| | |  | JACK'S PICKS | Home » » BlackBerry Curve 8330 Phone, Red (Sprint) | | | | | | | Description: | | Adding a fashionable touch to Research in Motion's formidable arsenal of telephonic, PIM, and media tools, the BlackBerry 8330 Curve for Sprint is also the smallest, lightest BlackBerry phone that includes a full QWERTY keyboard. This amalgam of the svelte BlackBerry Pearl and the more business-oriented 8800 combines RIM's long-valued corporate e-mail and messaging platform with a host of advanced multimedia features, including a 2-megapixel camera and stereo Bluetooth (for listening to music via wireless headphones). It also offers GPS navigation capabilities for accessing the optional Sprint Navigation turn-by-turn direction service. 
Click for larger view. | Sprint Service Options
Supporting the EV-DO high-speed data standard, this phone enables you to download and stream high-quality video, straight onto your phone. Where coverage is available, EV-DO connectivity provides average download speeds ranging from 400 to 700 Kbps, with peak rates up to 2 Mbps. With Sprint TV, you can make your cell phone your always-on source for news, weather, sports and more. This comprehensive video service combines high-quality streaming audio and video from channels including ABC, The Weather Channel, Fox Sports, E!, CNN, The Discovery Channel, and more. The Sprint Music Store enables you to buy, download, and then jam out wherever you are with new songs or old favorites. Offering a growing selection of more than 1.6 million songs, the store provides you two copies of each song--one for the phone and another for the PC, as well as the ability to burn songs to a CD using Windows Media Player. Save your songs to a memory card with a capacity that's right for you. This GPS-enabled phone provides optional access to Sprint Navigation for driving directions on your mobile phone--by voice and onscreen. Along the way, turn-by-turn directions will be announced in a clear voice and displayed on your phone. For example, Sprint Navigation will say, "Go 1.2 miles and turn right on Elm Street." As you approach the turn, you will hear, "Turn right on Elm Street." Sprint Navigation also provides proactive traffic alerts with one click re-routing. And it's easy to find restaurants, banks, cafes, hotels and more from over 10 million points of interest across the U.S. 
The Curve's full QWERTY keyboard and the innovative trackball navigation system (placed above the keyboard) makes accessing your data and writing e-mail a breeze. | Staying Connected
With BlackBerry's push e-mail technology, your e-mail will find you without having to initiate a connection. BlackBerry devices are designed to remain on and continuously connected to the wireless network, notifying you as new e-mail arrives. In addition to the text, you can also receive and view attachments in a wide range of popular file formats, including Microsoft Office, Corel WordPerfect, and Adobe PDF. Browse the web with the integrated, full-featured browser, which quickly and efficiently displays HTML pages as well as enables you to set up RSS feeds to stay connected to up-to-the-minute news and blog posts. And keep up with your contacts using a variety of instant message (IM) networks, including the integrated Blackberry Messenger as well as downloadable clients for Google Talk, Yahoo! Messenger, and Lotus Sametime. For corporate users, the Curve delivers all the enterprise e-mail and messaging capabilities you've come to expect. It's supported on BlackBerry Internet Service, giving you access to up to 10 work or personal e-mail accounts (including most popular ISP e-mail accounts), as well as BlackBerry Enterprise Server, enabling advanced security and IT administration within IBM Lotus Domino, Microsoft Exchange and Novell GroupWise environments. Phone Features
The Curve 8330 is fashioned with subtly curving corners and chrome highlights. Measuring 4.2 x 2.4 inches, the Curve is just as slim as the Pearl (0.63 inches) and weighs in at 4 ounces. It features a bright 2.5-inch color TFT screen that provides 65,000 colors and a 320 x 240-pixel resolution, and it includes a light-sensing feature that automatically adjusts backlighting for indoor, outdoor and dark environments. Like the BlackBerry 8800, the Curve includes a trackball navigation system located on the top of the QWERTY keypad, and it also features an integrated spell checker with a customizable dictionary to help maintain accuracy while on the go. It has 96 MB of internal ROM memory, and is expandable using microSD/microSDHC memory cards (up to 8 GB in size). 
