RIM BlackBerry Curve 9370 (Verizon Wireless)

RIM may be struggling to revamp its smartphone OS, but that's good news if you don't like change?or just want a cell phone bargain. The BlackBerry Curve 9370 ($99.99) doesn't offer the flash, the speed, or the app catalog of other smartphone platforms, but it can do just about everything most users need, and in an unusually svelte form factor. The BlackBerry Curve 9370 is a fitting send off for BlackBerry 7 OS in the face of the upcoming QNX-based BlackBerry 10, assuming RIM can finally get its act together. But if you like apps, you should still buy an Android or an iPhone.

Design, Call Quality, and Apps
The Curve 9370 measures 4.3 by 2.4 by 0.4 inches (HWD) and weighs 3.5 ounces. RIM has been refining this design for years, and it shows; keyboarded smartphones don't get much smaller or lighter than this. The Curve 9370 is made mostly of black plastic, with smoked chrome accents and a textured rubber back panel. The non-touch 480-by-360-pixel LCD measures 2.4 inches diagonally, and looks reasonably bright and colorful. Below the screen are RIM's now-trademark touch pad and four function keys. The four-row QWERTY keyboard is slightly curved and features large, well-separated keys. The keys aren't as raised as before, but the click feel is tuned just right. If you can get your hands around a small device like this one, it's super-easy to type fast.

A true world phone, the Curve 9370 comes?with dual-band EV-DO Rev A (850/1900 MHz) and quad-band EDGE (850/900/1800/1900 MHz) support, although it's limited to 2G data speeds overseas. You also get 802.11b/g/n Wi-Fi. Reception was fine, and voice quality was good in my tests, especially through the earpiece; voices sounded loud and bright, with no background noise. Transmissions through the microphone were also punchy, although the mic picked up a lot of street noise. Calls sounded fine through a Jawbone Era ($129, 4.5 stars), and voice dialing worked perfectly over Bluetooth. The speakerphone was a disappointment, with barely enough volume to overcome a desk fan. It's less powerful than Curves of old, and a clear consequence of the thinner design. Battery life was average at 5 hours and 4 minutes of talk time.

The 800MHz CPU is plenty for this application, and keeps the Curve 9370 moving at a good clip in day-to-day operations. BlackBerry 7 OS (Free, 3 stars) is a modest update of an established and now-dated OS. You get push e-mail for up to 10 Web or work accounts, plus built-in Office document editing and a vastly improved WebKit browser. The preloaded BlackBerry Messenger 6, BBM Music, and Social Feeds apps give the Curve some much-needed social connectivity. Verizon VZ Navigator offers voice-enabled, turn-by-turn GPS directions, but the new NFC chip does nothing for now, as Verizon is prepping its own service and doesn't allow Google Wallet support. BlackBerry App World is still an embarrassment, with a poor selection of apps and unreliable downloads, although by this point many popular apps now have BlackBerry versions.?

Multimedia, Camera, and Conclusions
BlackBerrys continue to make good music players, and the Curve 9370 is no exception, with its standard-size 3.5mm headphone jack and microSD memory card slot underneath the battery cover. My 32GB SanDisk card worked fine, RIM throws in a 2GB card, and there's 202MB of free internal app memory and 308MB of free media storage.

Music tracks sounded clear, if a tad bright, over Samsung Modus HM6450 Bluetooth headphones ($99, 4 stars). The music player is about as easy to use as it could be given the phone's form factor, with large album art thumbnails, although the sensitive trackpad makes navigation a chore; at least you can tune the level of sensitivity. BlackBerry Desktop Software works well for syncing media, including iTunes playlists, and comes in both PC and Mac versions. Standalone 320-by-240 QVGA and VGA MP4 and H.264 videos played fine, but anything greater (as well as DivX and Xvid files) wouldn't play.

The 5-megapixel camera has no auto-focus, although it includes an LED flash, face detection, image stabilization, and geotagging. Test photos were sharp and detailed, even indoors, although the amount of noise increased considerably as the lights dimmed. The flash blew out highlights and lit the room unevenly. Recorded videos maxed out at 640-by-480-pixel (standard VGA) and looked a little dark, but played smoothly at 30 frames per second. Kicking on image stabilization knocked the rate down a tick to 29 frames per second, although I still saw some shakes even with it on.?

If you want fast push email on the go and a hardware keyboard, the Curve 9370 is a solid choice, particularly if you travel overseas often but must have Verizon in the U.S. Having said that, keyboarded smartphones haven't seen much love on Verizon Wireless lately; I'd suggest holding out for the keyboarded Motorola Droid 4, which RIM promises will hit in the coming weeks to replace the Droid 3 ($49.99, 3 stars). The Droid 4 packs a slide-out QWERTY keyboard with edge-lit, sharply cut keys, plus an LTE radio, dual-core processor, and 4-inch capacitive touch screen; the Droid 3 lacks LTE and has the older keyboard, but it's still a good budget pick and now $50 less expensive than the Curve 9370. Otherwise, the BlackBerry Bold 9930 ($249.99, 3 stars) is faster, has a sharper screen with touch capability, and records 720p video, but it's larger, heavier, and more expensive than the Curve 9370.?

Benchmarks
Continuous talk time: 5 hours 4 minutes

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