RIM BlackBerry Curve Review

Messaging:

The Curve comes with the standard BlackBerry email client. While it sounds that it’s nothing special, the client is just as good as always. POP, IMAP, Exchange, Outlook, and Notes/Domino email accounts are supported. We tested a Comcast account with the Curve and it worked wonderfully. There was a delay with some emails that were received but it was no more than 3 minutes. There was no option to change the reconciliation period but there is the option to reconcile the mailbox yourself. Still, it did not always see all of the emails that were in the mailbox. Also, there were emails that appeared as doubles at times. Not all emails were affected but it did happen quite often. As expected, there was no multi-delete available. The most that could be done is delete anything before a certain date. If you want to delete just certain emails, each one has to be manually deleted.


Two mailboxes are present. One is strictly for emails and the second is for SMS, MMS, and emails. It would be nice to have the second mailbox just for MMS and SMS messages to keep things simpler and more organized.

AutoText is there to help while texting. If some thing like don’t is typed, it will be automatically changed to don’t. Words are automatically put into a list but other words can be added or that current words can be edited.


Connectivity:

The Curve is a quadband phone with EDGE/GPRS. Connections to the computer can be made through either the USB 2.0 connection or Bluetooth. Sadly, there is no Wi-Fi or 3G connection. Currently, RIM 8707g is the only model to feature 3G, but it is offered in Europe only.


Internet:

The Curve comes with BlackBerry’s full HTML browser. Still, there is a lot to desire from the browser. While it does provide you with everything that you need to surf, all of it is provided in one column. Also, if the scroll is moved very quickly, it tends to skip some, if not all, of the page. Browsing is quick, even though it’s on an EDGE network. Myspace.com took 4 seconds to open and another 3 seconds to fully load even though the signal indicator showed 2 bars.