Although badged as a Bold, the styling dimensions and feel of the device point more to a revamped BlackBerry Tour than a CDMA-based version of Bold 9700, which is offered by the GSM-based carriers AT&T and T-Mobile.
The Bold 9650 currently retails through Sprint for $200 and Verizon Wireless for $150.
Build & Design
The Bold 9650 is nearly identical to the Tour -- the only discernible design update is the addition of the optical trackpad.
This modelis heavier and bulkier than the Bold 9700 though still manageable in a pocket or purse.
Screen
RIM has been doing a great job in the display department as of late. The 2.4-inch 480x360 screen is crisp, bright, and manages browsing sessions well.
Like all BlackBerrys, the display will adjust to ambient light.
Keyboard & Trackpad
The Bold 9650 sports the better of the two keyboards RIM currently produces.It is accurate, responsive and quick.
Its rubbery keys are row-separated by a depressed chrome bezel.
Trackpad
When RIM first introduced the trackpad, I was blown away. There was almost no learning curve and I found the experience to be intuitive and accurate.
This isn't true with the Bold 9650 trackpad. I found it to be jumpy and hard to manage. Despite tweaking settings and adjusting pressure the experience simply wasn't as flawless as I've seen in the past. It's not a deal breaker but will take some getting used to your trackpad's unique attitude.
Etcetera
Sadly, the Bold 9650 sports the worst design feature of the Tour: a micro-USB charging port located on the right side of the keyboard. This makes it nearly impossible to type on the phone while you're charging it, a flaw which is not present on the Bold 9700.
The 9650 sports a rocker key in its top edgeto lock and mute the phone. Strangely, the rocker lock initiates a different lock than the keyboard lock -- users can't unlock the device with the keyboard after locking it with the rocker key. It would have been nice to see rocker key customization options, like the convenience keys on the side of the phone.
Performance
The BlackBerry Bold 9650 is a solid performer in almost every category. As a messaging-centric device its web browsing capabilities are weak, but for most uses the 9650 is a smooth operator.
I did experience some glitches requiring the device to be powered on and off. Resets were relatively quick and occurred without any data loss.
Wireless Data
The Bold 9650 boasts 802.11b/g, GPS, Bluetooth with profiles for streaming music, and support for UMTS/HSPA, CDMA/EV-DO and GSM based networks. In layman's terms, this means that this smartphone is one of the few offered by Sprint and Verizon that can be used outside of the United States.
The addition of Wi-Fi is a welcome improvement over the Tour, and is probably the biggest reason to choose this model over its predecessor.
The streaming audio profiles work wonderfully; I was able to stream high-quality Pandora radio over my car's audio system after initial pairing.
SPECIFICATION
- Optical Trackpad
- 3.2 megapixel camera with auto-focus and LED flash
- 512 MB onboard Memory
- 480 × 360 pixel color Half VGA resolution display
- Wi-Fi 802.11b/g, WEP, WPA-PSK (TKIP or AES), PEAP, LEAP, EAP-TLS, EAP-FAST, EAP-TTLS, EAP-SIM
- Battery Life - Standby: 13 days standby (UMTS), Talk Time: 5 hours (UMTS)
- Bluetooth v2.1, Bluetooth Stereo Audio via A2DP and AVRCP
- Browser - HTML browsing, View Movies/Clips from websites built for mobile streaming, RSS feed support
- Size - Length: 112 mm, Width: 62 mm, Thickness: 14.1 mm
- Network Support - UMTS/HSDPA 2100 / 1900 / 850 / 800 MHz and GSM/GPRS/EDGE 1900 / 1800 / 900 / 850 MHz or UMTS/HSDPA 2100 / 1700 / 900 MHz and GSM/GPRS/EDGE 1900 / 1800 / 900 / 850 MHz (dependant upon the UMTS/HSDPA bands used by one's carrier)
- Micro-B USB PC/Charger connection
- Operating System: Blackberry OS 5.0
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