BlackBerry 8800 Review - Audio Quality
One day, cell phones will be directly implanted into our brains, and the voices in your head will be from people calling you, not a sign that you're having a breakdown. In the meantime, you still have to hold cell phones to your ear, and that's why we test them this way. To get definitive, accurate information on the quality of the sound they produce and receive, we use the same testing equipment that the manufacturers themselves use: a HATS (Head and Torso Simulator) that has a highly calibrated microphone in the ear and a professional electro acoustic analysis program called SoundCheck. This is produced by
Listen, inc, and it analyzes the sound that the HATS captures to produce the results that we feature on this section. Most web sites make a few calls to test a phone and tell you it sounds OK; we use professional equipment to do an in-depth analysis. For more information on how we test cell phones, see
this article.
Sound Receive Frequency Response (6.99)
The blue line on this graph shows the frequency response of the sound that the 8800 receives, such as someone talking to you over the phone. The 8800 gave a mixed performance in this test. Although the frequency response does not go outside of the limits defined by the standard too much (the limits are shown by the red lines), it does have a shape that differs from the smooth curve that we like to see. The response for mid-range frequencies is low, while the response for higher frequencies is a little too high. This might make some words slightly difficult to understand, as the intelligibility of speech depends on hearing all of the frequencies across the range of human speech.
Sound Send Frequency Response (5.7)
The sound that the BlackBerry 8800 transmits, such as you speaking into the phone, is a little better, but the frequency curve for this has a number of problems. Although the curve is relatively smooth, it goes outside the limits significantly, going over the limit in the midrange and under the limits at the top of the range. This means that some frequencies such as those in the mid-range may be overly exaggerated while others such as high range frequencies will be squelched.
Handset Side Tone (8.72)
The BlackBerry 8800 did well in our test on side tone, though. This measures how much of your voice the handset feeds back to you so you can hear your own voice and you don't shout. We measured the side tone of the 8800 at -16.72 Decibels, a touch below the level that the standard calls for of -18Db. This means that your voice should naturally be at the right level, both for the person you are speaking to on the other end of the phone and the person sitting next to you on the bus.
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