The Blackberry Curve 8520 Pep Talk: Entertainment and Final Thoughts

Discussion on the Blackberry Curve 8520 continues, this time, I’ll be covering its full Entertainment Apps, Camera and my Final Conclusion on the phone. If you would like to read my previous articles on the phone, First Impression can be access HERE and the second article HERE.

Entertainment

Like most of the smartphones in the market at the moment, the Blackberry Curve 8520 also have apps that entertains users; a music player, a video player and 5 free games, but unlike others, it was seemed left out when it comes to music or video interfaces. They looked uninviting and uninteresting that Blackberry makers wouldn’t want users to play video and music on it. Though they provide a little functionality (unlike Windows Phone) where users can play around with the music settings like equalizer, bass boaster, etc., but they did not provide any pre-set settings and leave it for the users to discover for themselves. Playlist can also be created directly to the phone.

Music Player supports MP3, eAAC+, WMA, WAV files while the video supports MP4, H.263, H.264, WMV and DivX or Xvid. You can never expect fast rewind or forward response for the phone as it only runs 512 MHz CPU speed.

Games, simple yet entertaining, at least RIM squeeze a little fun on it rather than going all out with its boring business demeanour. Free games include World Mole, Bricks game, Texas Hold'em King 2 – a poker game, Sudoku and the Klondike solitaire.

Camera

2MP is all it has without flash or fancy features and taking average still pictures in broad daylight nor low resolution QVGA videos. If you’re taking casual photos to share around friends via social networks then this might suite you best since its low resolution images will be uploaded easily. Just don’t try taking images in the dark.

Final Thoughts

If you’ve been reading my previous article on the phone, it cannot denied that I despise the phone because of its system rooted problems and set-up. I specifically mentioned system rooted because the problem cannot be changed easily thus users have to adjust to it. Well, it shouldn’t be the case, phones must adapt to human needs and wants and not the other way around.

I cannot also understand why with the phones price point and package, the phone lags behind in all aspects and that there were tons of wonderful phones in the market within the said price points or even lower that offers a lot more. I wouldn’t want to think that they’re just fooling people, so the best way they can do is decrease the phones price.

Given all this, it’s not a good idea for people to buy this phone especially if they were used to easy to use interface from competing systems. This phone is difficult to learn, and confusing to operate, you don’t really want to be stuck on a phone that will make your mobile life miserable. But if they are going to drop the price of the phone by half, then I’ll give it a go. They need to compensate users with its subpar interface.

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The Blackberry Curve 8520 Pep Talk: Hardware Walkthrough, Messaging and Exclusive Apps

Discussion on the Blackberry Curve 8520 continues, this time around, I’ll walk through the hardware, Messaging, Mail, Application Store and Some Exclusive Services. If you miss my First Impression of the phone, CLICK HERE.


For starters, lets begin with the Hardware. On top of the phone is the music controls, utterly unique and mispalced, in fact, its the first time that I have encounter such on a phone. Its not the best place to find the music control but I gave RIM a tap on the shoulder for trying to be different than the rest.

The bottom is pretty clear with only the microphone hole on it.









Left side of the phone are the protruding volume rocker and camera button covered with a rubber mate. As I mentioned on my first impression article, I applaud this design being softer to press.

On the right side are the 3.5mm audio jack, micro USB port and the voice command button. I find the audio jack misfitted here because it would be burdensome for users specially if they put it in there side pockets.









If there’s one thing that the Research in Motion had mastered, it would be its Messaging and Mail services. Most of Blackberry user I know likes the phone because they can enjoy BBM for Free, or they can access email on the go or Socialized anytime on Twitter and Facebook via a systematize connectivity option, true, but it ends there, I never heard of anybody saying that it has an impressive User Interface or they can do this than the other, etc., it’s purely a bland edge at the bottom being boring and obscure. Yes its helpful one way or another especially if you’re using these services often but does other competing system also have these services offered at the same price? With the situation, a Blackberry user runs out of bragging rights and I feel sorry for them.

The exclusive connectivity offers of Blackberry makes everything distant for its users, for instance, if you are subscribe to a Blackberry service of 100MB, you can only use this on Blackberry devices and nowhere else unlike the non-seclusive usability a similar non-Blackberry package with the same price.

Blackberry Messaging (BBM), a very good service but nonetheless, again, secluded. With the outburst of social network nowadays with limitless reached, the service becomes a misnomer. Perhaps a Blackberry user would reason out that it’s a budget saver, true, but with the unlimited text offer from telecom companies nowadays, it cannot suffice the argument. With this current text offers, you can SMS or MMS far more people, Blackberry user or not.

