7520 Experiences
 

I've had mine for about 3 months, went from a cell phone plus a Sony Clie to the BB. (Nextel service)

1. It's an OK phone on it's own, but sort of like talking into a handheld game. A little bulky, but I got used to it. With a headset it's as good as any other phone. (btw - had a Motorola Bluetooth headset for a while - hated it. Too quiet.)
2. As a PDA for calendar and contacts it's awesome. I like it much better than the Palm OS based Clie.
3. Internet browsing isn't all that great - my old Samsung cell phone was much better. Seems slower, and not all WAP sites work properly.
4. The display isn't as sharp as I expected, but certainly acceptable.
5. And then there's email. Head and shoulders above the competition, esp. Treo, imho. I use the desktop redirector for corporate email, and forward my personal mail. Love it.
6. The ring tones suck. But once I realized that the thing is on vibrate 98% of the time I forgot about it.

All in all I'm a happy camper, and slowly getting addicted. I'm trying to figure out how to do internet stuff better, if I solve that I may be hooked for good.

By the way, if you're interested there's a good site for all things bb:
http://www.blackberryforums.com/

Cheers

That may be an all-in figure from zero to BlackBerry, as they'd have to set up a BlackBerry Enterprise Server, etc. and then licenses for each user. My company charged me $80 for the individual license (don't ask why they wouldn't pick it up...), but they obviously had to lay out money for the server, etc. Perhaps your company is including that cost.

Setting one up on your own (i.e. so it doesn't work seemlessly with over-the-air Outlook updating is sub-optimal, but you can do it, and make good use of one.

You really don't need a BlackBerry. Get a good phone.

If you told me that you are out of the office one or two weeks per month and need the ability to respond to emails during that time then I would tell you to go with the BlackBerry. It does what it does better than any other device out there. I wish the Windows Mobile devices did it as well but they do not. Soon though ... I hope.

webby is a little off, it's HELL, Yes Yes Yes Yes!!!!!

I had the b'berry & recently traded to a Treo 650. The Treo's great but the b'berry had a better keypad (size/placement) and you didn't have to "force" your e-mails. Never had a problem with the b'berry as a phone either, but it didn't have a speakerphone.

depends on model - 7520 has a speakerphone

What does that mean? Can't you set up the email client to check mail at specified intervals?