It is difficult to talk about the BlackBerry Z10 in isolated terms. Yes, the phone resembles a modern smartphone is every possible way — high-definition screen, dual-core processor, LTE support, NFC connectivity — but it represents so much more to the company behind it. RIM needs this phone to do well; its success or failure will play an integral part in deciding the future direction of the company from both a hardware and software services perspective.

BlackBerry 10 is the long game: it will evolve over time, as the code itself grew from its QNX roots. But the BlackBerry Z10, RIM’s first consumer handset in nearly two years, must stand on its own. Its design, its internal specs, its innate qualities, must compete with so many other high-end smartphones on the market today. With that in mind, and with BlackBerry 10 in the fore, let’s take a look at RIM’s new superstar.

Specs

- BlackBerry 10 OS
- 4.2-inch 1280×768 pixel TFT display
- 1.5Ghz dual-core Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 SoC
- 2GB RAM / 16GB internal storage (w/ microSD)
- 8MP BSI back camera / 2MP front-facing camera
- 1080p video capture @ 30fps
- WiFi (b/g/n), Bluetooth 4.0, A-GPS/GLONASS, NFC
- 1800mAh removable battery
- 130mm x 65.6mm x 9mm
- 135.4 grams
- 3G (850/1900) / LTE (700/AWS)

The Hardware

RIM has resurfaced not only with a new smartphone operating system but an entirely new design ethic. The BlackBerry Z10 is a complete departure from anything the company has produced, including the PlayBook; it may at first appear to be another “thin black slab,” the type of unassuming smartphone that so many OEMs are creating these days, but it’s no such thing.

The Z10 has a distinctive face, with curved corners and an inner bezel separated into three parts. The top and bottom sections enjoin the chassis itself, breaking away from the 4.2-inch LCD display with clean lines. The device itself is taller than its screen size would belie, due in large part to the oversized bezel surrounding the LCD itself. BlackBerry 10 relies heavily on outside-in gestures, so RIM likely thought it prudent to markedly separate the display from the perimeter of the phone. While some may find the screen size disappointing in relation to the device’s overall dimensions, the front is so well balanced, with soft edges and perfect symmetry, that it never feels ungainly in the hand.

With a familiar BlackBerry logo below the screen, there is no carrier branding to be found on the Z10. The display is four-point multitouch, with excellent viewing angles and bright, accurate colours; it more accurately resembles the Super LCD 2 display of the HTC One X than the AMOLED type found on the Galaxy S III. The 356ppi pixel density is sharper than the iPhone 5, though it doesn’t match the ridiculous 440+ found on recently-announced Android products like the Sony Xperia Z. It’s a solid display that gets the job done without breaking new ground in the process; RIM did its due diligence, aware during the design process that the Z10 would have a high-definition screen competitive with its smartphone counterparts. However, like Nokia’s Lumia 920, the Z10′s screen responds to gloved hands, a feature sure to be appreciated by cold-weather Canadians.

At 135g and 9mm thick, the Z10 is well proportioned. Its plastic frame lends it a lightness that I appreciated when typing long messages — it’s less tiring on the fingers resting behind the phone — and it feels perfectly balanced for its size. This is an aspect of the phone RIM took a lot of pride in, as representatives were not shy about pointing out that, to excuse a poor reference, there is more to the Z10 than meets the eye.

We find the microUSB and miniHDMI ports on the left side of the device; the volume buttons with a middle play/pause key that doubles as a voice assistant activator are on the right side; the top houses a 3.5mm headphone jack, power button and noise cancelling microphone; and the bottom contains the mono speaker and main clip for the battery cover.

Like all previous BlackBerry smartphone and, with clear sights on its utilitarian roots, the Z10 has a removable battery cover with a replaceable battery cell. The new battery, LS1, is taller and narrower than in previous RIM products and, at 1800mAh, is slightly larger. While I’d have preferred more raw energy to work with, as you’ll see shortly the BlackBerry Z10 performed well in our extensive battery tests, often lasting a full workday day on per charge.

The back cover is made of a sturdy, bendable plastic that is not unlike the Galaxy Note in terms of thickness and pattern. Its ribbed texture allows for a comfortable grip in the hand, and while it would have been nice to see something akin to the gorgeous battery door of the Bold 9900, RIM is keeping its legacy design for the BlackBerry X10. The unmarked — and unmistakable — BlackBerry logo sits in the centre of back cover, a glossy reminder of the company’s inveterate confidence (hubris?). We also find the 8MP camera on the back, near the top left, with a small LED flash to its right. It’s an austere and largely effective design, eschewing frills in exchange for business mindedness. It’s troubling that the camera sits so closely to the volume keys, which function as de facto camera shutter buttons; the camera app does not have a shutter, relying on an autofocus/touch anywhere mechanism that feels finicky. I often found myself wanting to use left-most volume button as a shutter key, only to cover the lens with one of the fingers on my left hand. Using my right hand to hit the shutter key forces you to cover half the screen in the process. There is no one ideal solution to taking photos, just a number of irksome implementations.

The top-mounted power button is not ideally placed, especially for those with smaller hands, requiring a slight readjustment of the phone in the hand. But the power button will likely be used half as often as on a regular smartphone, as turning on the Z10 requires a mere swipe from the bottom. This gesture-based interaction extends to much of the BlackBerry 10 interface, and is a key differentiator from other operating systems like Android and iOS. But gestures don’t entirely replace the back button, which appears in most native apps on BB10.

