Excited with the instant popularity of its Blackberry Bold 9000 handset, RIM has now come up with a modified version of this blockbuster smartphone, Blackberry Bold 9030, which inherits the same rich and royal looks. With this all-in-one business class super phone, RIM is ambitious to capture a larger chunk of the pie.
Its core features that include in-built Wi-Fi, GPRS, UMTS, HSDPA and CDC put Bold 9030 a step ahead of other smartphones in the market.
Attractive layout
When you take Bold 9030 out of its box, the first thing you notice is its enormous width, but this is necessary to accommodate a full QWERTY keyboard and 2.6 inch TFT screen. Superb keypad with keys spread out with lots of space allows you to type comfortably. And yes, RIM has raised all the keys on one side to make them easily distinguishable.
Bold has a really bold screen with 480×320 pixels and 65K color display. The bright and clear screen is excellent to watch videos and read emails.
Quick messaging system
Bold 9030 makes messaging absolutely easy and painless. HSDPA brings you the benefit of using Internet at the speed up to 2 mbps. MS-Word, Excel and PowerPoint documents can also be created and attached with the e-mails. Just with the tap of the thumb, you can zoom in the text.
RIM has provided it with everything – web feeds, bookmarks, previous pages to increase its efficiency and save your precious time.
Camera
This phone comes with a 2-megapixel camera with LED flash which is a little less than satisfactory because there are other smartphones equipped with a way better camera and cost less than Bold 9030.
Quality of images is fair, if not exceptional. Though it’s good for some odd snaps, do not expect great pictures when viewing on your laptop or computer. Oh, Facebook lovers, it does have an option to upload the pictures on your FB profile. It has a few image editing options along with geotagging.
Performance
As an improved version of RIM’s best-selling Blackberry Bold 9000 model, this offers a really punchy experience. Its 624MHz speedy processor delivers the kind of promptness you expect when browsing the web and launching the applications.
I must mention that audio voice can be increased to very high levels which is very useful for conference calls or hands-free. Bold 9030 comes with 1500 mAh Lithium-Ion battery which is the same battery seen in its previous version. RIM claims that the battery has the standby capacity of 10 days and 4 hours of talk time.
Other basic features
Amazing news for business users is that the phone operates via quad-band GSM and dual-band CDMA, which is very useful while traveling.
To give the best voice call quality, Bold 9030 features a noise reduction technology with the sole purpose of reducing the background noise. It has an address book where you can store multiple phone numbers of each person with their job title as well as e-mail address. You can sync the e-mail function in the handset with a number of platforms such as Novel Group Wise and IBM Lotus Domino to receive your e-mails immediately.
The handset supports various video and music formats including MP3, WMA, WMV, AAC and MIDI. It allows you to create a playlist of your choice, shuffle and repeat the songs.
GadgetGeek rating
Design – 4/5
Battery – 4/5
Camera – 3/5
Features – 4.5/5
Call quality – 4.5/5
Ease of use – 3.5/5
Value for money – 4/5
Other features
The Blackberry Bold 9030 is best suited for business.
[...] Blackberry Bold 9030 gives you the same gallant looks that instantly capture your attention. Its wide size immediately attracts you with the full QWERTY keypad. This time round RIM has raised the keys on side to make them easily distinguishable which makes for easy and efficient typing. The 2.6 inch screen stands up to its ‘bold’ name with its 480X320 pixels and 65K color display. You get excellent viewing experience of videos and photos on its impressive screen. [...]