The 2-megapixel camera makes it easy to capture pictures to send via e-mail or upload to your online photo collection. | You can snap vivid photos (though no video) using the 2-megapixel camera on the back of the Curve, which also features a 5x digital zoom, built-in flash, self-portrait mirror and full screen viewfinder. It can capture images in up to three picture quality and size resolutions that can be shared instantly by e-mail, MMS or BlackBerry Messenger, or even uploaded to your Flickr account with the Yahoo! Go service. Photos can also be immediately set as a unique caller ID or Home Screen image. You can edit photos and create albums within the Curve using the PhotoSuite application. Pictures can be cropped, rotated and straightened, and flaws can be fixed by removing redeye or changing the brightness, contrast, and saturation levels. Listen to your favorite music and watch downloaded videos using the included stereo headset, or use an optional wireless headphone thanks to the Curve's support for the Bluetooth stereo audio profile (A2DP/AVRCP). The Curve is compatible with MP3 and WMA audio files, and dedicated volume controls are conveniently located on the side of the handset. With the Voice-Activated Dialing (VAD) feature, you can initiate a call just by telling the Curve who to call from your contact list--either via the integrated speakerphone or using an optional Bluetooth wireless headset. Other advanced phone features include advanced sound technology that cancels out background noise and echo, dedicated volume and mute keys, and the ability to customize the Curve with polyphonic and MP3 ringtones. The BlackBerry Maps application enables you to view maps and driving directions as well as e-mail maps to other BlackBerry users and launch maps from your address book. It also includes a local search capability that allows users to find local businesses, such as banks, hotels and restaurants, within a short driving distance. Vital Statistics
The BlackBerry Curve 8330 weighs 4 ounces and measures 4.2 x 2.4 x 0.63 inches. Its 1150 mAh lithium-ion battery is rated at up to 5.9 hours of talk time, and up to 264 hours (11 days) of digital standby time. It runs on the 800/1900 CDMA/EV-DO frequencies. | | | Features: | |
• Smallest, lightest BlackBerry with full QWERTY keyboard features GPS turn-by-turn directions via Sprint Navigation
• Sprint Mobile Broadband Network via EV-DO connectivity; Sprint TV and Sprint Music Store enabled; access personal and corporate email
• 2-megapixel camera/camcorder; Bluetooth for handsfree devices and stereo music streaming; MicroSD expansion up to 8 GB
• Up to 5.9 hours of talk time and up to 264 hours (11 days) of standby time
• Includes: handset, rechargeable battery, charger, USB cable, 3.5mm headphones with microphone, 1 GB MicroSD card, quick start guide
| | | Product Details: | | | Product Length:
| 4.6 inches | | Product Width:
| 2.4 inches | | Product Height:
| 0.63 inches | | Product Weight:
| 0.25 pounds | | Package Length:
| 7.3 inches | | Package Width:
| 5.6 inches | | Package Height:
| 3.1 inches | | Package Weight:
| 1.3 pounds | | Average Customer Rating:
|  based on 18 reviews |
| | | | Customer Reviews: | |
Average Customer Review:
Write an online review and share your thoughts with other customers.
 How in the world do people rate this as a good device?Aug 28, 2010
This phone is the biggest piece of crap. It has a slow processor, crappy screen and even worse browser. It locks up if you run more than a couple apps at a time and requires a battery pull on a regular basis to reset.
This is my first experience with a Blackberry device and I am less than impressed. It says a lot about a device manufacturer when one of the top apps is a battery pull app! Geez RIM, this is the 21st century, get on board.
I am wanting to try another Blackberry but I am scared I'll waste a upgrade on another POS phone.
 The worst Blackberry, ever.Jul 16, 2010
I received one of these back in November when my Lg Rumor began to give me some problems. The first one I received gave me a screen glitch that was very similar to seeing lifelines on a heart monitor device. I took it back and they replaced it. The second one had something like a virus and they sent me another. The third one, that I am on now acted as if it wanted to work. It acted fine, then suddenly it stopped holding a charge, dropped calls, turned itself off and refused to turn back on, and now its dead as can be. Sprint are known for poor customer service and that is what they have given me this entire time. They sent me another 8330 and this time I told them that I'd be sending it back because I am tired of having a phone that doesn't work properly. They are sending me another model. With the 8330, some of the performance issues that you might notice are:
Won't ring, even on the loud (red) setting.
Inserts a period after every single word in texts
Won't hold a charge
Won't charge, period.
Gets scratched up, VERY easily
Screen glitches
0 of 3 found the following review helpful:
If you want a quality product that lasts, please don't get a BB!May 01, 2010
I know the quality of all cell phones as a whole are not what they used to be but this one seems to have topped them all. When I first received my BB Curve 8330 back in March 2009 I thought I was in love! It seemed so wonderful and did almost everything I wanted to do (minus the RIM version of Excel that the Sprint sales rep assured me would be included. Also I like to have several alarms set for different daily task (wake up, get the kids off the bus, take allergy meds, etc...) but unfortionatly you can only have one alarm set at a time so I find myself having to change the alarm for the next event after it goes off for the prior event (very frustrating when I came from a phone that would allow me to have 5 alarms at any given time and you could set each for certain days).
