Creating a BlackBerry Id is necessary if you intend on downloading apps to your BlackBerry.  This comes as a change to the app world application and helps to provide you with a secure way to download apps without having to worry about somebody downloading apps in your name.  This process can be done on bot the PC or in App World itself, however; using a PC is far easier and faster and so this is the method we will be showing you in this tutorial.

In order to create a BlackBerry Id (aka. BBID) you will need to get a hold of a PC with an active internet connection.  Once you’ve accomplised this follow the steps below to create yourself a BlackBerry Id. *Note – During this process you will need you will be asked for an email address that information about your BBID can be sent to. Try to choose an email that you can access online ex. hotmail, gmail, yahoo, peronal server.  This way you have the information stored on server you can access should you forget or lose your information.

1.  Start by right clicking on the following link and choose the option to open in another window www.blackberry.com/blackberryid.

2. On this page you are going to see a link that says “Register for a BBID”. Click this link to proceed.

3. Accept the Terms and Conditions by clicking the I Agree option and you will be given a page with information to fill out.

4. Fill out all of the fields on this page and then enter in the CAPTCHA phrase down at the bottom and then click “Save” to proceed to the next page.

5. If all of your information is correct and has not already been chosen by somebody else there will be a confirmation message displayed telling you that your BlackBerry ID was successfully created.  You will click OK which will send out a confirmation email to the email you used when filling in the form.

6. Go to this email and open the email, you will need to click on a link inside the email to validate the email address.  Once you have clicked this link you will be brought to a page where you will put in your BBID password that you entered in on the form you filled out on the previous screen.

Your BlackBerry ID is now created and can be used to download apps and log into your app world account.  There are a few important things to note about the above process that are listed below.

- The Screen Name will be the name that everybody sees when you submit a review.

- The BBID password cannot match the security question or answer that you choose should you forget your password.

-The link within the confirmation email that is sent to you will expire in 24 hrs from being delivered in the inbox.  If this email is not received in the inbox check your SPAM or JUNK folder.

Since being appointed as the new CEO of the once booming BlackBerry company Research in Motion, Thorsten Heins stated that he has significant plans for BlackBerry of which his top priority seems to be working on marketing and promoting the BlackBerry brand to get more BlackBerrys in the hands of US citizens, which is the market that has seen the most drastic losses to other competitors such as IPhone and Android based smartphones.

Thorsten Heins remained tight lipped about any of the details regarding his “plans” to take the company from where it is now to being a top contender in the smartphone industry once more, however has stated that he will be speaking with the board about his new plans for the company in about 2 weeks time in hopes to bring new light to the company and revive it’s once leading brand in the smartphone market.

In the meantime Thorsten Heins is concentrating on getting BlackBerry’s running RIM’s latest 7.0 software into the hands of customer’s who already own BlackBerrys.  The reason for this is due to the fact that only 20% of all BlackBerry customers in the US markets have BlackBerrys with 7.0 software.  The rest have BlackBerrys that feature 4, 5, and 6 software which is out of date. 

Thorsten Heins has stated that he has been working with US carriers to implement a new upgrade program to promote BlackBerrys running the new 7.0 software to encourage the 80% of older BlackBerry owners to upgrade to the latest BlackBerry devices, which are comparable to it’s competition.  While no details of this “Upgrade Program” were released by the new CEO, Thorsten Heins has said that they could look at options such as bundling different devices together, or offering it’s smartphones with popular pre-loaded apps.

The new CEO also has high spirits for it’s new BlackBerry Playbook tablet to be a strong competitor in the tablet market, as he stated that early this spring RIM will release a new version of it’s Playbook which will offer a high speed internet connection based on LTE, which is a technology that the 3 biggest Carriers are currently building into their network.  This of course is a late entry into the race as BlackBerrys competitors devices have already been in the races and have been promoted by the US carriers for some time now.

Thorsten Heins in my opinion is ambitious and has the potential to keep RIM afloat and even bring it back to the top of the smartphone/tablet industry, however; I also think that RIM right now continues to play “Catch Up” with it’s compettitors, and in order to succeed will need to need to come out with something new that has not really been seen before, or come up with something that has far improved on current technology.

At this point it is simply a waiting game to see what the BlackBerry 10 devices will bring to the table.  It has been touted by many analysts that these devices that have been said to be coming later this year will be the last hope of RIM and its BlackBerry brand.  Whether or not this is true only time will tell.

There are a number of reasons that you may want to reset your BlackBerry.   These could include things like slow or sluggish operation, errors, IT Policy, or corruption on the BlackBerry handheld.  With the BlackBerry there are basically 3 types of resets that can be performed.  This tutorial will show you 3 effective ways to reset your BlackBerry in order to remedy any of the above situations.