Ultimately, the BlackBerry Z10 may not have the forward-thinking design loyalists were expecting after such an arduous wait, but it strikes an effective balance between business and personal. It’s a well-made and nicely-designed phone that won’t win any awards for either category but assures that BlackBerry 10 has a modest and clean canvas on which to excel. The dual-toned colour scheme is attractive and the ribbed back cover is comfortable; the removable battery is appreciated and the play/pause button is intriguing.

Performance

It’s difficult to make substantive comparisons to other operating systems’ performance, but the Z10 is a huge improvement over previous BlackBerry devices. This is not the BlackBerry OS you grew increasingly disenchanted with over the years; BlackBerry 10 is built on stronger stuff.

Without getting too technical, BlackBerry 10 was created with the touchscreen in mind, and is able to parse more data much more effectively than its Java-based predecessor. The four-point multitouch display responds to input instantly; the virtual keyboard is one of the most accurate and intelligent ever produced; app load times are low and framerates in 3D games are high. In other words, BlackBerry 10 can do everything an iPhone or Android device can do and needs slightly less power to accomplish it. That is because its code structure, based on the versatile QNX operating system, is extremely power-efficient, and RIM has built a wealth of standards support on top of this architecture. If BlackBerry OS was a swaying tower fashioned from particle board, BlackBerry 10 is a low-rise built with steel and granite.

But we’re used high-performance mobile operating systems: iOS, Android and Windows Phone are smooth, beautiful and power-efficient. BlackBerry 10 differentiates itself by being able to do more things at once, in the background, with little penalty to the battery. Its emphasis on true multitasking is one of the best features of the operating system; background apps return to the fore instantly.

Because there are few cross platform benchmark tools available for mobile devices, I settled for Javascript-based tests. While these don’t tax the respective devices’ graphics processors as much as I’d like, they give a rough indication of where the Z10 stands in relation to the each respective platform’s current best hardware. The BlackBerry Z10 contains a 1.5Ghz dual-core Snapdragon S4 8960 SoC with an Adreno 225 GPU, the same part found in the Lumia 920, but the two devices inspire markedly difference results. Much of it can be chalked up to specific browser optimizations, but the reality is that the BlackBerry Z10 is relatively underpowered when compared to the quad-core Nexus 4 and the Cortex A15-like speeds of the iPhone 5. Even Nokia’s Lumia 920 elicits higher scores in two of the three benchmarks.

But the BlackBerry Z10 doesn’t perform poorly — far from it. Instead, it seems that the operating system has been heavily optimized for this particular chip, and I noticed little to no slowdown outside of a few buggy launch-day apps and the occasional poorly-scrolling Android port. BlackBerry 10 flies: apps launch instantly, the camera shutter is beyond fast and, at the end of the day, I rarely felt wanting for speed. It’s a shame there are no graphics-heavy titles with which to test the GPU, but games like Angry Birds Star Wars and Great Big War Game were indistinguishable from their Android and iOS counterparts.

I did encounter an issue with device temperature, however: after a few minutes of heavy activity, whether playing a round of Radiant or browsing a Flash-heavy webpage, the Z10 warmed up considerably, almost to the point of being unusable. It’s not just the back side that’s an issue; the LCD display itself was uncomfortably hot, forcing me to have to put down the phone for a few minutes while it cooled. This only happened during high-load situations, but it may be a serious flaw in the phone’s design.

The operating system’s speed was best felt when ambling through web pages. The native rendering engine is outstanding, providing a close-to-desktop browsing experience. Pages load quickly and, even with Flash turned on, scrolling never gets bogged down. Similarly, typing on the keyboard never gets backed up, unlike even the most powerful Android devices. The operating system intelligently prioritizes the foremost app while adroitly allowing background processes to continue; BB10 lives and breathes on its ability to notify.

To that end, the ability to “Peek” and “Flow” at any time is a huge boon to productivity. I didn’t believe it would be the case until I spent a few days with the Z10, but being able to swipe up from the bottom to check for unread notifications and quickly get back to work or play is tremendously useful.

Software

We’ll cover the BlackBerry 10 OS more in-depth in our feature review but, to put it mildly, this is an outstanding mobile experience. Not only are the first-party apps such as Contacts, Calendar, Pictures, Music, Videos, Docs To Go, and the Browser competitive with all the current major mobile operating systems, but there is a level of polish here that we’ve never seen from RIM.

Leave behind for a moment the talk of “Is it enough?” and “Too little, too late?” and let’s talk about how BlackBerry 10. In many ways the interaction is similar to what you’d find on iOS and Android, with a dash of webOS thrown in there. There is a large grid of app icons available to open at any time, with a permanent three icon dock at the bottom with access to Phone, Search and the Camera. To the left of the horizontal app launcher is a multitasking screen comprised of a maximum of eight Active Panes, each one capable of storing and displaying a bit of information. Think of these panes as Windows Phone Live Tiles with a dash of Android’s widget functionality thrown in. For example, BlackBerry World will cycle through featured apps while BBM will show status or avatar updates. It’s simple and useful.

To the left of the multitasking menu — or, by swiping up and to the right from inside any app — is the Hub. This is RIM’s killer app, its pièce de résistance, and will appease all you current and former BlackBerry addicts. It’s the area of the phone that consolidates notifications — all of them — into one area. Email, texts, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google Talk. The list goes on, as developers can plug into the Hub API for better integration with the notification system. Sure, the famous red LED still blinks; yes, the app icon still alights with infamous BlackBerry Spark star. These familiar assets act as the bridges that connect BlackBerry OS to BlackBerry 10; so much is different, and yet you can be sure that, either for work or play, your email, texts and social networks are as thoroughly integrated into the operating system as they’ve ever been.

