.FLYINGHEAD PRODUCT REVIEW
.TITLE Plucking a Berry
.AUTHOR Heather Wardell
.SUMMARY The Berry, from Sakar, is a handheld for children. Coming in four "flavors", BlueBerry, GreyBerry, GrapeBerry, and StrawBerry, it lets children feel like their parents. Read on for Contributing Editor Heather Wardell’s coverage of this hybrid telephone/organizer.
.OTHER
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.H1 About this article
This article, by Heather Wardell, looks at a handheld for children. To best test it, Heather gave it to a group of thirteen-year-olds and ten-year-olds and got their very unfiltered feedback. This is exactly the sort of article that showcases our hands-on approach and we’re thrilled to have Heather writing for us. We’re very pleased to announce that the Computing Unplugged Editorial Board has enthusiastically confirmed Heather Wardell as our newest Contributing Editor.
Heather, thanks for the great articles and congratulations! — Ed.
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The Berry, from Sakar, is a handheld for children. It comes in four different "flavors", BlueBerry, GreyBerry, GrapeBerry and StrawBerry, and lets children feel just like their parents. Priced at $19.99, the Berry has a Calendar, Address Book, Calculator, password protection, and a built-in telephone.
I’m an elementary school teacher, so I took the Berry to school with me to see what my students thought. I wanted to give it a good trial, so I handed it to the students without giving them any details on how it worked. To assist me in my coverage, I had several thirteen-year-olds, and a group of ten-year-olds, put the Berry through its paces.
.H1 First impressions
The Berry is quite a sturdy unit. It was passed around among my students, dropped several times, and still looks just as good as when it arrived. I have the BlueBerry, a soft, dusky blue color with silver accents. The upper segment of the Berry is the phone. It pulls off by sliding it out sideways, and the attachment piece seems to be quite sturdy. Figure A shows a close-up of the BlueBerry with its phone removed.
.FIGPAIR A The BlueBerry is a solid device, and seems ready to stand up to a child’s use.
The instruction manual, unfortunately, is quite poorly written. I had difficulty understanding it myself, and it went completely over the heads of my students. It refers to "the Organizer" instead of "the Berry", and not all of the instructions seem to be completely accurate. For example, I was never able to add an email address to my Address Book.
.BREAK_EMAIL To find out just how juicy the Sakar Berry is, you’ll have to click here.
Another problem with the Berry is Sakar’s Web site. There is literally no information about the Berry, what the device is, the target market, or anything else. In fact, except for a single picture with no caption, there isn’t anything on the product page.
All of my students felt the Berry was interesting and fast. They didn’t have a lot of time to work with it, but were generally able to figure out the Calculator and Calendar. The Address Book was more confusing for them, just as it was for me.
.H1 How does the telephone work?
I wasn’t able to have my students try out the phone at school, so I put it through those paces myself. I was actually quite impressed with it. The phone comes with a cable to connect it to the telephone wall jack, and a combination earpiece/microphone cable.
I found the sound quality to be quite clear, although I did hear substantial static if I wiggled the earpiece cable at its base. The earpiece was very comfortable to wear, and the people to whom I was speaking didn’t notice any difference in the quality of the sound as compared to my usual telephone. Figure B shows the Berry’s phone, detached from the rest of the unit, with the earpiece cable.
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.FIGPAIR B The Berry’s phone is small but functional.
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.H1 What the students liked
My older students focused on the convenience of the Berry. They were pleased that a phone was part of the unit, and that they could take the two pieces apart and use the Calendar or Address Book while making phone calls. The Calculator was particularly attractive to these students, as they would no longer have to remember to bring their calculators home from school.
The younger students were all about the Berry being new and different. I guess they take after their teacher in that way! They liked the fact that the Berry was light and small enough to be portable, and were additionally interested in the telephone.
.H1 What the students didn’t like
Almost universally, the students were disappointed the Berry’s display wasn’t in color. Many were also upset the buttons didn’t make any sound when they were pressed.
There are no games in the Berry, and this again was a disappointment to my students. They’ve seen me use my Zire to play games and were very hopeful the Berry would give them this functionality.
The students also felt they shouldn’t have to read the instructions before using the Berry. I didn’t require them to, and as a result, only one student actually did. One said, "Kids shouldn’t have to read instructions!" While I’m not completely in agreement with this point, I do think the instructions would’ve been more respected had they been written in a "kid-friendly" style. After all, this is a device targeted toward kids.
Of great concern to me was the student who said, "I can’t even use the calculator. I’m too dumb, I think." I was quick to inform her this wasn’t the case, but it’s still not the kind of reaction a child-focused product should evoke in a child.
.H1 Would they buy one?
My students had some pretty substantial complaints about the Berry’s lack of color and lack of games. Given this, I was quite surprised by how many of my students wanted to buy a Berry (or take my demo unit away from me). Six of the ten older students that worked with the Berry wanted one, and ten of my fourteen younger students did.
The $19.99 price is very attractive. My students were doubtful about their desire to purchase a Berry until I told them what the Berry would cost; they were then very interested. Several of them actually asked for the Web site information to show their parents.
.H1 Summary
The Sakar Berry is a solid handheld for children. The interface is a bit clunky, but a somewhat determined child would be able to figure it out. It provides enough functionality to help a child keep school and other commitments organized in a sturdy and portable package.
If the manual were better written, the Berry would deserve a rating of nearly 4. As it stands now, the Berry is a solid 3.
.RATING 3
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.H1 Product availability and resources
For more information on the Sakar Berry, visit http://www.sakar.com. The site is very poorly organized, and the link’s changed twice during our editing process. You’ll want to look on the menu for Consumer Electronics devices and then Organizers and, hopefully, it’ll still be there.
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