BlackBerry Reset Method – Hard Reset

This method is a very simple and quick way to reset your BlackBerry.  It consists of removing the battery from the back of your BlackBerry, waiting for 10 – 15 seconds and then replacing the Battery.  This is the most common of the reset methods and works to remedy a lot of issues, while keeping all data and information intact.

BlackBerry Reset Method – Soft Reset

While this method is a bit less practices it is still an effective way to easily reset your BlackBerry to remedy a lot of issues.  This method involves pressing a combination of 3 keys, holding them down for 3 seconds and then releasing them.  The BlackBerry will then reset itself, again keeping all of the data and information intact.  In order to preform this reset follow the steps below.

1. Press and hold the “alt” key usually located on the lower left hand side of the BlackBerry keypad

2. While holding down the “alt” key press and hold the RIGHT shift key and the “DEL” key all at the same time.

3. Hold this 3 key combination for around 3 seconds and then release all of the keys.  The soft reset procedure will begin a few seconds after this if done right.

Personally I find the hard reset to be more effective in some situations, however; if you have a protective cover over your BlackBerry it can be quite cumbersome to have to remove it every time so this method would make more sense.

BlackBerry Reset Method – Factory Reset

This method also known as “Master Reset, Master Clear, Security Wipe, and Handheld Wipe” is the most powerful and complete reset that you can preform on the BlackBerry without manually doing a clean reload of the BlackBerry Software.  This method will pretty much remedy any type of problem you have with your BlackBerry other than hardware issues or removing an IT Policy.  The only thing you must know is that this reset will delete all of your data and information off the BlackBerry and will bring it back the “Out of the Box” state.  The Factory Reset should only be done once you’ve done a backup of your BlackBerry, and only when nothing else has worked to remedy the issues you are having.  To preform this type of reset follow the steps below.

Software Version 4.x

1. Press the “menu” button to bring up the screen of icons and select the “Options”

2. Select “Security Options” and then select “General Options”

3. Press the “menu” button again and select the option “Wipe Handheld”.

4. Check or Uncheck the box for deleting 3rd party apps. Click “Continue”

5. Enter in the text “blackberry” and then hit the “Enter” button.

Software Version 5.0, 6.0, 7.0

1. Press the “menu” button and then go to  “Options”.

2. Go to and select “Security Options” from the list and then select “Wipe Handheld”

3. Select the check boxes to remove data and applications depending on what you want.

3. Type “blackberry”, and click “Wipe”.

BlackBerry Reset Method – Reset to Factory

This method is like the factory reset only more powerful yet.  While the names of the methods are very similar, this method is the only reset that will take out an IT Policy.  This method does not harm 3rd party applications however it will erase your current data and information on the BlackBerry and you should take the necessary steps to save your data before doing this.  To preform a “Reset to Factory” follow the steps outlined below.

1. Connect your BlackBerry to the computer and go to the “START” menu on your computer.

2. If you are running XP go to “run” and then type CMD and hit “Enter”.  If you are running Vista or Windows 7 there will be a search bar at the bottom of the start menu, type in CMD and then select it from the list to open up the Command Prompt window.

3. Type of copy the following line into the command prompt (Do not copy the brackets just the text inside them):

Windows 32-bit: { cd C:\Program Files\Common Files\Research In Motion\AppLoader }

Windows 64-bit: { cd C:\Program Files(x86)\Common Files\Research In Motion\AppLoader }

4. Hit enter on your keyboard.  Type or copy the following text into the command prompt and press “Enter”:

{ Loader.exe /resettofactory }

There will be a small script that runs and then it will look like nothing happened at first, however; after a few minutes your BlackBerry should turn off and the reset to factory process will have begun and you will need to leave your BlackBerry until the screen comes back up.  This can take anywhere from 10 t0 30 min.

BlackBerry Messenger is no doubt one of the most popular apps that BlackBerry has to offer today, especially with the younger crowds.  Losing all of your BlackBerry contacts is devastating and can take hours if not days to recover them there is no backup and they are lost.  There are a couple of ways to back up your BlackBerry contacts both of which will be discussed in this tutorial.

Method One: BlackBerry Desktop Software

The first method that you can use to back up not only your BlackBerry Messenger contacts but your BBM groups as well is to do a full or selective backup using the BlackBerry desktop Software.  If you have never done a backup using this method and would like to know how you can read our tutorial on “How to Backup you BlackBerry Information”.