As expected, the BlackBerry 10 email integration, along with the new virtual keyboard, is the best in the game. Typing is fluid and intuitive, and the email workflow just feels right. There were a couple instances of “Man, I wish they had this feature,” but they seldom cropped up. Notifications from non-native email accounts like Gmail were on par with the native app on iOS and Android, and adding the account to the Z10 also synced the calendar and contact list using CalDAV and CardDAV respectively.

Then there’s support for the enterprise, that much-neglected segment of the market likely to go nuts for BlackBerry 10. With Exchange Activesync support and the best VPN integration in the game, alongside legacy and new BlackBerry Enterprise Service compatibility, the Z10 stands to be an excellent work-issue smartphone. Where it may be hard to convince consumers to migrate from iPhones and Androids back to BlackBerry, existing BB users are in for a treat. BlackBerry Balance provides user accounts for work- and home time, allowing IT administrators to disable certain functionalities such as the camera during work hours. BlackBerry Protect provides remote administration and phone finding in addition to basic backup. With new apps launching for Windows and OS X, BB10 is increasingly showing itself as a platform, not just an operating system.

Where the BlackBerry Z10 currently falls short is in its app selection. While RIM promised 70,000 apps on launch day (and we promise to evaluate the situation again shortly thereafter), there is a dearth of truly great software for the platform. While providers such as Flixster, The Weather Network, Slacker Radio, CBC, Rogers, The Globe & Mail, Angry Birds, along with Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and Foursquare, are all available out of the box, I found that either the apps lost features in the move from iOS or Android, or they were somewhat buggy and underdeveloped. It’s great to see name brands on day one, especially ones that I use on other platforms, but it appears that the long tail has formed early on BlackBerry 10, and users are going to wonder what all the fuss was about. It’s a remarkable achievement to see such a diverse array of apps on a brand new mobile platform, but the pull from Android and iOS is so fierce, and a strong app library is at the top of the list.

I must say that using BBM again after so long was both a joyful and disheartening experience. Like any homecoming, things are the same and yet you’ve changed, moved on. Such is the current state of my BBM list; after logging in with my BlackBerry ID, which synced the contacts I’d since abandoned to other messaging apps, I found 16 people. At the height of my BlackBerry usage in 2009 I had over 90 BBM contacts; today, after culling the list to those who still own a BlackBerry, I have six. From 90 to six in just over three years. But BBM as a social platform has expanded dramatically, and has far more appeal now than it ever did. BBM Video allows for high-definition conferencing over WiFi or 3G/LTE, and users can activate screen sharing to accomplish work-related tasks.

RIM also includes a Siri-like Voice Assistant that is activated by holding down the play/pause button on the side of the phone. It can perform many of the same tasks as its iOS counterpart: send texts and emails, search the web, schedule an appointment or make a Remember note. It’s very good, but too similar to Siri to make a dent.

BlackBerry 10 also comes with its own Maps solution that brings turn-by-turn navigation provided by TeleCommunications Systems, with mapping data from TomTom. The app is neither as fast as Google Maps or as attractive as Apple Maps, but it does the job in a minimal sort of way.

The issue of abandonment speaks directly to challenges RIM faces: how does a company, once so tall and since fallen so low, return to its former heights? How does it take a brand like BlackBerry and a messaging platform like BBM and convince millions of iOS, Android and Windows Phone users to return to the fold? Or does it focus on retaining its current BlackBerry user base, the 80 or so million still holding on for dear life?

BlackBerry 10 is a brilliantly-designed operating system, but in its recognizability is a key problem: it may not be different enough from iOS and Android to make a stand. Despite the scarcity of truly great apps, I thoroughly enjoyed my experience on the Z10, and the well-roundedness of its feature set truly astounded me.

Camera

The BlackBerry Z10 has two cameras, a 8MP back shooter and a 2MP front-facing lens. Let’s get this out of the way first because, if you’re currently a BBOS user you’ve never heard this before: this is the first BlackBerry with a good camera. Yes, the Torch 9810 and, to a lesser extent, the Bold 9900, had back cameras sufficient to use in an emergency, but I still see too many people taking grainy, cringe-worthy photos with Curve 9300′s.

Upgrading to the Z10 is like stepping into a different world, one you’re likely used to if you’re coming from an iPhone 4S or 5 or any recent Samsung Galaxy S. Photos are not only colour accurate and noise-free, but the lens is whip-bang fast. As mentioned above, the only issue I have with the camera isn’t with the photos themselves; rather, I don’t like the lack of touch-to-autofocus, as the camera tends to lose focus quite easily. There is a way to fix focus on a particular object: hold down on the screen for a second until the green framing square turns blue. When you lift your finger it should refocus on that particular object; the problem with this mechanism is its impreciseness, as you’re still at the will of the jumpy f/2.2 lens to find your target.

This is only an issue in situations of less-than-optimal lighting. The Z10 takes photos of amazing quality — truly, truly great — outdoors and in well-lit rooms, but disappoints when there is little to no light. The camera underperforms in lowlight scenarios compared with the Nokia Lumia 920 and iPhone 5, but it’s in line with many popular Android devices such as the HTC One X and Samsung Galaxy S III.

There are two ways to fire in the Camera app. You can shoot in the Auto mode, which allows you to either tap the screen or depress one of the volume keys to activate the shutter. Then there’s TimeShift mode, that much-lauded feature licensed from Scalado. It takes a number of photos in a row (the shutter is really, really quick) and, with some face-detection magic, allows you to turn back time and select the best face for the finished product. In practice, the feature works quite well, and with some editing I was able to nail down a great photo every time.

