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The Curve 8520 is a very good choice for any first-time smart phone buyer or anyone looking for a well equipped smart phone on a budget.

The RIM BlackBerry Curve 8520 is a sleek entry-level smartphone that delivers some nice design enhancements and great performance.

Though it lacks high-speed 3G support, the Curve 8520 smartphone is a solid messaging and multimedia device.

It’s a budget BlackBerry that skimps on aesthetics, but manages to offer a lot of “must have” features that BlackBerry users have become accustomed to from other devices.

It's not that it's poorly built—the construction is plenty sturdy, like all good Fisher Price toys. But it's like RIM took the excellent Curve 8900 (which is also on T-Mobile for $30 more) and re-designed it for a very sophisticated 6-year-old.

The Curve 8520 will appeal to those who want access to push email through BlackBerry's excellent service and should appeal to those who want to improve the accessibility of email on their phone, be it for personal emails, work emails or both.

All in all, the BlackBerry Curve 8520 smartphone is an impressive piece of telephonic gadgetry for the money.

With the BlackBerry Curve 8520, RIM has done a good job of creating an affordable phone with all the right features, although you might miss 3G connectivity. Just make sure you get it in black.

Overall, the Curve 8520 is a nice little handset. It's a shame that some of the materials used aren't of a higher standard, but it offers good usability and a cheap entry point into RIM's impressive BlackBerry range.

With so many shortcomings and so little nice surprises to offer in return, the BlackBerry Curve 8520 isn't an easy handset to recommend.

It’s still a stand-up BlackBerry, and will handle e-mail, music, basic browsing and the odd application just fine, just don’t put your expectations too high for anything beyond that.