Hi,

I am currently a very happy user of a BB Bold 9700 and had all kinds of Smartphones (Symbian, Windows Mobile, iPhone) before.

However, by now I am feeling the pain I expected before: Since the Blackberry Service is tied to a Blackberry "Option", I can't just pop in and use any Pay as you go sim abroad. That's almost acceptable in the EU where my german carrier charges €0,99/MB. but clearly NOT acceptable outside the EU where I'm charged €10+ per MB.

I am now thinking of getting a Nokia E71/E72 instead in order to be free to roam.

What do you think? How do other International Travellers handle this?

Unfortunately my carrier doesn't offer unlimited International Data Packages (in fact no German carrier that I am aware of does that at an affordable price).

Are there ways to use your BES with a different SIM and option? I got the Pay as you go Blackberry Option from T-Mobile UK last month which worked with BIS, but kept showing me "Service Blocked" for BES, so it was useless as well.

Any workarounds or recommended Phones?

I guess the Nokia E's are the way forward since I always loved the form factor and have always been happy with Symbian in the past (from Nokia 76xx, Siemens SX1, to Nokia N95). I hated the IPhone (I need a "workhorse", not a toy!) - so that's not an option. I like the Android concept, but dislike touchscreens and need a physical QWERTZ Keyboard, so while a Moto Milestone / Droid, or a SonyEricsson XPeria seem tempting, I guess the Nokias are the only efficient option.

I do already dislike the fact that people are arguing whether E71 or E72 offer the better package, and that (so I read) I would have to manually enable HTML for every single Email. Also the low resolution might become an issue - but what else is out there?