BlackBerry 10 has some robust editing features, along with filters and “scenes” that make for a bit of a localized Instagram. The sharing feature is also quite robust, allowing you to save or share your photo to any number of services like Dropbox, Twitter or BBM. The issue is that if you choose to edit a photo after taking it, once you re-enter the Camera app you’re still in editing mode and have to manually return to shooting. It’s a small but persistent bug that often left me frustrated — and will hopefully be fixed in a future build.

As with its still shots, the BlackBerry Z10 takes great — but not industry-best — 1080p video. Frame rates are smooth and colour is accurate, but the camera has issues adjusting to changing lighting conditions on the fly. The built-in video editor allows for quick trims, rotations and exposure adjustments, while the Story Maker app lets you add video filters, music, titles and multiple edits to your videos. It’s a full-featured solution that is certain to impress.

Connectivity

Like any modern phone, the BlackBerry Z10 supports LTE connectivity up to 100Mbps, in addition to 3G up to 42Mbps. Whereas previous BlackBerry devices required a BIS (BlackBerry Internet Service) plan to facilitate much of the magic, such a plan is now only needed for BBM support — the majority of data transport is done over regular TCP/IP. What this means is that the Z10 is much more “cross-compatible” out of the box — it should just work with your LTE-enabled microSIM if upgrading from an iPhone 4S or newer Android — and you won’t need to explicitly change your plan unless you covet BBM.

It also means that the Z10, with its full-page browser and full assortment of bandwidth-intensive apps, will likely use much more data than your previous BlackBerry phone. With LTE speeds, the BlackBerry Z10 loaded pages and downloaded apps and media on par with much of its competition; you also have the option of disabling LTE, which in our experience saved between two and three hours of battery life per charge.

The Z10 can create and edit NFC tags or read external tags, though unlike some of its competition, RIM does not include any in the box. That the Z10 has Bluetooth 4.0 connectivity bodes well for its future accessory compatibility, as we’d expect RIM to work with accessory manufacturers to bring support for third-party devices like smart watches, fitness bands and wireless speaker docks. There’s also a HDMI out for hooking your phone to a TV or projector; this allows users who download video or music content to easily share it with connected stereos or receivers.

As for network speeds, the Z10 achieved roughly what one would expect over the Rogers network: 22-30Mbps down and 6-12Mbps up depending on the location and time of day. And, for those who occasionally still use a smartphone as an actual phone, the Z10 not only sounded perfectly clear and balanced in a loud, but the person on the other end of the line said he could hear me better than on my iPhone. I didn’t even have to prompt him; he just told me that it sounded better than usual.

The bottom-facing speaker, on the other hand, was too soft for even the most modestly-sized rooms, and doesn’t bode well for the phone-as-conference-call crowd.

Battery Life

For the first few days, your BlackBerry Z10 will likely not last the whole day; there is a fair amount of data being synced behind the scenes. Once everything has settled down, you can be certain of at least 10 hours of moderate to heavy usage depending on the number of accounts pushing notifications to your device. Thankfully, RIM thought it prudent to endow the Z10 with a removable battery, and there will be a dual-charging dock available at launch which will charge your phone as well as an extra cell.

In our extensive battery tests, the Z10 lasted just over 10 hours looping a video on 50% brightness with all network connectivity turned off. In our browsing tests, where we had the Z10 reload a page over LTE until the phone died, it lasted roughly eight hours. In other words, the handset, even when used heavily throughout the day, should last as long or longer than the average Android phone, and slightly less than the iPhone 4S and 5.

The Competition

We haven’t really touched whether the BlackBerry Z10 can stand on its own in an increasing crowded and competitive market. BlackBerry 10 is a great beginning, a mobile computing platform that RIM hopes will last 10 years or longer. But in its initial incarnation, the Z10 is a must-have upgrade for existing BlackBerry users — in fact, even if you’re rocking a Bold 9900, I’d recommend hopping on the Z10 bandwagon over the equivalent QWERTY BB10 device.

Whether the phone is worth ditching your iPhone or Android for is a different story. At launch, even with 70,000 compatible apps and despite a number of absolutely killer features, the Z10 does not overshadow the iPhone 5 on iOS 6.1 or the Nexus 4 on Android 4.2 Jelly Bean in terms of usability, speed or convenience. It meets and occasionally exceeds the standards we set for it (mainly because, after BlackBerry 7 the bar was set pretty low), but RIM is going to have a difficult time convincing users entrenched in Apple’s or Google’s content ecosystems to make the switch. With the prevalence of iMessage and Facetime, Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp, Kik and others, BBM is no longer the killer app is once was, and the number of North American users has dwindled perilously.

The Z10 is a great phone with a lot going for it; its success will largely depend on how RIM builds out its app ecosystem. It’s encouraging to see so much developer interest already; Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Foursquare, Flixster, Slacker Radio, TuneIn Radio, Angry Birds Star Wars, Asphalt 7, among others, are available on day one. But until we see mainstay apps like Netflix, Flipboard, Instagram arrive and, unfortunately, until developers coincide BlackBerry 10 releases with their iOS and Android counterparts, BlackBerry 10 will continue to be a hard sell. We said the same thing about Windows Phone 8 and though the situation looks less dire for BB10, the same rules apply. Many users will take a wait-and-see approach.

