The Curve 8300 series has been an immensely successful line for RIM, helping push the manufacturer out of the board room and into the family room.  There have been attempts at consumer friendly devices since, such as the Pearl and Storm, but nothing has quite hit the sweet spot like the Curve.  So, how do you create a follow up to arguably the best device you’ve ever put out?  Make it sleeker, of course.  Enter the Curve 8900, a rework on the original with a better screen, better in hand feel, better camera and better OS. It’s conservative enough for the suits but modern enough for the everyday user.  It’s gorgeous to look at and a joy to use.  In the box you’ll find: Li-Ion battery, AC adapter, 3.5mm stereo headphones, 256MB microSD card, Leather pouch.

Design

The new Curve feels distinctively different from the original.  The dimensions haven’t changed drastically, but it is narrower and lighter.  It fits great in the hand, although the keyboard is more cramped than other RIM offerings.

The screen is what immediately grabs your attention.  Measuring in at 2.4” it has a resolution of 480x360, bettering the Bold’s 480x320 and matching the Storm.  It is only 65K colors (like the others) but is still one of the sharpest and crisp displays we’ve ever used.  It stood up well to all lighting conditions, even direct sunlight.

Below the display is the standard RIM layout; a trackball flanked by two keys on either side above a full QWERTY keyboard.  The shift keys are regular size now, not elongated as they were on 83xx models, and the narrower phone means a narrower keyboard.  It doesn’t lose much in the way of functionality though.  If the 8350i is a 10 in terms of usability, the 8900 is an 8.5.  It is better than most keyboards on the market, and only those with very large mitts will complain about the smaller size.  With our moderately large fingers we had no issues tapping out messages.

The back of the device is in line with other RIM units.  The large battery door takes up most of the real estate, with the 3.2 megapixel camera and LED flash perched up top.  It looks like brushed aluminum, but unlike the Storm the door is actually plastic.  The phone has a ring of matte chrome trim around it, which is also plastic.  Neither of them cheapen the new Curve though, which feels more solid than the original.

The microSD slot has moved to below the battery, next to the SIM card, making it hot swappable.  RIM has still managed to mess it up though; rather than a spring mechanism that is found on nearly every other device out there, they have gone with a locking mechanism that requires two hands to operate.  Needless to say, this can be cumbersome at times.

The left side has a lanyard loop at the top and silver convenience key.  The right is busier, with a 3.5mm headphone jack at the top followed by the volume rocker, another convenience key and the microUSB charging/data port.  Like the Storm, the top of the Curve has a Lock and Mute key that are integrated into the housing.  The convenience keys have plenty of travel and feel, but the volume rocker could use some more tactile feedback.

We were really impressed with the design of the Curve 8900.  There are no doubt some that will prefer the slightly larger Bold, but in our opinion the Curve is the best designed QWERTY device we’ve come across.  Our one gripe is the microSD, which is finally hot swappable but is a pain to remove.  There is a little catch that holds the card in place, and you have to pull it down and the card out at the same time which took us a good minute to do the first time.  It’s a minor thing, however, and much better than the under-the-battery placement on the 8300.

User Interface

The BlackBerry Curve runs on the proprietary BlackBerry OS v4.6. It comes across as quite a looker at first, just as we noted reviewing the BlackBerry Storm. The homescreen and the main menu have neat and simple, yet very appealing icons. On top of that, the main menu and the standby screen can be customized beyond recognition and look even more attractive.

Alas, you just can't do anything about the text-only submenus, which are more frequent than one might think on the Curve 8900. Some nice graphics there couldn't possibly have cost RIM too much and it's a pity they spared themselves the effort. Some might argue it's all hairsplitting here as the Curve 8900 target audience is less likely to be impressed by the eye-candy than functionality. That would be a point we guess but this shortcoming is still worth noting. After all you won't notice menus like that on Nokia E71, for instance.

The BlackBerry users will find their way around the Curve 8900 menu pretty easily but newcomers will need some time getting used to it. A nice example here would be the file manager, which is located in the media submenus. Not that big a deal though, and everyone is likely to get familiar with the landscape in a couple of days. But it will take quite some firmware upgrades to fix the basic looks of the deeper UI levels.

The homescreen is pretty well organized with 6 (by default) shortcut buttons placed at the bottom and all status icons at the top.The profiles can also be accessed straight from here, as well as two other features that you choose to assign to the convenience keys. Quite naturally the main menu gets launched via the menu key. The BlackBerry Curve's interface is only operating in landscape mode as this is the display's default orientation.

The menu navigation of the BlackBerry Curve 8900 is somewhat different from what the competitors have to offer. Most other brands use soft-key based navigation where the available options for every menu item or feature are assigned to the context keys. The Curve has the menu key in charge of all that and it's really a new experience if you're used to the soft key labels keeping all options in sight. Well, you may have to spend a bit longer studying the available features if you are a first time user.

The BlackBerry Curve 8900 has pretty decent performance with very few instances of lagging for the time of our review. The Storm had it much worse with submenu taking their time to open pretty often. We didn't experience any freezes either that would have made us reset the handset.

While it was obvious that the Storm interface wasn't up to the competitors' standard, passing a verdict on the Curve isn't just as easy. The Curve 8900 is a business device and the target audience isn't likely to hold the dreary looks of the deeper menu levels against it. That, we think, is the major shortcoming and luckily for the 8900 it isn't make or break.