Safer email service or the phone where you can receive emails on the go, catchy phrase a decade ago but not today, other competing companies have already offered the same, even better in some instance.

Apps world, an important category to consider in a fierce mobilephone environment and the Blackberry App World lags a miles behind from competitors from the number of application available for download, localization of apps and easy payment scheme. As I’ve checked, for the Blackberry Curve 8520’s app page, it only showed a dozen for the theme and 10 or more in most categories, nowhere close to what I’ve used to. For localization, I have to made mention about making the prices of these apps being sold localized, that it needs to be fitted to the local economic capacity of the country. Imagine a theme that cost $3, that’s more than PhP150 locally based on the current exchange rate. Regarding payment schemes, the company needs to find ways to make the payment system more accessible to users like tapping local telecom operators or so. On the brighter side, I like the app stores interface ; I find it more interactive and informatively categorized.


General Settings. Like I’ve mentioned on my First Impression article, I have a huge problem with the phone’s confusing and arduous set-up, like if there were things that you wanted to do, it needs to undergo several steps before achieving such. For instance, the use of WIFI in browsing, first you need to turn the WIFI on, then turn the Mobile Data off, set the web browser to Hotspot , then finally turn the mobilephone network off and you have to find all these in different folders and subfolders. If you’re wondering why this was the set-up, like the need to turn the telecom network connection off before you WIFI can be use, that’s because the phone won’t connect to WIFI without you subscribing to any Blackberry service.

So that will be all for now, Pep Talk, the last episode will be posted the next day, featuring Games, Entertainment features and my final thoughts, stay tuned!

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The Blackberry Curve 8520 Pep Talk: First Impression

If your following my account on Twitter (gregg003) you might already have the idea how my first impression article would be like, but if not, then this is a very interesting article you should read if you’re planning to buy a Blackberry Curve 8520.

Let’s begin with hardware, if you’re familiar or have a notion at least of a Blackberry device, then this phone is no different, you'll get the same classic first glance impression on it that speaks elegance, toughness and serious business. I would regard it as a military tank that always signifies war and supremacy, that the phone is always ready for a tough day ahead. A pretty significant impression here for people who are born leaders or individuals who wants to get ahead of everyone else.

Holding the phone up close speaks the other way, it feels plasticky, cheap and vulnerable, that I felt betrayed, totally not somewhere near the tank impression that I mentioned earlier. Well, it’s reasonable somehow given its low price, but I honestly believe that the market strategy of making an entry level midrange phone that contradicts its high end impression is the biggest mistake that Research in Motion made. I just can't stand the phone’s build construction, it’s like anytime, one way or another, the phone will get scratched or cracked without me knowing.

The QWERTY keypad on the other hand was pretty average, it’s well outlined, well lit and well-spaced and has an impressive tactile feedback, I'm just not into plastic keypads as they are rough to press. Screen Display was average as well, about 2.46 inches, just enough to show what it intended to do but the resolution fell short with only its 65Thou color capability. The screen is not as crisp and clear as compared to the 16Millioncolor display of competing phones with the same price tag.

I'm a big fan of its touch sensitive optical tract pad, it’s very accurate and controllable that I find it fun to use, I never tough it would as usable as I previously perceived. I also like the stylish side button implementation where all buttons were covered with rubber mat making the buttons softer to press.

Turning the phone on and scrolling the Blackberry OS 5.0 for the first time totally enraged me, I never thought it was the worsiest, the most difficult and the most confusing Operating System (OS) in the mobilephone world. I can't believe that with the advancement and levelling up of other competing systems, Blackberry OS remains archaic, obscure and arduous to use that I want to throw and crashed the phone to pieces. Believe it or not, as simple as WIFI connection, until now I still don't know how to make it work with a SIM on.

Picture this out, I configured the WIFI connection of the phone and it’s fully connected, then I turn off the Data service of my SIM network, but when I open the browser to surf, it won't connect because it says that I don't have a Blackberry Service, same applies to its Twitter and Facebook clients. Funny about this was that when you take the SIM out, WIFI works perfectly fine for the aforementioned applications. How crazy was that?

Archaic! My God, try to open the web browser, Twitter or Facebook, and you will know, it’s like going back to the 90's with its web page implementation. Twitter and Facebook application page weren't too different rather; it looks so boring and outmoded. Can RIM at least put a competitive browser version on it; most of the competing brands with the same price point offer 5 times better browsing and social network experience.

Well, I know the blog post was already long so I have to cut it from here. Make sure you follow these posts for more no holds barred insights and revelations. Stay tuned! For the meantime, enjoy these first few shoots of the device.

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