BlackBerry® Bold™ 9650 (Sprint)

Call quality: We found call quality on the BlackBerry Bold 9650 is acceptable. However, we should note that occasionally callers sounded a bit far away, though we could still hear them clearly. For the most part, callers were clear, and it’s easy enough to adjust the cell phone’s volume with the corresponding buttons on the side of the Bold 9650. We also appreciated the speakerphone since we were able to speak simultaneously and callers weren’t cut off mid-sentence. Additionally, there was no degradation in call quality when we used a Bluetooth headset.

Audio quality: The playback of music on the BlackBerry’s speaker is impressive. It’s loud and clear and didn’t sound tinny; so much so, that we often lowered the volume on the cell phone when we were listening to music. The BlackBerry Bold 9650 supports stereo Bluetooth so if you prefer to go wireless, you can always listen to tunes via an optional Bluetooth-enabled stereo headset. If you prefer a wired headset, the BlackBerry Bold 9650 comes with 3.5mm stereo headphones. Music sounded great through them and since they are designed to work with the cell phone when a call comes in the music will stop so you can take the call through the included headphones and music will resume once the call is done.

Menu/phone book: If you love the BlackBerry interface, you’ll be happy to know not much has changed with the overall menu structure on the Sprint Bold since it runs the most current BlackBerry OS 5.0. You can use the BlackBerry Media Sync software to easily sync contacts, calendar, and e-mail between the Bold and your computer. Additionally, you can also view and edit word docs, excel docs, and PowerPoint presentations on the BlackBerry Bold 9650. You can store as many contacts as your available memory will allow. Each entry can hold multiple phone numbers, e-mail addresses, birthday and anniversary information, a picture and a slot for both work and home addresses.

You can customize the look of the BlackBerry Bold interface. Syncing media – videos, music, and pictures – is also infinitely easier thanks to the Roxio Media Manager software for BlackBerry (see Music for more details). The BlackBerry Bold comes with a micro-USB-to-USB cable for connecting directly to a computer; you can connect via Bluetooth if your computer has that functionality. Additionally, the Sprint Bold comes with many Sprint features including Sprint Navigation, Sprint sports apps and Sprint TV to keep you occupied on the road. If you want to add more apps to the smartphone you can always download them from the BlackBerry App World.

Messaging: The reason most people buy a BlackBerry is for the messaging, and rightfully so; it really has perfected messaging, and it has a built-in spell checker , which makes sending messages even easier. Even better, it’s extremely easy to set up multiple personal and work e-mail accounts (you can set up e-mail for up to 10 accounts) on this BlackBerry. You can do it during initial setup of the device by following the prompts on the screen or you can do it at a later time by Email Settings found under the Setup folder. If you tend to receive a lot of graphic-intensive e-mails, opt for an unlimited data plan, as downloading graphics can eat up megabytes of data pretty quickly.

Camera/video: The BlackBerry Bold 96500’s camera sports a 3.2-megapixel camera with flash and 2x digital zoom. However, it lacks a small mirror on the back for taking self-portraits. Overall, picture quality is acceptable when snapping pics, but the shutter could be a bit faster. Colors are bright, but images lack a lot of detail. Once you snap a picture, you can save it, rename it, save it as a Caller ID photo, Set as Wall paper, delete it or send it. Camera features are a little skim, but you can adjust Image Stabilization, White Balance, Picture Size, Picture Quality, Color Effects (Normal, Black and White, Whiteboard, or Sepia), and GeoTagging. You can even use the trackpad to zoom.

Additionally, you can view videos on the cell phone and shoot video, as well. You’ll be able to watch videos in the Media folder. While it’s a nice feature to have, you’re probably going to enjoy watching videos you download or stream from the Internet more. Playback of video is impressive. You could easily enjoy watching Sprint TV.

