BlackBerry Pearl
An unusual smartphone, that's how the 2006 BlackBerry Pearl can be described. In fact, the device had quite a few unique features. It was a great choice if you wanted to use BBM (BlackBerry Messenger) and e-mail, but didn't want to have a large QWERTY keyboard. Because the device didn't have that. Although, not completely. The company used its own SureType keyboard, consisting of 20 keys. This meant you had two letters per key. As a result, the keyboard could be seen as a cross between a full keyboard and the T9 input, as you knew it from Nokia handsets. Typing with this device took quite a bit of getting used to.
The BlackBerry Pearl 8100 was a relatively compact smartphone from maker Research in Motion. The device measured 107 x 50 x 14.5 millimetres with a weight of just 90 grams. This made the device extremely light. Two years later, the Canadian manufacturer released the BlackBerry Pearl Flip 8220, a clamshell device with its own design as well. The Pearl 8100 had a trackball, or a kind of joystick in the middle that we subsequently saw on more BlackBerry models. This was later replaced by a trackpad.
The Pearl had a 2.2-inch screen with a resolution of 260 x 240 pixels. An Intel single-core processor kept the device running. Internal storage came to 64MB, which you could expand with a memory card. The phone offered a 1.3-megapixel camera with an LED flash. Bluetooth was also on board the BlackBerry, as was an application to open documents and a media player. There was also a 900 mAh battery. You could purchase the BlackBerry Pearl 8100 in red, white or black.
The BlackBerry was positively received for its weight and size and e-mailing. Less positively received was the software with complicated menus and the slow web browser. Also, WiFi was missing.
BlackBerry Pearl 8100 summarised in 3 points
- Special keyboard: SureType
- 1.3 megapixel camera
- Ping!
