Vodafone UK BlackBerry Curve 3G goes on sale

The BlackBerry Curve 3G (aka the Curve 9300) has arrived on Vodafone UK, two weeks after RIM made the QWERTY smartphone official.  Priced from free with a new agreement (of £25+ per month), the Curve 3G has a 2.8-inch QVGA display, triband UMTS/HSPA and GPS, along with WiFi b/g/n and Bluetooth 2.1.

The camera – despite what Vodafone's listing says – is a 2-megapixel unit with no flash and fixed focus, and there's the new(ish) optical trackpad above the hardware keyboard.  Dedicated media playback keys round out the main specs, and there's lashings of rubberized plastic to help you avoid dropping it.

What you don't get, at least right now, is BlackBerry 6, and the smartphone was absent from RIM's list of devices guaranteed to get an update to the new version of the OS.  That doesn't mean OS 6 isn't going to arrive on the Curve 3G at some point, but with the Torch 9800 launching with the newest software we wish RIM could've done the same for this more entry-level device.