THE CHEAPEST ONE - Review Blackberry 8520 Curve

Finally, here is a BlackBerry everyone can afford
If the prices scared you away from owning a BlackBerry, your wait is over. The 8520 Curve, launched last week, thankfully costs just Rs 15,990, though available only on Airtel for now.

And it’s not just the price. Over the years, the BlackBerry had moved on from the side scroller to a trackball in the middle; now it has taken another leap of faith and switched to a track pad. Plus, the 8520 is 3.9 gram lighter than the lightest BlackBerry.

So what is good and what is bad about the new 8520? First, there is no 3G, (remember the Bold was 3G, the Javellin Pearl 8900 was not), the 3.2 megapixel Accurate camera of the 8900 has been replaced by a 2 megapixel in the new one. The new 8520 is thicker by 0.4 mm than 8900, and the 5.5-hour battery has been replaced by a 4.5-hour battery— with up to 17 days of standby time. The GPS and BlackBerry Maps features have been done away with, which means no geotagging for photographs. The 480x360 screen of the 8900 has been replaced by a 320x240 LCD, but at a bigger at 2.46”.

While I am not sure a lot of people use the mediaplayer on their BlackBerrys, the 8520 has dedicated keys to help you play music, pause to talk and skip tracks. You can easily mute a call with a dedicated button.
There is also a 3.5-mm stereo headset jack and BlackBerry Media Sync, which makes it easy to quickly sync music from iTunes and Windows Mediaplayer. However, RIM says the unit won’t play some music files. The 8520 has an expandable memory card (microSD / SDHC) slot next to the battery and supports 16 GB of memory— 32 GB when the new cards come out.

Also instant messaging and social networking applications are now available, thus enabling you to access sites such as Facebook, My Space, and Flickr. If you are a fan of Twitter, you can always download free applications such as Uber Tweet to update the world on your latest status. Like other models, it comes preinstalled with the BlackBerry messenger, which lets users text for free to other RIM phones.

RIM has also decided to make six new colours available, but it has not announced the pricing of these skins— you get one skin free with the handset. While the tight-fit rubber skins add more durability to the handset, it also allows you to be slightly different than the thousands of black BlackBerrys you see everywhere.

Premium phone features including voice-activated dialling and Bluetooth support for hands-free use with headsets, car kits, stereo headsets and other peripherals, built-in Wi-Fi and full HTML web browser with support for online streaming video

Recently, at parties and other social gatherings, I have been surprised by the number of people carrying BlackBerrys, more for the social standing it brings than purpose—some don’t even have a data plan. But the fact is that while BlackBerry started out as an email-only device, today it is on a par with the best in the market and has the best possible data handling. No wonder there are 28.5 million Blackberry users across the globe now.

Overall, the 8520 Curve is a great bargain. The ideal way to enter the BlackBerry club.


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The above review appeared in the Indian Express on Sunday 9th August 2009