Blackberry Z10: The messiah sent to save Blackberry?

Overview

The Blackberry Z10 is the first handset from the company featuring the Blackberry 10 Operating System, and the first one since RIM changed its name to Blackberry. This phone's first mission is not only compete on the smartphones market, but save the company from disappear. For no one is hidden blackberry has been in decline for the past year or so, they passed within a few years, to have 80% of the smartphone market to be no more than 8%, that's why a revolution is expected with the launch of Z10.

Design

The Blackberry Z10 looks very similar to every smartphone you find on the market today.The first few minutes with the Z10 are nice, first of all, it does not look like a typical BB, when you test early interactions with the UI, differences are very noticeable. Screen is surprising, also design and lightweight of the device play an important role.Visually it looks similar to an iPhone 5, but just a little. The handset does not look cheap, however it is consistent, robust, elegant.In the front we have the handset speaker, the 4.2" screen and a very thin bezel. Sensors and front camera are hidden behind glass, a small hole for the microphone on the bottom and the company logo on the screen. No frontal buttons.The back cover is plastic, there is the BB logo and the camera with a LED flash at the top.The back cover is easy to open, the battery is removable and microSD and microSIM connectors are inside.

Specifications

For BlackBerry users obviously the most striking is the screen, for the quality and size. With 4.2 " and a 1280x768 resolution with a density of 355 dpi it's something really new for a BB device. But not only from the technical, quality and brightness are excellent. It has a rare screen proportion of 15:9.The CPU is a Qualcomm MSM8960 Snapdragon Krait Dual Core Running at 1.5GHz, also with Adreno 225 GPU and 2GB of RAM. Now that BB10 is optimized for multitasking, 2GB of RAM was a good choice. It has 16GB of internal storage, but it has a microSD slot to add another 64GB, has microHDMI and microUSB output.The Z10 is 4G, and also has Wi-Fi, Bluethoot and GPS. should be noted that it has no FM Radio. Power is supplied by a ion-li battery with 1800mAh capacity what is not enough for the load of having 4G connectivity.

Software

BB10 incorporates the "Hub" where all accounts are managed, BBM, E-mail, notifications, SMS, Gmail, Twitter, Facebook, Linkedin, all concentrated in one place. This interface change requires a learning curve, and this isn't quick at the beginning.
There are no home screens with widgets, controls or live gadgets, as on android. The home screen looks very... BlackBerrish.
Voice recognition works very well and the keyboard is one of the best on a smartphone, very responsive, and word prediction is constructed above the keys you press in a fret that divides the keys.
BB10 interface is fluid, there are some bugs but they have been corrected with recent updates.
The music player is fine, organizing music for albums and their covers, by genre, by artist, but what?... we have no equalizer!. Someone forgot something important for Audiophiles

Camera

BB Z10 camera has 8 Megapixels, but quality and definition are not the best, it's more noticed when you zoom a photo and you can see diffused pixels, it looks more like a 4MP camera. Also the sensor isn't the best for low light photos. Focus is very fast, faster than many Android phones.

But camera is not bad at all, with enough light, it has a very good contrast and color

Time shift is a feature where you can choose the last seconds that surround our take, we choose the best shot and then if there were people on the scene, it let us choose, for each, the best faces in those seconds, now you can make a final photo with the best of all. Compared to previous BB cameras, this is years ahead.

Video camera takes videos at 1080p but it´s better on 720p, sound is mono but with high quality.

The gallery of images is quite simple. The edit function is like a little Aviary or Instagram already integrated to the phone, pretty easy to use and very powerful.
The video player is pretty good compared to others. The "Story Maker" is an exceptional application to take videos and photos of, say, a trip, make a collection, give them music and make a video, capturing every moment of the trip.

Conclusions

The Blackberry Z10 is an excellent phone, as comfortable as an iPhone, with the best virtual keyboard found on a 2013 phone, with connectivity of all kinds, light and well designed.

Starting price with contract is around $200USD in some carriers. While without SimCard or Contract could be around $680USD.

PROS	CONS
High Quality	Some minor bugs (requires updates)
Fast Dual Core CPU	Battery not powerful enough
BB10, Very promising	No FM Radio
4.2" 720p screen	Hard learning curve
Connectivity	Camera not impressive
BBM Pin Video Chat	Poor and Grainy Low Light Photos
Excellent Virtual Keyboard	First BB10(Surely will be improved in the future)
New HUB Integrates Social
microSD Slot, HDMI

Posted in: blackberry,gadgets,reviews,smartphones