It’s been about six months since I purchased my T-Mobile Blackberry Curve 8320. As anyone who reads Geardiary knows, I recently abandoned it for my iPhone. I was browsing Howardforums and found an interesting forum post that anyone considering purchasing a Blackberry Curve should read. It concerns a problem that has existed on every new model of Blackberry that I’ve used.

I’ve owned three different versions of Blackberry Curves. The first was from Cingular (now AT&T). I paid full price for it the day the Curve came out and promptly unlocked it online for use on T-Mobile. The unlocking process was flawless but the Curve had an irritating problem that I’ve consistently read about online.

At least some Blackberry Curves have this annoying habit of creaking when squeezed.

The noise is barely audible - but you sense the subtle motion as you press on either of the side rails. It’s a problem that should NEVER exist on an expensive phone.

Especially not on models that have been on the market for well over a year.

Another issue that bothers some is that the Curve attracts dust underneath the screen. This creates an annoying condition that can cause you to keep trying to wipe the screen clear of debris. But you’re never able to clear the screen because the dust is all underneath!

This doesn’t seem to happen on every model (my current T-Mobile 8320 doesn’t creak - but my prior Blackberry Curves have exhibited “the creak”).

Strangely enough I had this creaking problem on a Blackberry 8800 as well. You can see from the picture below that I “solved” the creaking sound by wrapping a few turns of dental floss around the side rails (a tip I picked up from a fellow forum member).

Unfortunately based on this post at Howardforums, it seems that at least some purchasers are still experiencing poor build quality on their Blackberry Curve. The message below is from a new user who just purchased a Blackberry Curve from T-Mobile.

This is my first blackberry ever. I have a 8320 Curve.

Purchased it brand new, no contract, and of course its not cheap.

The left side of the phone (near the send key, q key, a key) it creaks and I can see the plastic moving down onto the phone…

Is this normal? Is my unit bad? Should I request an exchange?

I haven’t even had it for 24 hours and I noticed this within the first 15 minutes.

Normally this might be the type of posting that I’d glance over, except for the followup reply.

The followup was a post from a long time forum member (over 5,000 messages) who essentially say’s to also be aware of dust under the screen and that the dust issue has happened on all of his Curve’s.

Another two forum members chime in to say they have the same creaking Blackberry Curve issue.

This is a really disappointing quality issue. Especially since I know it existed on the first Blackberry Curve that I purchased over a year ago. If you’re in the market for a Blackberry Curve, don’t be shy about opening it at the store and giving the sides a few squeezes to test for creaks. Also if it exhibits any of these side rail creak problems - take it back to the store within your initial 30 day exchange period.

Link: Howardforums Message Thread: My New Curve “Creaks”
Link: Blackberry Forums: Squeeky Side? (a message thread started over a year ago - 2-22-07)
Link: Blackberry Forums: Do your side silver bits creak? (relates to the 8800 series)
Link: Blackberry Forums: Build Quality