The original 8100 Pearl was responsible for bringing a playful glint to BlackBerry’s starchy business email rep, flaunting a slinky compact physique and multimedia mischievousness.
Since then the Pearl has been gently tweaked, with the 8120 Pearl follow-up bringing a more refined design, improved feature cast and high-speed Wi-Fi connectivity to the BlackBerry bowl. Now, to complete the series, the latest 8110 model extends the Pearl’s palate with sat nav shenanigans.
The 8110 Pearl is the 8120’s identical twin but ditches the Wi-Fi for a built-in GPS receiver. So, there’s nothing new to report on the feature front: the two-megapixel is still a little tame, the integrated 3.5mm headphone port is a mighty boon for such a trim handset while the new slick Facebook app makes poking and social networking a breeze on the bounce.
Naturally, the BlackBerry’s legendarily easy-to-use push email talents also remain and setting up your personal email client (up to 10 accounts can be added) is zombie simple. It’s the reason BlackBerry remains number one for mobile email.
But it’s the newfound navigation flair that’s the focus here. Like its QWERTY-packing, road-loving stable mate, the BlackBerry 8310, this Pearl relies on BlackBerry Maps and the network-tailored sat nav package. Our Vodafone sample used Telmap’s offering that speedily calculates the route and then downloads the relevant maps over its EDGE connection. You will be charged data rates but it’s not to draining on the mega-byte quota with a heavy abuser using up around 2MB a month.
The 8110 is also lightning sniffing out satellites, taking around 10-15 seconds to hook up. Unfortunately, the otherwise A-to-B competent sat nav performance was hamstrung by the Pearl’s smallish display that struggles to clearly show the 2D maps when perched on the car dashboard. It’s definitely geared more for trotting around newly visited cities and towns.
The 8110 Pearl is undoubtedly a slinky mobile emailer and worth a shufti for that alone. However, the competent but ultimately unconvincing satnav is clearly primed for the occasional dabbler rather than the hardcore roadster.
Best features
Compact slinky design
Easy to set up and use push email
Handy integrated Facebook app
Integrated 3.5mm headphone jack
Not so good
Screen to small for totally effective in-car sat nav
No 3G
Average camera and video quality
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