Method Two: BlackBerry Messenger Internal Backup

The second and in my opinion most preferred way to backup and safeguard your BlackBerry Messenger contacts is through the use of BlackBerry Messenger’s internal backup utility.  This utility is great and allows you to make a backup to an email address or a media card if your BlackBerry is fitted with one.  Here is how to backup your Messenger contacts using this method:

Step 1: Open your BBM app on the BlackBerry

Step 2: Press the BlackBerry(menu) button to pull up a list of options

Step 3:  Scroll through this list for an option that says “Options”, Once found click on it.

Step 4: On the screen in front of you will be a bunch of different options that you can look through and configure, however; for this tutorial you will scroll down to the “Backup Management” section and will press the button labled “Back Up”.

Step 5: You will be prompted with 2 options.  The first option is to do a remote backup, this is where your contacts are backed up to an email address that you provide.  The second option is to back up your BlackBerry Messenger contacts locally, this is where your contacts will be backed up to the media card on the BlackBerry itself.  Select the option of your preference.

Remote Backup Selected

5 a) Scroll down and select the integrated email address(es) you want to back up your Messenger contacts to by placing a check mark in the checkbox beside the emails.

5 b) Once done select the “Register” option.  This will trigger BBM to send out a verification email and will then allow BBM to go in and validate that you own the email.  Once your email has been verified the remote backup will be enabled and will begin backing up regularly to that email address.

Local Backup Selected

5 c) A screen will pop up with a checkbox and a button, make sure that the checkbox is selected and then press the Back Up button.  A box will be displayed and you will be able to choose where you want to save the file to your media card.  I would suggest leaving it in the default location.

5 d) Click the “Save” button and you are finished the Backup is created.

Both the local and remote backup methods should on a regular basis continue to backup as changes are made, however; as best practice about once every month I would suggest doing a manual backup to your media card just to be safe.  Using these backup methods will save you a lot of time and frustration and I would encourage you to back up your BlackBerry Messenger contacts as well as all of your other BlackBerry information as the BlackBerry is an electronic device and is subject to corruption.

Whether it’s after reloading your BlackBerry OS Software or you’ve accidentally deleted something important off your BlackBerry, sooner or later you will need to restore data onto your BlackBerry from a previous backup. In this tutorial I will be showing you how to restore all or some of your BlackBerry data back to your BlackBerry.

1. Connect your device to the PC and Open the BlackBerry desktop software by double clicking the icon.

2 Once your BlackBerry has successfully connected to the BlackBerry desktop software go up to the device option on the top left hand corner of the screen. This will produce a drop down box with a bunch of options.

3. Navigate to and select the option “Restore Data”. (blue highlight from above picture)

4. Select the backup file that you want to restore data from and then state whether you would like to restore some data or all data by selecting the appropriate checkbox. Choosing to restore certain data is useful if you’re only looking to replace some corrupted databases, or after a clean reload where corruption was the cause of the initial problems.

5. If you choose to do a full restore, simply hit the restore button down at the lower right hand side of the box. If however you choose to restore only the data that you chooose you will have to navigate through a list of items placing a check mark in each of the boxes of items you wish to restore. Once this has been accomplished simply hit restore down on the lower right hand corner and the restore process to the BlackBerry will begin.

6. When the restore operation has finished simply disconnect your device from the PC and then close the BlackBerry desktop software. Ensure that the data has made its way back on to your BlackBerry and that’s it you have successfully restored your data to your BlackBerry.

Backing up your BlackBerry is one of the most important, if not the most important thing you can remember to do. BlackBerrys like any other electronic device can malfunction or become unusable causing you to lose all of your information. This can of course cause a lot of headaches especially if you had hundreds of contacts or thousands of calendar appointments.

In order to create a backup of your BlackBerry you will need to have the BlackBerry Desktop Software which you can get from the link below:

BlackBerry Desktop Software

If you do not currently have this software, once you have downloaded the BlackBerry Desktop software you will need to install it. If you need help with this part you can refer to our tutorial on “Installing the BlackBerry Desktop Software”. For those of you who already have it downloaded and installed you can skip everything up to this point and continue on from here.

1. Connect your BlackBerry to the Computer via USB cable

2. Open the BlackBerry Desktop Software by double clicking on the icon. If this is your first time connecting the device then you will get a prompt asking you what to do just click the cancel button. If you have used this software before it will just display the front screen.

3. Once open the BlackBerry Desktop software will try to connect to your device software. When this happens you will see Sync All in the lower right corner and you will see a picture of your device with some options.

4. Select the “Back Up Now” button on the main screen, you will get a prompt asking you if you would like to do a full backup or select the information to backup. For the purposes of this tutorial we will do a full backup.

5. On the screen as shown above you will also have the option to select the name of the backup as well as the location of where you want to save the backup. If you want you can change either of these options, once done or if you do not want to change these options simply press on the button below that says “Back Up” and you will get the screen below.

