Blackberry Bold

25 Aug 2008
Lightweight and slim for a customary PC-like smartphone, the Blackberry Bold measures 114 x 66 x 14 millimetres and weighs 133 grams. The smartphone is clad in a black casing, designed with chrome edges that give it the edgy and classy look. The Blackberry Bold has a user interface that is characterized by a QWERTY keyboard, plus a trackball control located at the mobile phone’s centre part, for navigation purposes.

The chic Blackberry Bold offers quality viewing through its large display screen that displays 65,000 colours in a 480 x 320-pixel resolution. The Blackberry Bold has a wide range of picture wallpapers users to select from. Various sound alerts and ringtones in polyphonic and MP3 formats and are also offered by the Blackberry Bold, to effectively reflect its owner’s personality.

Running on the BlackBerry operating system, the Blackberry Bold smartphone operates under a 624-MHz processor. The smartphone also integrates, as its bonus feature, the BlackBerry Maps, which is built with a universal positioning system technically called GPS. The Blackberry Maps is meant to provide directions to a user’s destination, and is one of the most sought-after characteristics that contemporary mobile phones are known for. In addition, the stylish Blackberry Bold runs under a quadband network supported by GSM 850, GSM 900, GSM 1800 and GSM 1900.

As a modern mobile phone, Internet connection is stress-free with the 3G technology of the Blackberry Bold, complete with high-speed network of HSDPA, which, as users attest, aids in making user browsing and surfing on the Internet very convenient. The Blackberry Bold users can utilize the internal Web browser, which offers its user an on-device HTML Web experience.

The Blackberry Bold offers connectivity options through its Wi-Fi system, as well as support for Bluetooth A2DP, USB storage, GPRS and EDGE. These features allow the Blackberry Bold to transfer various file types from and to compatible devices.

Mainly, the messaging services supported by the Blackberry Bold include text messaging or SMS, multimedia messaging. Owing to Internet connectivity via the Blackberry Bold, the 3G smartphone supports email clients and instant messaging services, allowing users to enjoy mobile online communication in a pocket-size device. Notably, the modern handset also allows users to view files, as if looking at them from a computer, through its document viewer feature.

One of the Blackberry Bold’s pride features is its built-in 2-Megapixel camera, which allows its user to not only to capture still photos, but to shoot, playback and stream videos. Quality pictures and videos are produced from the Blackberry Bold, as the camera is complete with flash features and video settings with dedicated controls, including a viewfinder display.

Though essentially a business phone, the Blackberry Bold offers entertainment to its users with its high quality music player. Through the built-in audio player, the Blackberry Bold users can create playlists of their favourite tunes. Through the Blackberry Bold’s media synchronisation capability, users can transfer iTunes audio files from the desktop computer to the 3G mobile phone. The entertainment features of the Blackberry Bold are also highlighted by its support for certain games that are downloaded from the Internet.

The Blackberry Bold also functions as handheld organiser. Its customary features, such as the calendar, an alarm clock and a notes or tasks list support the business functionalities of the Blackberry Bold. It allows storage of contacts through its phone book. A handsfree speaker is also built in the smartphone for more convenient calls.

The BlackBerry Bold’s rechargeable battery provides standby time of up to 310 hours. With a fully charged battery, the Blackberry Bold offers a maximum talk time of five hours.

Internally, the Blackberry Bold allows storage of files, photo, videos and other data of up to 128 Megabytes. The smartphone also has a MicroSD memory slot that extends its storage capacity to 8 Gigabytes.

Despite its powerful features, the Blackberry Bold has elicited complaints of applications that freeze up in the middle of use. The Blackberry Bold battery has also been known to drain quite easily, especially when the camera is used to snap still pictures, or record and play videos.

Nevertheless, the Blackberry Bold satisfies users with its full package of business functionalities, and has continued to enjoy a reputation of utter sophistication that is seen to thrive in the modern market, and to meet the needs the modern user.

Reviewer: carl toffolo - hull
Reviewed on: 1st October, 2008
Rating: 8/10
Coming from an N95 I think I have been spoilt but the Bold seems to hold it's own despite some misgivings as I opened the slightly naff packaging and pulled out the equally slightly naff accessories. I have had to return one handset already since the sat nav caused all sorts of freezing problems and i'm still not convinced that the bluetooth is functioning correctly - but maybe i'm a technofart and can't get to grips with it. I'm really impressed with the email and internet accessibility and the package through Vodafone - 700 x network; unlimited landline, texts and internet plus Vod GPS all for £40 per month (18 month contract) - is a great deal, currently. I dont envy any left handed users since the keyboard leans heavily towards the (majority, I suppose) right handed user. It's a big beast and literally a handful but this is certainly offset by the quality of the picture available if you are sad enough to load a few films onto your £17 8gb card - and I am sad enough. Izzard and Peter Kay, so not too sad I hope. And it was very easy to do with a direct usb link to the memory card without having to navigate through a programme like PC suite. Just as well since the card can only be removed by people with itsy bitsy teeny weeny yellow polka dot fingers, together with a grip that an orang utang would be proud of. Remove once, replace and then stick to cable loading. Believe me.

Reviewer: Paul Simpson - Derby UK
Reviewed on: 23rd August, 2008
Rating: 8/10
Well the wait is over and I received my shiny new Blackberry Bold yesterday on the Orange network. It is my first Orange contract and my experience was very positive. I put in the sim and the phone started up straight away. Going through the setup process was very easy and impressive with the amount of control is afforded the user.
I was not ready for the quality of the display. I had heard it is good but seeing it in living colour was an experience on its own.
I was gutted that the signal strength was wavering on 2 bars and am worried that this might force its return. I am a bed-bound paraplegic with poor eyesight and was excited to find that there are extensive font options. User Selectable Fonts should be the standard of all phone makers. If RIM can do it why not all the others. I found the keyboard easy to get to grips with and there is ample spacing of the keys. The camera is reasonable and surprised me how well the pictures came out. Built in flash is a must and is provided. Next I wanted to check out the GPS and maps but there was no icon. The GPS failed to find any satellites and the maps were missing although the sofware was supposed to be loaded. I am informed that there is a software update on the way to correct this. I also liked the feature to set times when the phone was on or off. I found the browser to be tiny and wonder how long it will be before reducing mobile phone sizes will have a negative effect on our young peoples eyes. In any case it was too small for me to see and use. It is a pity the Font setup does not include all fonts including menu's and browser. Each Blackberry has a unique PIN number and this can be user to send sms and email without going through the email system. I was surprised when Edge was not listed as a connectivity option. Mine only lists 2G & 3G. So in all mine leaves a few problems but I love the Blackberry Bold and will only return it to Orange to get another one on a network with better coverage for me.

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