Where it will likely rocket to success is with enterprise users. Out of the box, BlackBerry 10 has support for RIM’s new cross-platform BlackBerry Enterprise Service 10 as well as robust VPN features for IT administrators. Its excellent virtual keyboard, Exchange Activesync support, remote locking and wiping, HDMI out for presentations and BlackBerry Balance makes for a compelling value proposition in a market increasingly comfortable with bring-your-own-device workplace policies.

Conclusion

The BlackBerry Z10 makes an excellent first impression, and is one of the most impressive pieces of hardware for a platform debut in recent memory. BlackBerry 10′s ability to consolidate troves of data into a usable space, the Hub, its powerful development tools and a growing community of loyal developers, along with excellent first-party and launch apps, bodes well for its entry into the Canadian market.

That it’s available across all Canadian carriers for less than the equivalent iPhone 5 makes the BlackBerry Z10 not only compelling, but within reach to both consumer and enterprise users alike.

WHAT WORKS

* Excellent responsive screen
* Superb performance
* BlackBerry Hub is an incredible information consolidator
* BlackBerry 10 feels extremely polished
* BBM Video is a treat
* First-party apps are top-rate
* Great network speeds
* Good battery life

NEEDS IMPROVEMENT

* Phone design lacks punch
* Launch-day apps feel perfunctory, occasionally unfinished
* Camera disappoints in low light
* Maps solution cannot compete with Google’s
* Occasional app bugginess
* Twitter app lacks multiple account support

With BlackBerry World 2012 well underway, it seems like logical timing for RIM to release their latest update to the bridge app for the PlayBook. Updated to version 2.0.0.30, the change log isn’t a large one, but addresses issues with predictive text.

The update should be live in the BlackBerry App World, so go in and update accordingly. If the update is not available for you yet, sit tight and wait for it to be pushed to your device.

You can also download the BlackBerry Bridge App here

Via: CrackBerry

But with the BlackBerry Music Gateway they’re sticking with what they know best: simple and powerful hardware that just works. To that end the Gateway is a small box (60mm x 40mm x 12.5mm, 28g) that connects to your home/car system or A/V receiver and communicates via Bluetooth to transmit a music stream from up to 30 feet away.

Compatible with the PlayBook and a number of BlackBerry devices (Bold 9900, Bold 9790, Curve 9380, Curve 9360, Bold 9981), the Gateway is NFC-enabled for easy Bluetooth pairing. The whole idea is to play music from your BlackBerry device and use the phone or tablet as an interactive remote control, sort of like how Sonos operates its mobile apps, or how AirPlay allows you to control your music from your iPhone or iPad. It is compatible with any BlackBerry music app, including 7Digital, Slacker Radio and BBM Music.

The Gateway is powered by microUSB and connects to the stereo through either an included 3.5mm headphone cable or regular RCA connector.

Shipping soon, the Gateway will be available in June for $49.99

Update: RIM has sent out a press release and announced that the BlackBerry Music Gateway is now available. Price is still $49.99 (USD) and ships “within 7-14 business days.”

More over at RIM.

The official PlayBook Bluetooth Keyboard Case is available for $99 exclusively from The Source in Canada, and while it won’t be replacing my MacBook Air anytime soon, it adds just enough functionality to the business-oriented tablet to be a compelling prospect. While the price may be a bit high for some, considering it, with the tablet itself, costs less than an iPad, you’re getting quite a bit of bang for your buck.

The keyboard itself is a generic Bluetooth Profile device, so it can pair with any compatible tablet or smartphone. I paired it with my iPad and a couple Android tablets and it worked just fine, though there are some PlayBook-specific features, not to mention it is designed to fit, with the tablet, in the included case.

The keys are clicky but a bit soft for my liking, with a distinct lack of travel. This could pose a problem for those who like to touch-type, as it’s difficult to tell whether you’ve pressed the key down enough to move on to the next one. I never felt entirely confident typing this way, and combined with the cramped nature of a 7-inch keyboard, it’s not the fastest experience.

The case itself is propped up in typing mode by a piece of thin cardboard. This is one of the case’s biggest liabilities as, although it is attached to the frame by a piece of stretchable fabric, the entire thing collapses with the slightest nudge, sending the Playbook careening down to the surface with a thud. The tablet is protected well enough within the faux-leather folio, but it’s frustrating to have to right the ship every time I nudge the table.

Inside the case, the PlayBook’s top buttons are encased in a forgiving plastic that makes the flat power button protrude enough to press it. When I say that the PlayBook’s power button was one of the worst in modern history, it wouldn’t be an exaggeration.

When closed, the combo operates like a folio notebook, with a Moleskin-like piece of fabric that wraps around the hard shell to close everything in. The keyboard itself is removable and can be affixed into the case using similar fabric notches; nothing is entirely secure in this case.

Nevertheless, the case sans keyboard operates as a great prop to type on the virtual keyboard, and due to the hard crease in the plastic itself, works wonderfully when holding the PlayBook with one hand (think the iPad Smart Cover when rolled up on the left side). The extra gripping room is luxurious, but feels awkward with the keyboard installed — you’ll have to take it out first for an optimal experience.

One feature of the keyboard that can’t be overlooked is the trackpad. When paired with the PlayBook, you can use the small trackpad to navigate a mouse cursor around the interface. Rather than imitating a Windows or OS X desktop, the trackpad uses one- or two-finger touches to initiate most functions. Bring the cursor to the left or right edge of the screen, press touch two fingers (for a “right mouse button equivalent”) and it will navigate seamlessly to the next open app in the multitasking list. Do the same at the bottom of the screen to bring up the multitasking list and at the top to activate the app- or system menu. The bottom left corner activates the virtual keyboard and the bottom right corner any notifications.

