BlackBerry® PlayBook™

[Torontom]

RIM needs to make syncing with a stand-alone Outlook installation standard on all their phones and the Playbook.

This is especially important for self-employed business people who don't use and have no need for MS Exchange, and just use Outlook on one PC at their home office.

I certainly do not want to have to sync all my personal information through a third party like Yahoo, Google or Microsoft. That just makes it far more complicated then necessary, and I really don't trust them with my personal information - they will always find some need and way to snoop on my information for "marketing" or "research" purposes.

It should be as simple as connecting my phone or Playbook to my PC through my WiFi network, by Bluetooth, or with the supplied USB cable - and using some simple synchronisation settings in Blackberry desktop software.

Again, I'm really disappointed that this feature was overlooked or deemed not to be essential to the OS 2.0 release. My faith in RIM is quickly fading.

[dc-it]

Torontom.. I agree with you 100%.

RIM could at least let us import our Outlook Contact via CSV file as we can export the Contacts in CSV and then copy it to the PB and all RIM has to do is amend/add some code to the Email/Contact App to add the Import feature?

[Torontom]

...like I said in my original post, I've been syncing various versions of Outlook and several generations of Windows PDA's very simply and successfully for over 10 years, surely this should be something the PB should be able to do...it can't be that difficult!

[rat-7]

I have found a very efficient way to sync the contacts between Outlook 2010 and the Playbook,

1) you get yourself Outlook Connector for HOTMAIL

2) you link your HOTMAIL account with Outlook

3) just right click and drag the contact(s) that you want from the Outlook contact, to the newly created HOTMAIL account contact and choose COPY

4) have you Playbook linked to the Hotmail account and there you go you have the contacts on you Playbook

BTW you can drag more than one contact at the time, but remember to use the right-click to drag them otherwise they are moved

PS. It might even work with the calendar, I did not have the time to try it before work today

[RobEh]

this has been discussed above, using hotmail or gmail.  Problem is... pricacy of that information and with ease of future syncing/

I am now regretting my PB purchse and upgrading my phone to a 9790.  With the total lack of apps that BB has compared to apple. and the PB lack of required function, I have to consider making a change sometime this year.

[scottpm]

it does work... (the calendar, that is)..but how many power plants are we going to end up needing to support these server farms, and the infrastructure that transmits all of this, mostly, trivial stuff. I think the notion is nuts. I have a PC that is three feet away from me and that is where my Outlook file resides... why do I need yet another copy of it in the middle of who knows where? I understand the point behind the making money off of this idea... I just don't get why people are buying in to it.

[Torontom]

...the point is that when I'm more than "three feet away" from my computer I have all my calendar and contact information with me...

[scottpm]

I get you entirely... I am coming from a similar background - years of syncing outlook with PDA's and phones without any hassle... I only ended up in the BB camp last year because MS, in all their wisdom, decided to make syncing their new phones with outlook a major pain in the butt and useless. Now BB is signalling that they are about to take the same path (? i am supposing).

[ACRC]

Is there no way to synch between a pc and the playbook for the contacts.  I have had to create a gmail account and synched my contacts from outlook to gmail that way, but when I open the contacts section on the pb i get nothing, no addresses at all, and I have the gmail account on the pb and I have it marked synch calendar (which is does nicely) and synch contacts, which it doesnt do.  I must be doing something wrong with the contacts since every other posting says that contacts via gmail is the solution until BB comes out with a direct synch via usb, just as how we synch our BB phone contacts with the pc.

any help would be appreciated

thanks

t

[Torontom]

I'm exploring Microsoft Exchange Server alternative software.

I'm thinking that if this can be set-up on my personal computer at home, I'll be able to set-up a connection between my PB and my stand-alone Outlook installation.

Once the PB is connected on my WiFi network, all the Outlook data (most importantly Calendar, Contacts and Tasks) will automatically be transferred to my PB.

I found one product so far that might fit the bill, but I haven't had a chance to download, install and configure it.

Once I do, I'll post the results.