If the excitement surrounding BlackBerry 10’s impending release is a complete turn-off, and you instead long for the days when a BlackBerry phone was all about a QWERTY keyboard and a fiddly menu system, don’t despair, as T-Mobile has exactly what you need. The network has announced it’ll begin stocking the BlackBerry Curve 9315 at the end of this month, just in time for it to become even more obsolete.
Those of you keen to own such a device will be pleased to know the specification is far below that of many budget smartphones using the Android operating system, and the phone’s timeless design means it’s almost indistinguishable from those models introduced in 2008.
The Curve 9315 is a variation of the Curve 9310, and therefore boasts a 2.44-inch screen with a resolution of 320 x 240, a single-core 800MHz processor and a 3.2-megapixel camera. The press release says it has a microSD card slot, GPS and a 1450mAh battery, plus an FM radio, Wi-Fi and pre-installed apps for Twitter and Facebook. BlackBerry 7.1 is its operating system and the phone has a 3G radio inside.
So, how much does this little beauty cost? It’s yours for $50 and a two-year contract, plus a $10 per month payment for 20 months for T-Mobile’s Equipment Installation Plan. Alternatively, you can also buy the Curve 9315 for $50 with a $50 mail-in rebate and not have to pay the $10 monthly charge, but you’ll still have to sign up for a two-year plan. Two years with the Curve 9315, a phone that was out of date when it was announced as the 9310 in mid-2012; now isn’t that a tempting proposition.
T-Mobile is optimistically holding a “business customer pre-sale” for the Curve 9315 from January 16, while mere mortals will have to wait until January 23 to buy the phone online or in a retail store. The queues outside will be enormous, we’re sure.
