With the arrival of the 8700g, T-Mobile injects some life into its aging lineup of BlackBerry devices, which hasn't seen a serious new handset (besides a small update to the compact 7100t) in more than a year. Besides the GPRS-only 7290, T-Mobile users have had to make do with the 7105t, a consumer-oriented BlackBerry with a slimmer form factor but a tricky, pseudo-QWERTY keypad. The new 8700g (also available on Cingular as the 8700c) takes the features of the 7290 and adds EDGE support to the mix, along with a speakerphone and mapping/driving directions (courtesy of Google Local). Overall, we were impressed with the 8700g's performance, particularly when it comes to e-mail handling (no surprise there), and the added EDGE support certainly revved up its browsing. However, both the 7105t and 7290 are tempting bargains now that their price tags have plunged to $100 (with two-year service agreements).

The black-and-silver 8700g looks pretty much like your garden-variety BlackBerry, complete with a bright, 2.5-inch QVGA display and the standard full QWERTY keypad. Measuring 4.3 by 2.7 by 0.8 inches and weighing a reasonable 4.7 ounces, the 8700g is a bit bulky for a jeans pocket - then again, you weren't really expecting to cram a BlackBerry in your pocket, were you?

The 8700g's 65,000-color, 320 x 240-pixel display looks sharp and rich to your eyes, although the display is (as expected) tough to see in direct spotlight. The handset's icon-driven main menu looked colorful and vibrant, as did the full-color images people saw on the web browser.

You will have little trouble typing on the roomy RIM keyboard, although some wish numeric keys and common symbols (such as the period and the comma) merited their own keys; instead, they're relegated to second-banana status on the letter keys. People have also noticed that the entire thumb board was rattling around a bit inside the plastic 8700g shell; it had no effect on typing and didn't seem in danger of coming completely loose, but some wish the keypad felt more solid. Back on the plus side, the 8700g is the first BlackBerry with dedicated "call", "end", and "mute" keys (the mute control sits on the top edge of the device), and people liked the side and front "convenience" keys, which you can assign to launch any of the 8700g's various apps.

The quad-band GSM (850/900/1800/1900) 8700g has an Intel XScale processor under the hood, along with a decent 64MB of flash memory and 16MB SDRAM; in different tests, most people found the handset to be relatively zippy (although none of the apps on the 8700g are terribly demanding). The phone also supports T-Mobile's 2.5G EDGE network, making for speedy (if not bone-rattling) surfing on the RIM web browser.

Messaging is the name of RIM's game, and the 8700g comes ready to play. Like the latest BlackBerrys that has been seen, the 8700g will check up to 10 e-mail accounts, including Microsoft Exchange, Lotus Notes, and IBM Domino accounts and standard web and POP/IMAP e-mail services, such as Yahoo (whose subscribers get the added benefit of real-time message delivery), Gmail, and AOL. While push e-mails Exchange/Lotus/Domino setup requires the help of your handy IT department (or the use of the included desktop mail redirector), personal e-mail setup was a snap; people just entered their Gmail account info, and within minutes the 8700g was collecting their messages. The fly in the ointment, however, is that the 8700g (on T-Mobile's network, at least) doesn't support Hotmail or MSN accounts; T-Mobile reps told customers that talks are underway and that Hotmail/MSN service will arrive in the near future.