Once the BlackBerry desktop software is finished backing up with will give you a window that will tell you it was successful. You will have just successfully backed up the entire contents of your BlackBerry so that should you lose the information in the future you will have a way to restore your old data back to the BlackBerry.

Today I am going to be showing you how to do a clean reload of your BlackBerry OS software. There are a couple of ways to do it and but we will only be touching on the apploader for this tutorial. Learning how to reload your BlackBerry OS software can save you a lot of headaches caused by numerous re-occuring errors and corruptions on the BlackBerry as well as hours spent trying to get a hold of and talking with BlackBerry tech support.

The first thing you need to do regardless of which method you choose is that you will want to create a backup of all the information on your device. Be warned however; that if your device displays an app error or jvm type error this may not be possible, also be aware that should you back up your device and restore the information onto the new OS it could bring over the corrupted information and cause your problem to re-occur. If you do not know how back up your device information this information can be found in our tutorial – “How to Backup your BlackBerry Information”.

The first method we will be going over is the use of APPLoader.exe. Personally I find this method works the best, especially if you are receiving errors on the device or the BlackBerry desktop software is not recognizing your device.

Download the Device Software(BB OS) to Your Computer

• a) Click on the link below, choose your device service providor (t-mobile,rogers,att etc) from the list on the page. BlackBerry Device Software Link Page
• b) Once on your carrier page you will be asked to select the model number of your BlackBerry. If you do not know how find your BlackBerry model number if you are using a 5.0 device you would go to Options->About. If you are using a 6.0 device go to Options->Device->
• c) Follow the prompts and depending on the Carrier or Service providers website you may be asked for some information. Once at the actual download link for the BlackBerry Device OS software click on it and then when the prompt comes up click “SAVE”. (see picture below)

*Note – Make sure that when you click “save” that you know where the computer is saving it to, try to save it to your desktop so that it can easily be found and accessed.

Installing the BlackBerry Device Software to your PC

• a) After the Download is finished you may or may not get a window asking you whether you want to run or close. If you get this then click “RUN” if not then find the icon and double click on the icon to start the installation process.
• b) Go through the prompts as you would a normal installation, the installation of the BlackBerry OS software is fairly straight forward. I would also like to note that at this point you should also ensure that your BlackBerry is disconnected and the BlackBerry desktop software is not open or you will get an error in the latter parts of the installation process.
• c) Once done you should receive a box that asks you whether you want to start the blackberry desktop software and has a finish button down at the bottom. Ensure that you un-check the box as we do not want to open the desktop software, and then click finish.

Reloading the BlackBerry Device Software using AppLoader

• a) Plug your BlackBerry into the PC and then click on My Computer (XP) or Computer (Vista/Win7). If this is not on your desktop then it will be in your START menu.
• b) Double click on the C: drive icon and then proceed to the following directory:

For 32bit OS

• i) C:/Program Files/Common Files/Research In Motion/AppLoader/loader.exe

For 64bit OS

• ii) C:/Program Files (x86)/Common Files/Research In Motion/AppLoader/loader.exe

• c) Click “NEXT” and then verify that your PIN is listed in the drop down box. We will leave that checkbox unchecked and then press “NEXT”. The apploader will attempt to connect to the device at this point.

• d) Once the apploader has connected to the device you will get a window with a list of items that are going to be installed / uninstalled from the device. Go through this list and check everything you want installed and un-check all you want uninstalled. Once done click “NEXT”.

• e) If the next screen prompts you with some backup options, click the “Do not automatically backup” option (we already backed up earlier) and then click “NEXT”. If you are not prompted with this window then your device is too corrupt or unable to be backed up.

• d) On the next screen you should see a button that says “ADVANCED”. Click this button and on the window that pops up make sure that both options listed there are checked. Usually these will be both checked and grayed out which is fine. Click “NEXT”.

• e) Finally you will get a screen with some text and then a “FINISH” button. Click FINISH and then the apploader will start to reload the software on your device. *Note – Do not disconnect your device until loading is complete, this will create bigger problems for you”
• f) When the loading operation is complete you will get a message telling you that the software was successfully installed and there will be a “Close” button at the bottom of the window. Press “Close”. At this point you can unplug your device from the PC and you will have to wait about 5-15 min while your BlackBerry comes back up.

That’s it you have successfully done a clean reload of your BlackBerry OS software using the BlackBerry AppLoader.exe utility. Now all you have to do is to restore your information back to the device and you’re back to where you started only without the pesky errors. If you need help restoring your information be sure to read our “Restoring your BlackBerry Information” tutorial.

*Note – When restoring your data you will want to make sure you only restore items you absolutely need as restoring all of the information could end up putting the corrupted data or database back on the device. This will be talked more about in our tutorial on restoring BlackBerry information to the device.