BlackBerry Curve 9300 3G Review

The BlackBerry Curve 9300 3G can be seen as this year’s upgrade to the Blackberry Curve 8520 but is there enough in this QWERTY messenger to make it worth moving to, or would you be better waiting for the more high-end BlackBerry Torch when it launches? Read on to find out how well it handles in our BlackBerry Curve 3G review.

When it comes to looks and design, there isn’t a great deal to get excited about with the BlackBerry Curve 3G. After all, it looks very much like the BlackBerry Curve 8520, which is no bad thing but we’d have liked to have seen some progress. You’ll find a new chrome finish, there is also a red finish option, and little has changed.

However, this does mean that the BlackBerry Curve 3G comes with an amazing keyboard, which let’s face it, if you’re opting for a messenger device this is the key requirement. The keys have a great feel to them with plenty of space around them. In terms of usability they feel much better than the Nokia E72, for example, which is the main rival for home and business users.

Less appealing is the rather mainstream screen, which is a 2.4-inch screen with a rather average 240 x 320-pixel resolution. Sure, this is fine for messages and text does look fine but images and video tends to look blocky, as do websites.

However, the big difference with this device is given away in the name as the BlackBerry Curve 3G comes with a faster internet connection than the older BlackBerry Curve 8520, which is great news for anyone who needs to stay constantly in touch. We found using Facebook was a breeze and sending email is well up to par.

When it comes to features, you’ll find the 2-Megapixel camera is still rather underwhelming, still lacking Flash for instance, but you will find that GPS has been added, so you’ll now be able to using mapping tools on the BlackBerry Curve 3G.

What’s more, BlackBerry has added a slightly faster processor to the BlackBerry Curve 3G, so you’ll find apps load and run smoother than previously. This processor boost will be truly felt when the BlackBerry 6 OS update launches, as the BlackBerry Curve 3G will be fully ready to take advantage of it. For us, this seems the most logical reason to think about upgrading your old BlackBerry to the BlackBerry Curve 3G.

Specifications

• 2.4-inch QVGA (320 x 240) display
• 624 MHz CPU, 256 MB of RAM
• 2-megapixel camera, fixed focus, no flash
• Tri-band UMTS 3G, quad-band EDGE, Wi-Fi b/g/n
• GPS, Bluetooth 2.1
• microSD (support for up to 32 GB)
• 3.5mm headphone jack
• BlackBerry OS 5, upgradeable to 6
• 390 minutes talk time, 348 hours standby
• 109 x 60 x 13.9 mm and 135 g

Price: Rp. 3,300,000  -  Second Rp. 3,000,000