I am continually confused when people write things like <i>"Blackberry...has the shittiest web browser, terrible apps, but an absolutely fantastic email experience (still)."</i> I used to work on corporate IT managing and using RIM products from end to end, and I never found the email experience all that compelling. Sure the devices have fairly good keyboards, and, as a proponent of hardware keyboards in an era when they are all being relegated to software, I'm somewhat sympathetic to the RIM cause.<p>But the "email experience" on the Blackberry's I've used-- from older, clunkier models with the torturous side-scrollwheel to the Storm2-- was only ever as good as the Blackberry OS itself, which has consistently been pretty terrible. Who cares if it's easy to select an email if you have to endure an excruciating boot process before you can get to it? Who cares if the device has a fantastic keyboard if you have to wade through awful UI in order to launch the email app? (This is not to mention the horrible experience of <i>managing</i> the server portions of BES, which I always found confusing and often deliberately crippled).<p>I think this "myth" stems from the legacy of the Blackberry, which was one of the first devices to really have <i>any</i> kind of data/email capability. (Or, at the very least, was one of the first to be easy to adopt and fairly inexpensive to run with those kinds of capabilities). Of course the Blackberry was considered amazing when it was the only way to connect a corporate email system to a cell phone or other mobile device. But it isn't anymore, and frankly, I've found the "experience" of using and managing Google Apps and an Android phone <i>light years</i> better. (Hell, I think the crappy IMAP client that comes with Android is better than having to use a RIM OS, although I confess, I got out of the game before the Playbook, and thus, QNX).<p>UPDATE: Grammer, and ending comment.
I wouldn't put RIM into 'survival' mode just yet.<p>Sure they're are taking a beating right now. They were a powerhouse in the early smart-phone wars, and they don't seem to know what they are doing, which direction is up, and lack a clear vision.<p>But I believe they have a huge ace up their sleeve that is being somewhat ignored. QNX. Not as the operating system for their devices, though obviously that is important too, but as a popular embedded operating system 'in everything from in-dash radios and infotainment systems to the latest casino gaming terminals' (from the qnx.com website).<p>Blackberry has a history of making some pretty good hardware, and they have systems embedded in enterprise (BIS) and consumer devices (QNX). Those who are only seeing the currently mediocre products I think are selling RIM short.<p>I don't own a Blackberry but apparently I interact with RIM products everyday.
People have been making relatively similar arguments for awhile about how RIM should just switch all their handsets over to Android, then rewrite BBOS as an Android skin akin to HTC Sense for the enterprise.
I'm not trolling when I ask, because I have zero experience with it, but what advantage does BES email have over a properly configured Exchange 2010 server?