Music: As noted, the BlackBerry Bold 9650 has a music player and you can listen to songs stored in MP3, AAC (Apple’s audio format) and WMA files (Microsoft’s audio format). There aren’t many music-centric features included in the player, but it has the ones we’ve come to expect: Repeat, Shuffle, and Playlists (you can’t create them on the fly) Audio Boost and a Headset Equalizer. You can save tunes stored in your cell phone as a ringtone. The Bold comes with 512MB of available user memory onboard plus a 2GB microSD card so you’ll be able to store at least a few albums worth of music and pictures. If you need more storage space, the BlackBerry Bold 2 will support up to a 32GB MicroSD card.

We still commend RIM for teaming up with Roxio to help you get music, photos, and videos from your computer on your Bold 2. The software has an extremely intuitive user interface, so you don’t even need to read directions to get started. You can also use this software to turn CDs into MP3s. Another nice feature is that the software won’t allow you to move music the Bold won’t play back (that is, protected music that you might have purchased at an online store) onto it, so you’ll never have to wonder why a song isn’t playing.

Connectivity/Bluetooth/WiFi/World Phone:You can do a lot with Bluetooth on this cell phone. Besides easily being able to connect to a Bluetooth headset (we found call quality was great when we used the Plantronics Discover 925 headset), you can also use it to sync up with your contacts if your computer supports Bluetooth.

This BlackBerry Bold has built-in WiFi so you can log onto available WiFi networks to surf the Web or send/receive e-mail. It’s a nice feature and it just takes moments to set up on the smartphone. The only thing you need to know is the WiFi network you want to use and the password if it’s a secure WiFi network. We should note that surfing the Web on the Bold wasn’t bad (and if you have music playing it still plays in the background while surfing), thanks to the 3G network. Pages loaded quickly and you could scroll around them via the trackpad.

Finally, since this is a world phone, which means it will work on both GSM and CDMA networks you can use this cell phone around the globe. The BlackBerry Bold 9650 comes with a Sprint SIM card so if you’ll be travelling abroad you’ll want to check with Sprint about International Roaming fees.

Look and feel: The BlackBerry Bold 9650 looks a lot like the BlackBerry Bold 9700 . Infact the only real design differences are the Sprint logo at the base of the smartphone and a slightly different back casing that’s actually a bit more streamlines. The display is vibrant and images are sharp. Plus it’s visible in bright sunlight. Additionally, instead of the company’s trademark trackball the Bold 9650 sports a trackpad similar to that found on the Curve 8530. The next thing you’ll notice is the smartphone’s weight and size. It’s feels good in the hand, but those who have smaller hands will have a hard time sending messages one-handed. Unfortunately, like many cell phones these days, the display attracts face grease, so we occasionally found ourselves wiping off the screen. The amount of buttons on the Bold 9650’s spine is on par with other BlackBerry cell phones – except it doesn’t have the dedicated music player buttons found on the newer BlackBerry Curve models. There are two keys on either side of the smartphone that you can set to activate any feature you want. The key on the right side of the cell phone is already set to launch the camera. However, you’ll need to remove the back cover to insert a MicroSD card, but you don’t have to remove the battery.

Keypad:The BlackBerry Bold 9650 sports a white backlit QWERTY keyboard and each of the keys have a slight curve on the edge. This aesthetically gives the keypad a bit of a slicker look. Usability-wise it will take a bit of time to get accustomed to it especially if you have larger fingers. Although you can type long messages with few misspells. Though we were able to dial phone numbers with a minimal amount of misdials, we still wish the alt key was on the other side of the keyboard away from the numbers, which would make it easier to access the numbers for other applications besides just dialing phone numbers.

We found battery life on the BlackBerry Bold 9650 on par with other BlackBerry cell phone models. If you use the cell phone frequently to make calls, listen to music, as well as send/receive text messages and e-mail, the Bold 9650 will probably last about two to three days before needing to recharge. However, if you consider the Bold 9650 primarily a cell phone and less of a messaging device, you’ll get about four days of battery life from it.

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