It’s a pretty good system — scrolling is activated by sliding two fingers up or down — but the mouse sensitivity is atrocious, forcing you to run a marathon with your finger just to get to the other side of the screen. Similarly poor is touch accuracy as the trackpad failed to register nearly a third of my finger presses. Nevertheless, with a software update the trackpad could be dramatically improved.

For $99, the PlayBook Bluetooth keyboard case is not cheap, but it’s a good idea to have with you when traveling and out of laptop juice. It won’t substitute for a good laptop — no tablet will, even the iPad — but RIM improved the various productivity apps in OS 2.0 that for basic word processing, spreadsheeting and presenting DocsToGo does as good a job as any other tablet suite. With the keyboard paired, it performed as well as any other Bluetooth keyboard, and never missed any letters (unless my fingers missed the key, which was more often that I would like).

The PlayBook Bluteooth keyboard case is available for $99 exclusively from The Source in Canada.

As February 2012 draws to a close, RIM has unleashed its next iteration of the PlayBook OS on the world, and it’s almost good enough to recommend over any other tablet on the market. Almost because it still lacks for many of the essential apps that iPad and, to a lesser extent, Android users have been taking advantage of for months, but in many ways it outperforms its competitors.

Let’s dive in for a quick look at three reasons the PlayBook running OS 2.0 is the best tablet bang for your buck (and a couple areas in which it still needs work).

Messages

Messages is the new Email/Social Networking hub built into the PlayBook. Whereas RIM could have installed a bare-bones IMAP client, it wouldn’t have garnered much support from the long-suffering BlackBerry crowd. Instead they went the other way and not only brought extensive push email support through Activesync (so long BES) but wove Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn tightly into the fabric of the app itself. The result is a pleasurable and robust emailing solution with a focus on simplicity.

Accounts are divided into tabs on the left side; these are viewable in landscape mode, with the message/compose column on the right. The keyboard has been updated to support autocorrect, and using SwiftKey’s learning algorithms, it’s able to adapt to your writing style. That means autocorrect gets more accurate over time.

Now, an email client/social media consolidator does not have the makings of a titillating story, but when viewed without scorn (yes, we get that the PlayBook should have had email when it debuted) Messages is likely the best, most comfortable and user-friendly email client on a tablet OS. Sure, the iPad’s is easy, but it’s also woefully simple. Android 4.0 improves somewhat on the previous generation’s email client, but performance issues and UI inconsistencies compound the issue.

Not only is typing remarkably swift and accurate on PlayBook OS 2.0, but having access to your private Facebook and Twitter messages means that the PlayBook is a hub you’ll likely return to, and often.

Remote

The Remote feature of PlayBook OS 2.0 is an excellent way of making use of your BlackBerry device to navigate, type and share files and data between the two products. While at first the use cases may seem limited — why would one need a mouse pointer and/or gesture emulator on a tablet? — but during presentations these features are fantastic. Not only can you navigate between screens and applications with the Remote feature, but you can share images, web pages and open attachments from your BlackBerry directly on the PlayBook.

While the same things can be done on the PlayBook itself, it is sometimes much faster, when holding your BlackBerry in hand, to click the BB button and “Open on PlayBook.” The same thing can be said about typing on the PlayBook. While the virtual keyboard is vastly improved over OS 1.0, BlackBerry lovers know that there is nothing faster than typing on a hardware QWERTY keyboard. With a PlayBook in front of you, typing out the body of an email or an Evernote memo and editing it directly on the tablet can be a much more enjoyable experience.

On a side note, this Remote feature extends to other devices that support the Bluetooth HID profile, so most Android tablets and even the PS3, will work with BlackBerry Remote.

Once you get used to navigating the PlaBbook with the Remote app, it becomes immediately apparent that the tablet’s gesture controls are remarkably intuitive. The fact that you don’t need to be touching the screen itself to comfortably emulate many of its functions speaks to the fluidity of QNX and the 1:1 performance of the Bluetooth connection with BlackBerry Bridge.

Browser

The updated PlayBook browser is one of the fastest and most standards-compliant out there. It’s just a joy to use. Most every HTML5-compatible web page, from Google+ to New Twitter, works without a hitch, even when the full desktop page is loaded.

Its speed is also evident when executing Javascript-heavy functions; rarely does the browser fail to load a page faster than the iPad 2. When comparing the PlayBook’s browser to the new Ice Cream Sandwich-only Chrome for Android, the BlackBerry trails by an imperceptible degree.

RIM has also included a native Reading Mode feature that strips down ads and excess formatting on pages. It works similarly to Apple’s Reading List or even Instapaper, and loads even the heaviest pages very quickly.

Due to the smaller form factor of the PlayBook, it’s a lovely way to read long-form articles since it’s easy to hold in one hand for long periods without strain. This is easily the best browsing experience on a 7-inch tablet, and with OS 2.0 perhaps on any tablet.

Conclusions

PlayBook OS 2.0 comes with many improvements — easy folders, awesome calendar, improved overall performance — but where it’s lacking is in the developer community. This is still being marketed as a business tablet, and for that reason there is a dearth of ‘essential’ apps from developers we take for granted on iOS and Android. That being said, the situation is improving and RIM is enticing Android developers to bring their wares to the App World.

Most Android apps work alright, but the performance dip is noticeable from a native app and they take an excessively long time to load. We’d prefer developers to port their code to the PlayBook using the existing SDK and NDK, but at least the catalogue is being fleshed out in some way with these Android apps. One of the better examples of an Android app feeling like native is Taptu, a news aggregator that uses a visually-pleasing UI to display RSS feeds. It’s obvious that the Taptu team spent a lot of time optimizing their app for the PlayBook, and as a result it shows off just how powerful and versatile the QNX platform has become.

