Review: The BlackBerry 8800 is sleek, but missing some features

Computerworld - The BlackBerry 8800 smart phone is a departure from previous BlackBerries. It is both more mainstream and more refined. But it also suffers from some missing features that diminish the attractiveness of this otherwise elegant device.

After its successful foray into the consumer market with the BlackBerry Pearl, Research In Motion Ltd. (RIM) set out to give the 8800 a bit more swagger than previous business-oriented BlackBerries. As is typically the case with RIM, everything it did on the 8800, it did very well. But many users will miss some of the features that RIM chose not to support, most notably 3G and Wi-Fi.

Bottom line: We liked the BlackBerry 8800 a lot. Depending on your needs, however, you may not be as enthusiastic.

New look and feel

The BlackBerry 8800 smart phone

Longtime BlackBerry users will also immediately notice the omission of the thumbwheel on the right side of the device, a feature that has long been used and was much beloved by some. Instead of the thumbwheel, there is now a tiny trackball-like navigation device on the front, just below the display.

We found the new trackball quite easy to use. The initial instinct is to push down hard on the button, then push it to steer to the on-screen item you want. But the trackball actually responds better to a lighter touch, and we became quite accustomed to it after only a few minutes.

Another significant refinement is the full QWERTY keyboard on the 8800. Given the fact that RIM had less space to work with in this more svelte device, it did an excellent job making this keyboard usable. Unavoidably, the keys are closer together than on older BlackBerries. However, the top of the keys are beveled so that it's easy to feel each key. As a result, we found typing with the 8800's keyboard to be at least as easy as typing with the old keyboard and more satisfying than typing with the rounded oval keys on our Motorola Q.

While the 2.5-in., 320-by-240-pixel, 65,000-color display has roughly the same specifications as some previous BlackBerries, the clarity and brightness of the display on the review unit were truly impressive. Add the familiar and elegant BlackBerry user interface, the new keyboard and trackball, and the overall usability of the BlackBerry 8800 is quite high and arguably improved over previous models.