upgrade period. Needless to say this phone spoiled the excitement of the blackberry world.

Got this phone about a month ago and i have had nothing but problems with it. The phone freezes constantly!!! I am on my 3rd replacement of the same phone and all of them have had the same problems over and over again. I do not recommend this phone to anyone one who is a business man because like me i am sure that they don't need a phone that freezes all the time and randomly deletes texts an emails.

I purchased the bb pearl from verizon 3 months ago and now i'm on my 6th phone. Every phone has had the same problem and it wasnt just a batch at store, I called verizon and they sent me one from the warehouse after the 4th replacement. The problem being, at least one a day, when I place a call my phone says connected but is totally mute the caller can hear me but I can't them the problem is easliy fixed by removing battery but when you recieve an important call reseting becomes a hassel because it takes so long to boot up. I am staying with pearl because I love its features and is the best phone i've owned. So this replacement i'll go with the pink one maybe i'll have better luck.

I just wanted to say i have had this phone for a few months and so far so good. Every phone has its quirks you just have to realize that nothing in this technology world is perfect. To get it to stop deleting stuff randomly you need to have a memory card. The reason why this does this is so your phone has enough memory for your contacts applications ect. Thats about it overall great phone.

i really like the phone because of all the features that the phone has but i have way better signal with sanyo phones, plus i have to re-boot the phone every other day because it keeps erasing my message and calls by itselft, and this is my second one, i wish i can change it for a better one...

this phone would be much more better if it had Vcast Music, Video, or Mobile TV.

I've had the pearl on Verizon for about four and a half months now. It's my first Blackberry and I absolutely love it. It's got its issues just like any phone is going to have (and people who want to scream and yell about little things need to remember that EVERY phone will have its issues). The browser is great, the suretype took a day or so to get used to, but now I can't even text on a regular phone anymore without it taking an hour. I can finish a long email in ten minutes with no problems. I've not had the issue with losing the call log or messages, but then again I don't see the purpose in keeping a million text messages or emails around when I've already read them. If you keep your logs clear, there's no problem. Memory card is necessary if you take lots of pictures or videos. I've never had one issue with my losing memory on the phone. The trackball easily pops out and you can use canned air if it ever sticks. All in all, I think it's a great phone and I wont' ever go to another type of phone now that I've been sucked into the world of Blackberry

Hate the phone, worst phone I ever own. Had the phone for two weeks and nothing seems to work correctly more than once. Drop calls, callers could not hear me, and have a problem seeing the numbers. Texts, major issues. Phone may be better suited for younger ages. Not very good for fast pace Business professional

Yes it is true about the sd card. It is a safety feature on the phone. when you use up too much memory with pictures and text messages and nonsense it will erase everything out automatically. Just be sure to clean ur cache/cookies from ur browser and move ur "show last text recieved" to a lower number like a 2 or 3 and delete ur texts daily and clean it out daily and u should be fine!! give yourself a bit to get used to it and you will enjoy it

I have the pink pearl and i absolutely love it. Like every phone i have owned i have had problems with this one and returned it once without a problem. Every phone is going to have problems no matter what carrier you go thru. I personally myself like Verizon. Yes they r expensive but i never lose service whether i am talking texting or on the internet.!!!!

I love this phone, everything is great except one thing...it randomly erases my messages and calls! This is very annoying especially when it erases your incoming messages! Any solutions? I have a memory card in there and it doesn't seem to make a difference. Thanks.

I heard if you put an sd card in it it will stop erasing your msgs/calls. A friend of mine was having this problem and that fixed it. =)

This has been the best phone VZW came out with until now with the Curve coming out. I love everything about this phone! Battery life is great, picture quality is amazing too! i just love it!

For what it's supposed to do, I could not ask for a phone to do no more. But for what it actually does, I have never had such an awful experience with a phone before. The trackball flies out if you angle it too hard, it randomly erases my messages and calls, and sometimes decides that it is not bluetooth capable, which it is. It also displayed to me one night that it did not have a battery in it, which it did. The reception is fantastic, I reach full strength where others don't have a signal at all! But in one day, I reset, backed up, and restored my phones 12 times! I am really disappointed in the way this phone has not been been fixed. I am on my 3rd one, with this one doing the same things the other ones did! I hope the Curve will be a better sloution to my needs.

After graduating from a Razr the 8130 is my first smart phone. I wish not to say what carrier I currently have as they all use the same technology and they even share each others towers more often than you know. My experience with the quality of a connection has been more relevant to the handset. Do some research on handset signal quality and make a purchase accordingly as I have done with the Pearl 8130. It stays connected just as great as my last phone. I did have an issue with my new 8130 purchase. All three radios that are on the device witch are the cell phone, blue tooth and network radios would randomly turn themselves off. Four days after purchase the device was returned to the store and the carrier replaced it. The new replacement works great and at first I hated the suretype but after using it for a week it really is a snap. The phone does have a lot of settings and some are a labyrinth to find and get to. Also once you find them the 8130 can be customized to just about any ones liking. Just have to patiently educate ones self on using the Blackberry software. As for the MMS feature not working on the 8130, tech services stated it was being resolved in the near future. So for now I just use the email to send/receive photos. As for messages being deleted the phone does have a default text message items to keep set at 5. You can change this to a much greater number of items in the options as I have done.