BlackBerry Bold or iPhone 3G: Which fits your corporate attire?

Smartphones are the best gadget for any corporate user. However, to select the one, fit for their corporate personality, is hard to choose from the crowd.

The article is a feature by feature comparison between BlackBerry Bold & 3G iPhone that are label as best Smartphone available in the market.
Apple iPhone 3G

The iPhone is an internet-connected multimedia Smartphone designed and marketed by Apple Inc, which lacks a physical keyboard, but the multi-touch screen renders a virtual keyboard when necessary. It functions as a camera phone, a portable media player and an Internet client. The Apple iPhone 3G is known as the Smartphone that is best in multimedia.


BlackBerry Bold
The BlackBerry Bold aka 9000, the first 3G BlackBerry, launched in the U.S. in November of 2008, is a mobile phone data device, which is considered as one of the best in BlackBerry series.

Comparison of features:

Microprocessor: BlackBerry has 624MHz Intel PXA270/Marvell Tavor PXA930 processor, up from 312MHz, whereas iPhone has Samsung ARM 1176JZ(F)-S v1.0 620 MHz under-clocked to 412 MHz, 32-bit RISC processor.

Operating System: Bold runs BlackBerry OS 4.6, whereas iPhone 3G has iPhone OS 2.2.1.

WLAN: BlackBerry has 802.11a/b/g plus good GPS, typically a tradeoff with BBs, while iPhone supports Wi-Fi 802.11b/g.

Resolution:  BlackBerry has 480 x 320 resolution screen with 65,000 colors, whereas iPhone sports 480×320 px, 3.5 in (89 mm), 3:2 aspect ratio, 262,144-color LCD touch-screen.

SMS/MMS: In the Apple iPhone 3G Smartphone, you can only send SMS. Where-as in the BlackBerry, you can send both SMS and MMS.

Memory: The memory that is installed in the Apple is 16 GB where as in the BlackBerry it is 64MB only. In BlackBerry, MicroSD expansion is available where as in Apple it is absent.

Applications: RIM has made a lot of noise about its BlackBerry App World store, whereas Apple recently celebrated its 1 billionth App Store download.

Screen: The Apple has a touch screen and whatever information you are inputting has to be done through that, where as a BlackBerry comes fully equipped with a QWERTY keypad. In the Apple phone the size of the screen is 3.5 inches where as it is 2.5 inches in the BlackBerry.

Camera: In both devices, the resolution of the digital camera is 2 megapixels.

Speakers: The Apple comes in with speakers that are built in. The BlackBerry also comes with inbuilt speakers, but they also come with a 3.5mm stereo jack.

Battery Life: The life of the battery of the BlackBerry is higher than the Apple phones battery life as there is no touch screen and resolution of screen is less.

Location support: BlackBerry has Gokivo Navigator and iPhone provides Google Maps.

Discussion
As usual, you cannot get all the features in one gadget, for e.g. in the BlackBerry the features like the alarm clock; calendar, digital zoom is available where as such features are not available in the Apple. Also, you can do cut and paste text between apps in BlackBerry, while iPhone lacks it. One more thing you miss in the iPhone is opening a zipped attachment, which is present in the BlackBerry Bold.


But, the 16GB memory, rotational ability, touch screen, use of accelerometer for motion detection, Safari browser's support, larger screen and easy apps downloads from the application store makes it better Smartphone than any other.

The most important function for a corporate executive is E-mailing.  BlackBerry has become the Lotus Notes of the mobile world for providing secure e-mail anywhere on the move.

Also, the iPhone works directly with Exchange, so you can e-mail, e-mail folders, calendars, and contacts all flowed effortlessly among the iPhone, laptop, and server. The configuration was trivial.

It is important to note that BlackBerry Enterprise Server (BES) supports Novell GroupWise and Lotus Notes, while both of those servers support the iPhone only through Web clients, limiting their integration with other iPhone apps such as Contacts and Calendar. Thus, BlackBerry supports more e-mail systems, even though you have to add a dedicated server to get that support.


In the security front, organizations running BlackBerrys can trust as if a BlackBerry is lost, IT can wipe all of its data and render it useless over the air. Apple also provides more iPhone security capabilities than most people realize, but it still does not have the depth of messaging and device security that the BlackBerry does.