I went on a plan with 5 other people who also got the exact same phone (only different colors). I was the only one of those 5 people who could figure out how to do the software updates (even with the instructions it tooke me hours). After about 6-10 monthes the phone quality started going really bad. Now I'm to the point where although I've always been anti-apple I cannot wait for my contract to end so that I can get as far away from this phone as possible and the iPhone is looking pretty promising. Now I have to be fair and say that although the majority of my problems are definitely the BB, I have to give them the benefit of doubt and say that some problems COULD be from the phone service. Its hard to know where to draw the line. For the record, I have never gotten this phone wet or caused any damage any other way. In fact, I've had phones that I have dropped in water for several seconds that worked better after that than this phone. Also, I know probably around 15 people with BB curve and most of them have at least several of these complaints.
Pros:
* I like how you can customize the phone such as select certain keys to do certain functions. For example, I never use the button on the left for the speak command so I changed it to be my phone lock button.
* You can customize the different ringtones, volume settings (quiet, loud, normal, phone only, etc...) and even create your own (I made one for the office where it rings very quiet and texts vibrate)
* You can organize the menu and put the apps in folders. Depending on how often you use them, you can put the most frequent ones on the main menu.
* The speakerphone works great! It is loud and the other person can usually hear pretty well as long as I am within a 2 foot radius of the phone.
* You can get a memory card to fit more pics, music, videos, etc. (Although you want to keep it small. Don't make the same mistake my friend did. He bought a larger sized memory card and it just bogged it down so much that he has to remove the card until he wants to listen to his music, then he puts it in just for that and has to take it out when he is finished. Personally this is too much work for me. I would rather carry around my Creative Zen Widescreen MP3 playing to watch movies and listen to music than this phone.
Cons:
* Although the camera does have a flash (it doesn't really FLASH) its more like a spot light that lasts several seconds. If you are taking picture of a person or an animal it ends up blinding them forcing them to close their eyes. So if you are taking a picture of an object it works great but I still consider this a con.
* I don't use the voice dialing because it doesn't work very well
* Camera takes terrible quality pictures. My mom bought a cheap $50 (NONsmartphone) and hers takes way better pictures than my BB.
* I HATE that you can only send a text that is 160 characters long, unless you want to PAY for an app that will allow you to go over.
* Although I caught on pretty quickly, the majority of my friends who have this phone have trouble with customizing things and are left using the phone as they bought it. I have to agree that this is not a good phone for someone who isn't good with technology or wants something that is user friendly (unless you have someone nearby who can walk you through this stuff or set it up for you)
* The internet isn't anything like it would be if you were on a computer or other smart phones. It's often jumbled and you can't click on all the links
* About half (if not more) of the youtube videos I tried to watch won't work on this phone. When you do find one that works its so small that it usually a waste of time trying to get it to even load!
* In order to watch the videos I recorded with the camera, I had to go to [...] and download a special program for all of my computers.
* I don't talk a lot on this phone but regardless, I have to charge it every night.
* It keeps freezing up all the time
* It tells me I have text messages when I don't (and it won't allow me to get rid of the new text message icon at the top of the screen, even with turning it off)
* There is no real way to reset the phone without taking the battery off. Once you put the battery back in, it takes a VERY long time to reboot. If you just hit the power button, when you turn it back on it started where it left off (almost like a sleep mode)
* The camera works most of the time. The other time is will just show black. ( I would expect it to work all of the time. Maybe I'm asking for a lot here)
* The trackball barely works and when it does it is VEEEEEERRRRRRY SLOOOOOOOW
* The TB selects random buttons that I didn't click and often times the curser only goes down no matter which way I roll the TB.
* Even when I am texting pretty slow it can't keep up. It starts lagging and often leaves out characters (and because the TB is so slow it's usually faster just to delete everything I typed up to the mistake to fix it rather than to scroll over to it)
* It randomly tells me I have voicemails when I don't or it will bleep for a VM from 12 days ago that I already checked (I have to take the battery out to get this icon to go away)
* Often times my ringer will go out on me and it will act as if it is on silent. I have to turn off my phone and take out the battery sometimes several times to get it to work again. (I know a number of people with this complaint)
* Sometimes my BB messenger won't release the messages I type or receive the messages sent to me. I have to turn off my phone and take out the battery sometimes several times to get it to work again. (I know a number of people with this complaint)
So in other words. If you want a phone just to talk on, your a quick learner, and you only want it to last about 6 months then this could be the phone for you. If you want a phone that is going to last, you want music, videos, internet, a nice camera, etc then skip this phone and get an iphone or some other smart phone. I know so many people who went from BB to iphone and they said it was one of the best decisions ever made. I think its my turn to do the same.
FIY:
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2 of 3 found the following review helpful:
 Amazing PhoneOct 18, 2009
I've had this phone for 4 months now and I believe I've had it long enough to write a review. First off, let me just say that I found a way not to pay for any web services because I don't use them, so this review will not be for the internet, BBM, or applications (which may be why I have not had any problems).
