Update 17/12/2013
Because of the time taken up by my free Blackberry unlocking service for giffgaff users I no longer have the time to monitor or answer questions in this thread so if you have successfully carried out the service book conversion please take a minute to help anyone else who may be having problems.
If you own a Blackberry and don't wish to buy a Blackberry Plan because you have no need of BBM etc but would still like to access the internet from your phone,there is a solution that will allow you to use the standard Blackberry browser rather than having to use a 3rd party one like Opera Mini.
Once you have activated your Blackberry browser there are then a host of other apps that you'll be able to use that would normally require a Blackberry Plan but you won't be able to use BBM or Blackberry email.
The instructions to activate your Blackberry browser are below and although it may look like a lot,once you have everything you need in place the job only takes a couple of minutes.
The steps are as follows:-
Step 1: Getting your ducks in a row.Before you start you will need:-
1,Your Blackberry with your giffgaff sim installed.
2,A suitable data cable to connect your phone to your computer.
3,The "browser via tcp" service book file which you can download from
https://dl.dropbox.com/u/29800643/Browser_via_TCP_all_network_beta_V1.1.ipd
Download and save the file to an easy to find location such as my documents as you're going to need it later.
4,Blackberry Desktop Manager installed on your computer.I used version 4.7 without media manager to make a smaller download.I've uploaded it to Dropbox at
https://dl.dropbox.com/u/29800643/470_b059_english_nomediamanager.exe
When you are installing BDM there are two things to look out for,first you will want to uncheck the box for BDM to start every time Windows starts or it will run in the background and slow down your computer and uncheck the box for it to check for updates as you don't want it to update itself to the latest version which is of no use for this job.
Step 2:Installing the service book.1,On your Blackberry if you have up to OS 5 navigate to options/advanced options/service book.If you have OS 6 or later go to options/device/advanced device options/service book.Once you are in the service book page hold down the “ALT” key and type ”SBEB”.A message will appear saying ”Legacy SB Restore-Enabled” .Click “OK”
2,Start Blackberry Desktop Manager on your computer and connect your handset.Once it is recognized select “backup and restore” then “advanced”.Next, at the top of the left hand box you will see an arrow marked “file” click it and select “open”.Navigate to your “browser via tcp” file and double click it,it should now appear in the left hand box of Desktop Manager.Click the file to highlight it and then click the >> arrow to send it to your handset,clicking “yes” when asked.Once the transfer is complete you can close desktop Manager and disconnect your handset from your computer.
3,On your Blackberry navigate to options/advanced options/TCP and input the APN,username and password for giffgaff which are:-
APN: giffgaff.com
Username: giffgaff
Password: password
4,On your Blackberry navigate to options/advanced options/browser and make sure the top line is set to just “browser”.
5,To test that all is well open the BB browser on your phone and you see a bookmark called "Home Page(Blackberry Bookmark)",click it and you should be taken to Google.If so you are now in business with a fully functioning BB browser and the ablity to download apps etc directly to you phone.
Blackberry 95xx users.
The method for converting the 95xx is a little more involved but only takes a couple of minutes more.
Once you have Blackberry Desktop Manager and the service book file in place you should do the following :-
The first thing you need to do is download and unzip a little comand line program called "enable browser v2" from
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/29800643/enable_browser%20v2.rar
Then once you have it,with your Giiffgaff sim in your phone,do the following
With your Blackberry connected to your computer open the folder called "enable_browser v2" on your computer and double click the file called "enable_browser v2.cmd"a small command line program will open.Select option 1,then select "y" when asked and allow the program to run once it has finished press any key to return to the main menu.Your Blackberry will restart and display an error message on the screen.Leave the command line program running because you are going to need it again shortly.
Start Blackberry Desktop Manager on your computer and connect your handset.Once it is recognized select “backup and restore” then “advanced”.Next, at the top of the left hand box you will see an arrow marked “file” click it and select “open”.Navigate to your “browser via tcp” file,which is in the service book folder on this disc and double click it,it should now appear in the left hand box of Desktop Manager.Click the file to highlight it and then click the >> arrow to send it to your handset,clicking “yes” when asked.Once the transfer is complete you can close Desktop Manager.
Go back to the "enable_browser v2" command line program and select option 2 then select "y" when asked and allow the program to run once it has finished press any key to return to the main menu.Press Q to quit the program.Your Blackberry will restart.
On your Blackberry navigate to options/advanced options/browser and make sure it is set to just “browser”. Eg.you may have 2 options such as “Vodafone Live” and “browser”,set it to “browser”.Save and exit.
On your Blackberry navigate to options/advanced options/TCP and input the APN,username and password for your network.
Step 3: Push email,extra apps etc.
As you will probably already know,without BB services you can't use BBM,BB email,BB maps and any other apps that run via the BB servers but there are lots of solutions available to get push,email using 3rd party apps,,IM,access to Facebook and Twitter etc with your newly converted handset and below are just a few that we've tried so far.
Logicmail (free and brilliant)
Shangmail free push email app
Twitter
Blackberry Appworld (yes really)
Facebook (must be version 1.6)
Google maps.
Nimbuzz multi messenger giving access to Facebook chat MSN and Google Chat etc.Thanks to benromanom for pointing this one out
How it worksFor those of you like myself who wonder how this conversion works the answer is as follows:-
The service book files in your BB determin how the phone carries out certain funtions and the default browser service book tells your phone to use the BB servers for all internet traffic but the new service book along with the tweaks to your phone's settings tell the BB to access the internet via TCP and so just like any other phone.
This project is still very much a work in progress for me and I'm still playing around in my spare time looking for apps to suit the grandson's needs that will work with this method.At the moment as MSN Messenger for Blackberry is hosted by the Blackberry servers we're looking at multi IM apps that will do MSN,Yahoo Messenger etc all in one app so if you're thinking of buying a BB to use on giffgaff and you want ot know if a particular app will work,feel free to contact me and I'll test it for you when time permits.
I hope this helps,Woody.
