Blackberry’s innovative smartphones have long been the preserve of the power dressing professional types, who saw them as the ultimate corporate fashion accessory as much as an essential business tool. The Curve is one of a new breed of phones from Blackberry that is designed to take advantage of the everyday consumer’s demand for smartphone functionality and interesting looks. But can the Blackberry Curve make the jump from business to pleasure, in an already crowded and competitive market?
The Curve looks unmistakably Blackberry, with its wide body and the trademark full QWERTY keyboard laid out over dozens of keys. While this may be an acquired taste, it does mean that the Curve has a decent sized screen, and unusually for the majority of phones on the market, it’s landscape layout gives it quite a nice widescreen appearance. To help convince consumers that the Curve doesn’t take itself too seriously, it comes in a variety of different colors, although most will probably want to stick to the basic black.
The Curve has had a few cost-saving changes made to it, which also help to make it more appealing to the everyday user. Gone is the chrome trim in favor of a rubber one, and a trackpad has replaced the trackball seen on the business versions, but these changes don’t do anything to reduce the appeal of the look and feel of the Curve.
What the Curve lacks in connectivity features, it makes up for in usability. It has WiFi but no 3G or GPS, however this is Blackberry’s entry level smartphone, so it would almost be unfair to expect everything you’d find in the top mobiles. What the Curve does do well, is provide features that make the most of that QWERTY keyboard. Setting up one or more email accounts is simple, and using the Curve’s applications to keep in touch with your social networks couldn’t be easier.
Navigating around the Curve is nice and simple, thanks to Blackberry’s operating system and the user-friendly interface. You can add to the pre-installed apps thanks to the App World, and the music player is better than many would expect – the Curve even includes dedicated music control keys, to make it more appealing to consumers.
With the smartphone market dominated by the three or four big names, it looks like Blackberry is going to make the most of its business experience and provide a cheaper alternative that gives users what they want, in a way that lets them be a little different to the rest of the Apple, Google and HTC crowd.
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