When you enter the App World you will find games from EA and Gameloft, apps from Evernote, Facebook, Kobo and Globe&Mail, but you still can’t take for granted that your favourite cross-platform apps are going to be there. During Mobile World Congress, Netflix claimed it has no plans to port its popular “watch anywhere” app to the PlayBook despite roaring opposition.

By and large, PlayBook OS 2.0 is a gigantic step in the right direction for RIM. There are still those proclaiming the death of the company, of QNX and, pre-emptively, BlackBerry 10. But I still think at $199.99 for a 16GB version, the PlayBook is by far the best deal in the tablet space right now. For $249.99 you can get a 32GB model and for $299.99 a 64GB model, and there is no reason one should spend hundreds of dollars more on an iPad unless the app environment is a dealbreaker.

The biggest endorsement I can make for PlayBook OS 2.0 is that I am using it again. Every day I leave my iPad at home and I do my browsing, write my emails and read my books on the PlayBook. Yes, I miss a few apps and some of the games, but for many people like me the PlayBook is currently the best tablet option out there, especially if you’re a BlackBerry user. At least until the iPad 2 drops significantly in price.

This is a nice way to start the day. The entire RIM roadmap for 2012 has leaked and it’s a doozy.

Let’s start with the simple stuff: the Curve 9220 and 9320 are ready to go for a mid-year release. The 9220 is indeed an EDGE-only device with a 2.44″ 320×240 display with a 2MP camera, 512MB RAM and ROM, WiFi, Bluetooth. It will probably not come to Canada as Rogers is the only network remaining with EDGE service an they are transitioning away from that technology.

The 9320 is going to be very popular. Likely launching for $299 or less, it also has a 2.44″ 320×240 display, a 3.2MP fixed-focus camera with video recording, 512MB RAM and ROM, WiFi, Bluetooth, FM Stereo and a dedicated BBM button. Very cool! The left hand side button will likely launch BBM from wherever you are in the OS, but I wouldn’t be surprised if it can be re-assigned to other functions.

The Curve 9320 looks to be launching in Q2 of this year.

 Next up is the 3G Playbook, which looks and feels the same as last year’s but has an updated 1.5Ghz TI OMAP 4460 processor, 42Mbps HSPA+ and NFC capabilities. It will launch with Playbook OS 2.0 sometime in Q2.

We don’t have any idea whether it will be offered by Canadian carriers, but you can be sure there are going to be some killer bundles with some upcoming BlackBerry devices. White 9790 anyone?

In addition to white Bold 9900 and Torch 9810′s we’re looking at a white Bold 9790 and Curve 9380 at some point this year. Probably launched sometime in the first or second quarter.

The BlackBerry 10 roadmap still seems pretty far off, but we have confirmation that there is going to be at least one BB10 device this year, likely late September or early October according to the roadmap. Anything is subject to change, but we hope that RIM doesn’t rush the device; rather get one killer device out the door.

Some other cool stuff? Wireless Media Server capabilities are coming to BlackBerry 7 devices, which will allow for streaming of photos, movies and music to your favourite electronics such as PCs, consoles and stereo systems. Considering this wasn’t bundled in the BlackBerry 7.1 release, it will likely be in the next major update.

There are some interesting statistics around Playbook owners and ownership, too: 72% of Playbook owners are aged 35+, 84% are male and the average annual income is $78,000. Not bad. Definitely peaking higher than the rest of the pack.

So there you have it! Lots of cool stuff on the way from RIM. What do you think of all this news? Does this bode well for the company’s turn-around? I wonder if Thorsten Heins is upset about the leak…

Source: BGR

Based on the initial findings of a Corporate Governance review mandate issued last July, RIM co-CEOs Mike Lazaridis and Jim Balsillie may be forced to step down as co-chairs of the Board.

As we told you in mid-December, there have been calls by RIM investors for a change of governance, with five-year board member Barbara Stymiest leading the pack of candidates for new chairwoman. She “should step up and take the lead in making dramatic governance change,” according to Vic Alboini, Jaguar CEO and RIM investor. What is being called into question is the need, or “business necessity,” for a CEO (or in this case, two CEOs) to be chairmen of the board. This practice is less common in Canada and the U.K., but quite common in the U.S., a reason RIM claims as justification for maintaining the current hierarchy.

While this does not endanger the CEOs’ main roles of running the day-to-day operations of the company, the call to remove Lazaridis and Balsillie as chairs of the Board is the first step in what many see as a fundamental shake-up of the corporate nature within RIM. The common trope is that the company cannot continue the way it has been going; 2011 was a disastrous year for the company, whose stock price tumbled 75% amidst poor product launches and failed earnings expectations.

The co-CEOs, who together own 12% of the company’s total shares, have insisted on sticking to their guns regarding the new BlackBerry 10 OS, which is expected to debut in new smartphones in the second half of this year. Until then we will see a marketing blitz for existing BlackBerry 7 devices with renewed vigor.

The Corporate Governance review is expected to be submitted by the end of January, and there is no word on whether it encompasses, as some investors implore, a splitting of the company into separate divisions. We are only in the first days of 2012 and already RIM is back in the news. Let’s hope this will be the year they turn it all around.

