Many boaters who start shopping for an onboard smartphone are bound to encounter one of the hard truths of today's market: mobile phones that work wonderfully on land are not always the best choice for marine use.

For example, Blackberry phones are ubiquitous in the business world, where their excellent capabilities with email have afforded them a sterling reputation. Roughly 14 million devices were sold last year. Even more popular is the Symbian operating system, which is not well–known in the United States but is the number one seller abroad. Almost 77 million units were sold in 2007 alone.

Blackberry is great for email, but less so for browsing the web.

But despite their successes, both Blackberry and Symbian have significant limitations when it comes to onboard use. Blackberry phones do not display web pages well and are not widely compatible with third–party applications. Symbian phones are not well supported by U.S. mobile carriers and have very few marine–specific programs available.

Both offer great service on land, and if you have one they can be pressed into service on a boat. But if you are buying a smartphone for marine use, there may be better products out there.

BLACKBERRY

Blackberry smartphones are known for excelling when it comes to email – and they certainly do. No other smartphone device handles email faster or smoother. Setting up your email accounts is simple even for multiple accounts, and there some very cool email–friendly features. For example, when entering an email address, the first time you hit the space key it inserts an "@" character. The second time you hit the space key it enters a period. How does it know?

Blackberry smartphones have an excellent physical full QWERTY keyboard that is known for its good tactile response, a requirement for heavy email and text users. The layout of the keyboard and trackball make it natural to use a Blackberry with one hand. They do not have a touch screen, which is something we strongly recommend for a smartphone on your boat. But they are known for having good battery life, another must for business users.

Like many brands, Blackberry offers a selection of models that often represent compromises for marine users. The Blackberry Curve 8310/8330 comes with a 2 mega–pixel camera and flash, and a built in GPS but does not have Wi–fi. The Blackberry Curve 8320 has WiFi but no GPS. The 8310 and 8330 have Quad–band support for GSM/GPRS and EDGE networks, while the 8320 supports Dual–band CDMA2000 1X EV–DO networks. Other Blackberry devices offer differing functions, and you can check the RIM website for more information.

The Blackberry Curve is almost as slim as the iPhone and also has a sleek, elegant and glossy look. A nice touch, however, is black mat plastic on the sides that provides some grip, which is a good thing to have in the damp environment of a boat.

Blackberry has a limited selection of third-party marine applications available, a major drawback.

The newest device, the Blackberry Bold, is getting great reviews. It has a high–resolution screen that is bright, sharp, crisp and, well, bold. It has a built–in GPS with Blackberry Maps that gives you onshore street directions. It comes with quad–band GSM and HSDPA/UMTS support. It also includes Wi–fi and Bluetooth, as well as the multimedia support Blackberry smartphones are known for. AT&T will be the first mobile carrier offering the Bold, which is anticipated to be available this month. Other carriers will most likely follow.

BAD BROWSER

Where the Blackberry falls short is web browsing. The web browser that comes with the Blackberry does a very poor job, making web pages difficult to navigate. Fortunately, Opera Mini, a free web browser from the same company the produces Opera Mobile, supports the Blackberry. Opera Mini uses an online server to format the web pages, which increases the speed at which they are displayed. It lacks true end–to–end security, but it does send all information in an encrypted format. If you want to use a Blackberry for anything but the most minimal web browsing, you should download Opera Mini.

Another major drawback is the limited availability of third–party applications. The problem is that Blackberry smartphones only support Java–based programs, which is a serious constraint. Because of this, there are currently no native marine navigation or tide and current applications for Blackberry smartphones. There are, however, two Java–based tide programs, MuTide and mobiletide that will run on most Blackberry devices. They are very basic Java tide programs. You can also access web–based tide, current and weather applications – but it will be painful unless you have a third–party web browser like Opera Mini. (For a full story on third–party applications, see link.)

Certain Blackberry devices come with Tethered Modem software from RIM. This application allows you to "tether" your Blackberry smartphone to your laptop and use the phone to gain Internet access. You can tether using either the Bluetooth connection or the USB cable provided. (For a full story on tethering, see link.)