Wow! What an amazing new berry! This is a very professional and slick looking device. EVDO works great and I've been doing to real web browsing for a change. Although it seems a tad thicker than the 7100t, it looks muck sleeker with it's two toned black and cobalt? casing.

Hopefully, RIM will be online long enough for me to give this puppy a good test run. Will post a more extensive review later if anyone is interested. Oh, and I nearly forgot! The killer thing about this puppy is that Verizon intends for you to tether to a notebook or pc and take full advantage of the EVDO connection. They even provide the software!

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Ascii stupid question, get a stupid Ansi.

Yup; it looks great. Waiting for mine to arrive to play with. Too bad Verizon only works in North America... I travel all over the world.

I am so interested in this thing.

How about a review from a PPC or Palm Smartphone user perspective?

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BB8830/Treo700wx/Treo700w/XV6600/Treo600/Kyo7135

I got mine yesterday. A great improvement over the last iteration. More like a phone with great email capability rather than a great email machine that also has a lame phone.

Any thoughts on a new case for it? The Verizon choice isn't very comfortable.

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Tnbruiser

I had my mind made up to get a Samsung i730 until I went to Verizon and looked at them. I never was interested in a Blackberry because of the size but then the salesman showed me a 7130e. I like the looks of it better than the Samsung. My only concern is I live on a fringe area and without the pullout antenna I am afraid I will get a lot of dropped calls like I did with my LG phone.

I like that device. Its fun to play with and from my experince havent had alot of problems with it.
Works very well

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WDTS PEON

I went ahead and got one since I knew I had 15 days to return it. I have not experienced any dropped calls, it works great.

On the case, I bought one from Verizon. The one that comes with it is not very good. The one I bought is a generic one that the phone fits in without any problem.

Has anyone signed up for BT tethering, which I understand is an option? How well does it work (ease of use, speed, etc.)?

It works. Pretty zippy. Downside (and why I don't use it) is that when the BB is being used as a modem you can't use it as a phone. So I am sticking with my EVDO card.