Review: Blackberry Bold
By David Flynn | theage.com.au | 11 August
Blackberry Bold
Price: $89 a month (Optus 24-month contract)
Rating: 4.5 out of 5
http://www.blackberrybold.com
Don't let anyone tell you the new BlackBerry Bold is an "iPhone killer". They belong to two entirely different classes of smartphone. In the case of the BlackBerry, this means a smartphone that puts mobile email front and centre. And email, either being "pushed" from a company mail system or shunted down from your ISP and web-based accounts, is what the BlackBerry has always done better than any mobile phone.
Yet the Bold then piles on the features - high-speed 3G, inbuilt Wi-Fi and GPS, improved music and video playback, gorgeous 6.5cm display and slick new interface - to make this the sweetest BlackBerry ever.
It's available next week from Optus for $89 a month (which gets you unlimited data plus $300 worth of calls and text) on a 24-month contract. Telstra, Vodafone and 3 will release the Bold on their respective 3G networks next month.
The Bold is slightly larger than the popular BlackBerry Curve but feels superbly weighted and balanced in the hand and the design is far more elegant. The case is detailed in matte black with a dash of silver trim and a leatherette textured backplate.
Under this sits a high-capacity battery to ensure that even with the increased demands of 3G, Wi-Fi, GPS and that larger screen, you can comfortably go several days between recharges.
The mobile email experience is better than ever. Whereas all other BlackBerry devices strip away formatting to present each message as plain unadorned text, the Bold supports the rich formatting of HTML. Colours, font attributes such as bold and italics, column-based layouts and pictures all appear just as if they would in your desktop or laptop email program.
New viewers let you easily read Microsoft Office document attachments in their original formatting, with the option to edit a document - not so hard a task, thanks to the Bold's sharp screen and accurate keyboard.
Mobile web surfing on the BlackBerry takes a huge step forward with a desktop-like browser that beats any BlackBerry before it.
Couple that with the crisp and stunningly bright high-resolution screen and you get a smartphone without the squint factor. The Bold's revamped user interface makes the best use of the screen's colour depth, with rich colours and stylish icons to seal the deal.
The processor is also upgraded, doubled from 312MHz in the Curve to 624MHz in the Bold for snappy performance and stutter-free video playback. Call quality, a subject of criticism in previous models, now hits full notes with true timbre.
To prevent the Bold from being an "all work, no play" device there's new software to download albums and playlists from your iTunes music library, turning the Bold into a pseudo-iPod (although it won't copy tracks bought from Apple's iTunes Store).
This requires spending a little extra on a microSD memory card, as the Bold's 1GB of on-board memory is on the small side for a serious music mix. But that's no great impost: $25 will get you a brand-name 4GB microSD card that's good for days of music or a few hours of compressed video.
Our most serious criticism is that this software, as with the BlackBerry's excellent desktop synchronisation program, is for Windows only.
Mac users get no iTunes synchronisation and have to make do with an infamously crash-prone desktop program named PocketMac. The BlackBerry's legion of Mac customers deserves better: we would invest $40 on the superb Missing Sync for BlackBerry (www.markspace.com).
First published by TheAge.com.au on August 11 2008
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