The performance is what matters here and the Curve manages to deliver on that pretty well. The response is more than adequate so this here QWERTY fella won't be discriminated against based on its UI. Well actually, it won't draw the biggest cheer either but it sure gets things done.

Phonebook

There isn’t anything new about the phonebook, which is a good thing.  It’s as simple and straightforward as ever, and you can store virtually an unlimited amount of contacts.  Each contact can hold three email addresses, two work phone numbers, two home numbers, a mobile, pager, fax and “other” number as well as a space for a BlackBerry PIN number.  There is a slot for both a home and work address, as well as dates for anniversary and birthdays. Contacts can be sorted by user definable categories, each entry can have a custom ringer and picture ID, and there is a section for a webpage and notes.

Users can search directly from the main screen by typing in either the first or last name, and as you start to type a number in the phone application the Curve matches it with the contact list. When an entry is highlighted from the main contacts view the user can hit the send button to initiate a call. If the entry has multiple numbers it will bring up a popup window where you can select which one you want to call.

Organizer

Again, nothing new here.  Like the phonebook, the calendar function is very robust. It can be managed either on your phone or on your PC, and when paired to a BlackBerry Enterprise Server (BES) it can be remotely managed and synced over the air. Creating an appointment is simple, and options such as reminders and recurrence are present. Appointments can also be marked as private for added security.

Other basic PIM functions are available, such as Tasks and a Memo Pad. Tasks is very basic, but reminders can be set and they can also be grouped into categories. The Memo Pad is a basic notepad, no bells and whistles. A Voice Note Recorder is present for taking notes on the go, and a basic calculator is also available.

Multimedia

The 8900 Curve upgrades to a 3.2 megapixel camera and a centralized media player, which allows the user to play and manage music, videos, ringtones, pictures and voice notes.

The media player is good and simple to use, but not overly loaded with features. It supports folders, and will sort your music by Artist, Album and Genres. It also supports album art and playlists, which the user can create on the go, and the other options are Repeat and Shuffle. Audio formats supported are MP3, AMR-NB, AAC/AAC+/eAAC+, WMA and WAV, while the video formats are MPEG4, H.263 and WMV.  As you would expect videos look wonderful on the high resolution screen.  The included stereo headphones are pretty poor, but the 3.5mm jack means you can use any headphones you want.  With our higher quality headphones music sounded very good.

The 3.2 megapixel camera performed well, better than the 3.2MP shooter found in the Storm.  Pictures were crisp and color saturation was natural. They were still a little dark, but we really had to nitpick to find something wrong with it. Options are sparse, the only real adjustment is the white balance, but the results speak for themselves. Especially since the camera is almost an ancillary feature we were pleasantly surprised with its performance on the Curve.

Video performance was more pedestrian. It records at 240x180 in normal mode or 176x144 for MMS mode, and is more on-par with what you’d expect from a cell phone. Performance isn’t bad, it’s just not good. The only option is Color Effect, and videos can only be recorded when using a memory card.

Software

The Curve 8900 doubles the memory of the most well-endowed 83xx Curve with 256MB on board, and allows for microSD expansion up to 16GB.  The OS ran smoothly, and we did not experience any lockups or even momentary hangs.  This is even more impressive given that it runs the graphically richer 4.6 OS, as opposed to older versions found on previous Curves.

Included software is very sparse, with only a few standards along for the ride.  DataViz’s Documents to Go Standard Edition adds Word, Excel and Power Point support.  RIM has packaged four games with the 8900: Word Mole, Texas Hold ‘Em King 2, Klondike (solitaire) and of course the ever-popular Briack Breaker.  BlackBerry maps takes advantage of the internal GPS, but unlike the other major carriers there is no other GPS software included.

Third party GPS solutions are of course available, such as Google Maps.  Other third party applications can be downloaded also; our favorites include Opera Mini, Facebook and Flickr.  There is decent third party support for BlackBerry, but it is not as extensive as Windows Mobile, Palm or the iPhone.

Conclusion

Bottom line: the BlackBerry Curve 8900 is less controversial than the TouchBerry Storm. It comes to update the Curve line and it does its job quite well. We guess only the missing 3G won't let us call the 8900 Curve the perfect upgrade. Anyway, on home Blackberry turf the Curve 8900 certainly holds a high position.

As to reaching outside the BlackBerry realm, the Curve 8900 does have the looks and some of the skill to try and earn new customers for the company. But the very concept of the closed BlackBerry ecosystem is a limitation. In our case, the Curve 8900 is not a bad phone, but once the BlackBerry Internet Service account is out of the equation, it is much worse a deal than what the competitors can offer. The Nokia E71 costs less than the Curve 8900 and puts HSDPA on the table. It also matches the document editing of the Curve and has the solid metal feel that some will sure prefer. While the lighter weight of the BlackBerry shouldn't be underestimated, the E71 is still the slimmest smartphone to-date and is by no means less pocketable, which makes it quite the better deal.

Windows Mobile QWERTY devices are also likely to be picked over the Curve 8900 for offering a much greater variety of 3rd party applications to choose from. While there certainly are a number of apps for the BlackBerry too, they are merely a drop in the bucket compared to the software available for WinMo.

So all in all, we're gonna leave pricing and features somewhat aside now. We guess the most important thing here is that - like all BlackBerries - the Curve 8900 is more the carrier's than the end user's type of phone. With that in mind, comparison with competing smart QWERTY messengers is not quite fair but in our humble reviewer's opinion it's not in favor of the BlackBerry Curve 8900 either.