[chrisnol]

Something weird is going on. I was a former attw 7280 account until last Friday. Went to my local Cingular store and bought an 8700c. The put in the new Cinglar sim card that shipped with the 8700c. They extended my contract for 2 years ( got the 8700c for $349 plus a $50 rebate for a net cost of $299) and switched me over to the "orange" cingular from the attw "blue " side (and as I mentioned used the new orange sim card that came with the 8700c). Essentially they just set up a new account for me because my old account stopped working-- I had to re-set up my BIS (Web Client account). Within a few minutes (before I left the Cingular store) I had BOTH the Cingular and Blackberry browsers on the home screen of my 8700c. They both seem to work fine, although I do get an error message sometimes that a particular page won't open because the server is overloaded or something to that effect. I tried "delta.com with the Blackbery Browser and it opened fine but with the Cingular Browser it said it was "unable to render page" and wouldn't open. It looks like the reported problem is customer specific rather than systemic. Anyway, my 2 cents.

[chrisnol]

By the way, if not clear from my prior post, I do NOT have BES. I am only on BIS/Web Client, so I have both browsers without BES

[Jack]

I had my third conversation with cingular this afternoon in an attempt to motivate action on this issue. Again, I was placed on hold and told that a blackberry rep was consulted. And again, I was told that without BES, I would not have the browser and nothing could be done. I encouraged the representative to review this website so that the collective frustration expressed here would be conveyed to someone who may be able to resolve this issue.

Anyway, I've decided that if this is not resolved within the next few days, I'm going to return my device -- the cramped keyboard is hurting my thumbs anyway, and I'm having a tough time justifying the switch from the 7100 series.

Good luck to everyone who has taken the time to speak out on this issue.

[acoss]

anyone with bes experience that could tell us if what i suggested might work?>

[acoss]

I can't beleive cingular data tech support chat!

I was explaining the bb browser situation and the rep (JamesV) suggested i went to handango.com and purchased a third party internet browser since "There's no way a cingular device would show the bb browser unless is part of a BES"

What an ***hole

[cwosigns]

Ahh...ANOTHER guy who has BIS only and both browsers. WILL SOMEONE FIX MY EFFING PHONE ALREADY!?!?!?! THIS IS RIDICULOUS.

[rcg]

Does Cingular have the BB browser on the 7100g?

More over why can TMO make this happen but not Cingular? As soon as the TREO people figure this out it will grossly impact sales - really a "Smartphone" without a web browser.

Perhaps everyone should open a ticket with cingular... I think I will forward this to some tech broadcasters I know... Nothing like a little negitive publicity in front of millions of listeners.

[DaMaDo]

I only have BIS and I have both browsers. When I click a link like www.delta.com it automatically launches the "HTML Browser"

I use a year old orange and white cingular SIM.

Edit: Actually the only way I can get it to use the cingular browser is to launch it manually.

[cwosigns]

I'm "The Phone Guy" when it comes to friends, family, coworkers, etc. I'm a sign language interpreter, and BlackBerry's and Sidekicks are the standard in the interpreting and deaf communities. As much as I LOVE the screen on this, right now it doesn't offer much over the Sidekick II. The browser on the SKII is html-enabled, even though its GPRS and not EDGE. If someone asked me to recommend a good SMART phone right now, not sure that I'd recommend the 8700.

I'm not sure if I'll keep the 8700 if I can't get the fully-enabled browser. EDGE is lost if you can't really do any browsing. Not to mention I didn't get what I paid for.

[cwosigns]

DaMaDo: Will you give me your phone number so I can call in and ask them to compare our accounts? There has GOT to be a solution to this.

PIN me or shoot me an email at

Thanks!

[gadgetman]

To Chris Owens: It's early days. I'll give Cingular the full 30 days to sort out the problem. I just refuse to believe that they will not address this issue favorably. Incidentally, I too am not thrilled with the 8700. Too big, too delicate, lousy keyboard, and a problem with Bluetooth that I hope is merely a defective unit. I love the 7100t with OS 3.8. But I'll wait and see. If I can get my personalized Yahoo page on the BB browser and it's a quick download, I may stay with the 8700. I can't get the page on the crummy Cingular browser.

[acoss]

For those of us that only have the cingular browser; Usually when you open the browser it loads the medianet page which shows you your local weather, news etc.. It will also let you change your links or categories.
I'm loading the meanet page right now and the local weather dissapeared and the links to change your weather and categories have also dissapear...
are you guys experiencing the same thing?

[cwosigns]

Nope. My MediaNet is normal.

[VidGameKing]

okay, so I don't have a 8700 yet, I seriously want one though! the browser deal is not that big for me, because I only brows very casually (like while queuing or waiting in dead traffic). I mostly dislike the fact that when I get an extremely large e-mail it sometimes only downloads a bit and while I'm reading the body it downloads more of the email. I figure the edge will make this faster. I just thought this thread was sort of silly because my orange cingular browser allows me to open delta.com and it also allows me to set my home page to yahoo.com. Now it's true that all the sites default to WAP but if they are HTML only they still seem to render fine, and I can configure the browser to look just like a normal desktop. anyways I've got a 7290. I wonder what it takes to go to BES...

[Jack]

I discovered a browser called "opera mini" on the web. I apologize in advance if this is something that everyone in the world already knew about but me, but if you go on your cingular browser to http://mini.opera.com and download the "low memory version" of the software, it loads and runs. I think it is relatively slow (at least compared to the wap browser) but it renders the pages really nicely and it is free.

Anyway, I was not familiar with this until I searched around and found it, so I thought I'd share the information.

If anyone is aware of other third party browsers, please post. Thanks.

[VidGameKing]

yes, but if you use third party internet browsers don't you get billed for superficial data usage not covered by the standard BBunlimited plan?

[Jack]

Originally Posted by VidGameKing

yes, but if you use third party internet browsers don't you get billed for superficial data usage not covered by the standard BBunlimited plan?

I do not believe so, but if anyone else out there can confirm this, that would be great -

[gadgetman]

Does Cingular have the BB Browser on the 7100g and the 7290? (I don't know as I'm coming from T-Mobile which has the BB Browser on both the 7100t and the 7290). If Cingular doesn't have the BB Browser on the 7100g and the 7290, then presumably it won't put it on the 8700, in which case it's goodbye nice knowing you Cingular as far as I'm concerned.

[VidGameKing]

Wow this full HTML browser deal is really that big eh? I guess I've only experienced mobile browsing at GPRS so I wouldn't know the advantage had at full HTML with EDGE. I just know that WAP makes the pages load faster on my 7290.

[cwosigns]

Originally Posted by gadgetman

If Cingular doesn't have the BB Browser on the 7100g and the 7290, then presumably it won't put it on the 8700, in which case it's goodbye nice knowing you Cingular as far as I'm concerned.

That's kind of a moot point, since the 8700 is ADVERTISED as having a full-html browser. It's not like we're demanding something that would just be nice to have--it's the whole reason a lot of people are buying this device. The 7290, even if it HAD an html browser, used only GPRS and it was too slow to be usable. This is the FIRST BlackBerry with EDGE, and it was advertised as having an html browser.

I see a parallel between Verizon crippling bluetooth on the V710 (a device touted as having complete bluetooth capabilities but being released with just the headset profile) and Cingular releasing a BlackBerry touted as having an html browser to take advantage of EDGE data speeds, but releasing a device with a measly WAP browser. The 8700 is a helluva lot more expensive than a V710. There's a good case building against Cingular if they don't step up to the plate on this issue.