Five BlackBerry Power Utilities

When people think about mobile phones and platforms today, the iPhone would most likely come to mind, followed perhaps by Android or even Sidekick. BlackBerry devices are gaining acceptance in the mainstream, if celebrity BlackBerry sightings and Beatle-esque commercials are anything to go by. No longer the sole providence of Corporate America (something I discussed in my recent review of the BlackBerry Bold 9700), more and more people are discovering how useful the BlackBerry can be.  There are a few apps that are almost universally considered “must-haves” on your BlackBerry, such as Google Maps. This list, however, is to focus on other applications that may not immediately be on your radar for installation on your BlackBerry, but should be.

1. SearchIt

SearchIt ($1.99) does one thing and does it extremely well: it allows you to search the web very easily and in a flexible manner. Launching SearchIt brings up a well-designed search box where you enter your query.  Then, with a press of the button you can quickly cycle through various search engines for sites, such as Wikipedia or YouTube. SearchIt has a number built-in, and via the Options screen you can check off which ones you want to be appear.  You can also add a custom search engine (with more custom slots coming in future revisions, along with the ability to set searches to launch in Bolt or Opera Mini).  SearchIt also has the option to integrate into the System menu on the BlackBerry so that it is always just a click away. If you want a fast way to look up information from your BlackBerry (or don’t want your phone provider forcing you to use a specific search engine), SearchIt is a great option.

2. BerryPopup

BerryPopup ($6.95) solves a problem that the BlackBerry OS has; namely, that its notification system is lacking. Yes, when you receive an email, you see an envelop icon appear with the number of messages.  However, to see who emailed you or what it concerns, you need to exit out of the screen that you’re in, switch to the Messages application, read the email, and then go back to where you were originally.  Not very efficient for a system that can multi-task. BerryPopup elegantly provides a solution by popping up a customizable message box containing information from the email or SMS message, such as the sender, subject, and text. There are buttons on the pop-up for you to go to your inbox, mark the message as read, delete it, reply to it, and more. There are also a number of options available to tweak the pop-up to your liking. This is one of those applications that the BlackBerry OS should have built-in, or something equivalent. It is a huge time-saver.

3. QuickLaunch

QuickLaunch ($4.99) is something of a Swiss army knife utility for the BlackBerry. At its most basic, it is a pop-up menu that you can use to launch applications. Now add the following features: sub-menus; keyboard shortcuts, ability to dial phone numbers, send emails, SMS and PIN messages with a click, open audio and picture files, view temperature, mute the camera, take screen shots, toggle WiFi and Bluetooth, search Google / Wikipedia, and more. Plus, you can extensively customize QuickLaunch, making it one of the best bang-for-buck applications for your BlackBerry.

4. Evernote

Evernote (free) is not really a utility, but you’ll want it in your arsenal.  Evernote is a fantastic notetaking tool. Sure, MemoPad can do that job for you, but Evernote supports audio and picture notes, and most importantly, it saves it out to the company’s servers, allowing you to not only be able to access it from any machine or phone, but also sync down to the desktop via the Evernote client. Evernote’s service is free unless you are a high-volume user, but even then the price is a meager $5 a month (or $45 a year), which also includes enhanced features.  A big knock against Evernote is that the client is not as feature-rich as the iPhone counterpart; hopefully, they will show the community some love and make a richer BlackBerry client. Still, if you are constantly jotting down ideas or reminders, Evernote is a great organization tool.

5. Bolt Browser / Opera Mini 5.0 Beta (tie)

OK, so I fudged things here a bit.  The problem is, both of these browsers are so good, are close in a lot of areas, but diverge in other key ones.

Bolt Browser (free) is a powerful web browser replacement for your BlackBerry.  Based off of Webkit (the same as Safari, the iPhone’s browser), Bolt provides a desktop-like experience for browsing on your BlackBerry, while remaining fast and easy to navigate.  Bolt boasts YouTube support as well, but it can be hit or miss (more the latter).  While not perfect, Bolt has been steadily improving with every version and is able to render pages properly that the stock Browser and Opera Mini cannot.  Also, they offer a plug-in to make Bolt your default browser, a huge plus.

Opera Mini 5.0 Beta (free) is another powerful alternative to the anemic BlackBerry browser. Opera is fast at rendering pages, due to the fact that it communicates with Opera’s cache servers to speed downloads up to 2x or 3x faster.  Opera Mini can render desktop-like views, but on occasion will run into a site that it can only render in mobile view (something I never ran into in Bolt).  While Opera Mini does not have an option to set it as a the default browser, it adds itself as a menu option when clicking on hyperlinks.  Opera Mini has a couple of advantages over Bolt: it can zoom in, provides a nicer-looking default font, has support for tabbed browsing, allows you to sync bookmarks to Opera’s online service (and share them across devices), stream YouTube and download BlackBerry OTA apps (by sending them to the built-in browser), and has more pleasing aesthetics.

Both browsers have their advantages, and it’s tough to pick one to recommend over the other.

What are your experiences with any of the above applications?  What are your must-have utilities for your BlackBerry? We’d love to hear your feedback!

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