The mp3 player is very easy to use, and it has an extremely useful search feature: when you just go into your music and you start typing, it will automatically search for you. I have also recently found that, if you hold the "volume up" button on the right side of the phone for about 3 seconds, it will go to the next song, and if you hold the "volume down", it will go to the last song (once again, very useful). The speakers on the phone get a little blurry when at full volume, but then again, what phone doesn't? It is also very convenient that the phone accepts normal 3.5mm headphones, so you can just plug your iPod headphones or any other standard headphones into the jack and listen to your music, and the same if you have headphones with a microphone.
The user interface is very nice and easy to use, and the best thing I have found about this phone is that it DOES NOT FREEZE. This is a HUGE deal for me since my last phone used to freeze practically every time I went to the mp3 player. However, on my Blackberry, I play Brickbreaker while having music play on the speakers and it works seamlessly (there is a little bit of a lag when the song changes, but it's not too big of a deal).
The thing I like most about this phone is how text messaging shows up. It puts all of your conversations in one thread (similar to the iPhone) so that you don't have to keep going between messages to find something you said to your friend, or vice versa.
It also has a decent camera with flash and zoom. The camera is not as clear as the iPhone's camera, but I'm very satisfied with it because I take a lot of pictures at night when flash is absolutely necessary. I'm not sure why the review says it does not have a video camera, because the phone actually does have a decent video camera that I have used at least 10 times so far.
Also, battery life is AMAZING. As I said before, I play a lot of music and Brickbreaker on my Blackberry, but I only need to charge it every few days.
The keys are a bit small to type with sometimes, but I have adapted and I put up with it because the small keys are what lets the phone be so small.
I have also dropped this phone many times and it is still LIKE NEW. However, I would recommend buying a silicone case for it (you can find them for as low as $5) to protect it.
1 of 2 found the following review helpful:
Finally, a real "Smartphone"Oct 16, 2009
I've had my Blackberry 8330 with Sprint for a couple of weeks now. With the many different units I have had over time, I have a good comparative baseline to note the Blackberry's performance against. My prior phone was a Motorola Razr with AT&T. I loved the phone and the service I had. Concurrently with the Razr, I had numerous PDA's, aka "Smartphones" which my workplace provided me. All these units had issues, quirks, and downright irritable tendencies. I still have one of these PDA's; it's a Verizon 6800 - one of the most aggravating PDA's I have experienced to date. I have also had two Palm units and an IPAQ.
I got this unit as a replacement for my Razr as the plan I was on wasn't conducive to texting/web. The switch from AT&T wasn't easy as I had a long run with them as a carrier and would recommend their customer service. Sprint had a better data/phone plan so I went with them and got this jewel of a unit.
The Blackberry is lightweight, comfortable to hold and unbelievably easy to use. I love the QWERTY keyboard, there is no 'lag time' in typing words as I suffer with the Verizon unit. The screen is bright and easy to see even outdoors and with sunglasses(!). Not so with the Verizon - I have to take off the sunglasses, position the unit 'just so' in order to use the touchy (not in a good way) touch screen and also to read emails. The Verizon has a slide out keyboard which I thought would be a good thing - well, if it worked as it should.
I have downloaded a multitude of free apps from the numerous Blackberry websites. The unit comes with a decent amount of apps already built in. I now use OperaMini for the browser as I find it to be faster than the pre-installed one. It came preloaded with Blackberry Messenger, Yahoo, AIM and much more. I have email coming from three different accounts, each nicely in its own folder. Emails come quickly, I don't have to synch all the time as I do with the Verizon unit (yes, even with the settings set to download on a timed basis).
The battery life is good. No complaints at all. I call, use the web all the time, download apps all the time and the battery holds up. The Verizon unit? It sucked wind within hours of unplugging from a full charge. I also spent hours with tech support for the Verizon unit both on the phone and in a store. But those are stories for another time.
The sound quality is great. I haven't tried it my Bluetooth earphone as yet. Texting is a breeze. I haven't lost the phone signal or had delayed emails anywhere I've gone yet. The PC software to synch and backup the software works like a charm. The unit is so easy to use right from the box. I may go and read the manual at some point and see what else it can do I haven't discovered on my own.
There are a multitude of covers, accessories and software (free and fee) for this gadget. I can't say enough about it. I am thrilled I bought it and I guess I am now officially a Crackberry member. I wish I got the real "Smartphone" sooner. As a techno-geek, I love this gadget. For non geeks out there, get it - you don't have to be a techie to use or appreciate the work it does. I now have two phones in my purse, but only ONE that IS a SMARTPHONE.
Terrific product. Kudos RIM.
Update-there is a hefty user community out there. Help and a thorough knowledge-base is at your fingertips [...].
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