BlackBerry Curve 8300: QWERTY BlackBerry for Consumers

Research In Motion (RIM) has continued its assault into the consumer space with the announcement of the new BlackBerry Curve 8300. The Curve is the QWERTY keyboard equipped cousin of the Peal 8100, but steps the multimedia features up a notch.

Gone is the 1.3 megapixel camera of the Pearl; the BlackBerry Curve sports the manufacturer's first 2.0 megapixel sensor, paired with a large QVGA (320x240 pixel) resolution display. An overhauled media player allows keyword searching for the music you want, with A2DP stereo Bluetooth 2.0 and a 3.5mm headphone jack both available to connect your listening device of choice. RIM has collaborated with Sonic to bundle Roxio Media Manager for BlackBerry with the Curve 8300, an application based on the award-winning Roxio Easy Media Creator 9. A microSD memory card slot is thankfully available to store all your media and files.

All these multimedia features are on top of the regular BlackBerry PIM functionality and the well-known push email support. New to the BlackBerry Curve 8300 is a 'high-performance' web browser for viewing full HTML pages and RSS news feeds, and speaker independent voice activated dialing and speakerphone functionality make an appearance on the quad-band GSM device.