The story goes like this: A TownHall Investment Research director was quoted by Barron’s as saying that Sprint is seeing almost a 50% return rate on the BlackBerry Tour primarily because of trackball issues. We ran a simple poll where 36% of participants said they have returned a BlackBerry Tour because of trackball problems and another 16% have returned the phone for other reasons – that’s a 52% return ratio btw. But a tipster just sent us a little note stating that both Verizon and Sprint are calling bullshit (our words, not theirs) on the claim.
It’s not surprising that the companies that profit off of these handsets would publicly refute damaging statistics. But the fact remains that if you search the forums at CrackBerry, HowardForums, or others, a lot of users are having tackball problems. RIM has used the trackball with what I guess could be called moderate success over the last few generations, but perhaps this is why the new models will have trackpads instead.
I do love my BlackBerry Tour from Sprint, but I did have to exchange it due to trackball problems.
I waited till the very end of my return period with Best Buy to make the exchange, in order to maximize the odds that I’d get a device from a later batch…and thankfully, no trackball issues with the replacement Tour.
It’s not first RIM’s device which is quite unusable. What about Storm with its awful touchscreen? Now Tour.
I have been seeing the HD dock for the Zune selling on Amazon for around 50.00.
Also, the Zune a/v dock (the round one) that works with the original Zunes, and the 2nd generation Zunes, works with my Zune HD…the remote works too, but you have to unlock the screen with your finger first. I noticed WalMart by me has the Zune A/V cable set for around 30.00. They have the power adapter too.
Amazon has a lot of great reviews from new owners such as myself. Honest reviews from owners, your best source of info!!!
I’m not sure I’d trust the review of someone that doesn’t have the intelligence to tell that this article isn’t about the Zune.
Steve,
Rest assured, I have the intelligence.
However, as I was subjected to the ‘post your comment challenge’ by this fine website, getting the same, “commenting feature is inaccessible at this time”, I cut my text out of the original comment form, then pressed F5 to refresh, and had not realized that doing so would load this page that contained a different article.
For that and any confusion it may have caused anyone but you, I apologize – on behalf of the web admin that is.
But alas, I owe you no apology, as you have attempted to jibe my intelligence because of a simple human error, not unlike the error of your birth.
No offence, but your poll is obviously vulnerable to misinformation (malicious and otherwise).
There isn’t a carrier on the planet that would keep a phone on the shelf that was causing a 50% return rate.
Of course the rumor is bullshit (your words and mine) and of course online polls are unreliable and also subject to manipulation (sorry, but it’s true).
“There isn’t a carrier on the planet that would keep a phone on the shelf that was causing a 50% return rate. ”
Pffft! I don’t know about that.
Since February of this year I’ve replaced my Storm three times and my wife is about to replace hers this week-end for the first time.
I had to replace my Motorola V600 six times in five months. I’m also on my third BlackBerry Storm in seven months.
For everyone’s sake, this is the article I meant to comment on, again, apologies for posting my Zune comment to the wrong article…
http://www.crunchgear.com/2009/09/18/whats-holding-me-back-from-buying-a-zune-hd-the-lack-3rd-party-support/
I’m thinking about getting a Tour as my first (personal) Blackberry, so no experience there yet. However, my work phone is a Storm and it’s horrible. I haven’t had to replace it yet by some miracle, but I would never buy one for personal use. And I’ve only had it three months so who knows…it could break tomorrow.