Source: Financial Post

When I reviewed the all-touch BlackBerry Curve 9380 (which I didn’t much like) I decided to take a stab at using its bigger brother the Torch 9860, a device released back in August. This much-maligned device didn’t receive nearly the same amount of press as the flagship Bold 9900, and was overshadowed by the familiar form factor of the Torch 9810.

But the Torch 9860 is a really nice device. I’ve been working feverishly over the past few days to get used to its software keyboard — a serious liability for a BlackBerry if I ever saw one — and through trials and tribulations it’s turning out pretty well.

Let’s just get something out of the way: this device will not be for everybody. It’s an easy device to dismiss, and easier to make fun of — “you mean it’s a high-end BlackBerry with no keyboard?!” — but RIM has done a very nice job with its design, and with BlackBerry 7′s fluid touch support, not having a physical keyboard rarely feels like a hindrance to productivity.

The big screen is sharp and vivid, and probably the phone’s biggest advantage. BlackBerry 7 made huge improvements in speed and quality to the browser, and the Torch 9860 reaps these rewards more than any other. Reading long emails is no longer an exercise in scrolling, and many of the other first-party apps such as Twitter and Facebook look and work great on the big screen.

Media also looks great on the 9860. Photos and videos can actually be viewed in landscape mode without squinting, and with the 1.2Ghz processor and 14.4Mbps baseband, it’s finally possible to use a BlackBerry to enjoy 720p HD content. The camera itself, a 5MP EDoF autofocus sensor, isn’t up to par with many of its 8MP peers, but the BlackBerry 7 interface is intuitive and enjoyable to use. I did find that it produced shots that equaled or surpassed any other BlackBerry device.

Finally, the keyboard is really the only roadblock to choosing the Torch 9860 over another BlackBerry. The virtual keyboard takes a lot of practice before mastering, and even then it is liable to make more mistakes than you’d like. It would be one thing if the virtual keyboard was better than that of iOS or Android, but it’s not. Sure, it’s capable of predictive text and autocorrect, but that doesn’t mean it works all the time. With practice, and by adding dozens of words to the custom autocorrect dictionary, I was able to keep from correcting every word manually, but it took a while to get to that point.

I found that instead of trying to type as quickly as possible and trusting the autocorrect to fix the errors, it behooves one to type at a slow, steady pace. At first this may seem like a hindrance, but it ends up saving time and avoiding undue frustration. After using the keyboard for around twelve hours, I can reasonably say I no longer fear the Torch 9860.

For someone who wanted a BlackBerry experience again without sacrificing size and function, the Torch 9860 suits me well. I can’t type as quickly on it as on the Bold 9900, and I doubt I ever will. But I can scroll through web pages, flip through photos and watch YouTube videos without feeling like I’m missing out on the whole picture, and, coupled with the decent screen and awesome build quality, makes the Torch 9860 one of the underdogs.

Do you use a BlackBerry Torch 9860? Why did you buy it? Has it held up over the past few months? Let us know in the comments.

Nostalgia is a funny thing. Though last year I left my BlackBerry behind for the shinier, app-centric shores of iOS and Android, I still recall my experiences fondly. There are times I miss the great keyboard, push email and how easy it is to compose lengthy soliloquies like it’s nothing at all. I retain a closeted affection for BBM and the friendships I clung to so dearly through PIN. But mostly I miss that flashing red light, hounding me to check my phone, check my phone, check my phone.

Since the arrival of BlackBerry 7, RIM has emphasized that they too can play the smartphone game in 2011. And in many ways they have succeeded, at least in retaining their current user base; I see a lot of Bold 9900′s when I’m out in public. And while others, like me, have left for greener pastures, we’re always willing to come back for a visit.

The Curve 9380 is the first all-touch Curve device, and is intended to bridge that small gap between entry-level and high-end consumer devices. To its credit the Curve feels great in the hand: it is well-constructed, and employs many of the same technologies, like NFC, that are available in RIM’s most expensive models. It also aims to convince users that there doesn’t need to be a hardware keyboard for it to be called a BlackBerry.

Will the masses listen, and is the Curve 9380 worth buying? Read on to find out.

Specs:

-     800Mhz Marvell processor
-     3.2″ 360×480 capacitive touch display
-     512MB RAM / 512MB ROM
-     5MP  EDoF camera w/ LED flash
-     VGA video capture
-     WiFi (b/g/n), Bluetooth 2.1 w/ A2DP, A-GPS, NFC
-     1230mAh battery
-     109 x 60 x 11.2 mm
-     98g

The Phone

The Curve 9380 hues closely to the keyboard-adorned 9360 in its design, which means it’s very light, thin and fluid. At 11.2mm thick, the body barely registers in the hand; at 98g, it disappears in a pocket or bag. RIM has honed down the right-side convenience and volume buttons to such an extent they now flit out like little nubs, barely perceptible unless your fingers brush upon them. This is by no means a negative trait: the phone’s design is about as simple as it gets.

While the 9380 forgoes the weighty aluminum battery cover of its big brother, the Torch 9860, in other places it is constructed with premium plastic and a high-quality glass. The four buttons below the screen are actually housed within the glass which lends a sense of continuity to the form. It’s clear RIM wanted very little to distract from the main event: the 3.2″ screen. At 360×480 its resolution is quite low on paper but I didn’t find myself wanting for smaller text or sharper images. But for the browser, which would have benefited from more zoom, the Curve’s size relative to its resolution felt well matched.

As with all recent BlackBerry devices there is a standard-issue trackpad for text selection and other “legacy” functions. That the BlackBerry ecosystem still requires four buttons and a trackpad reasserts the issue that the OS needs doing away with — text selection and secondary context functions are finicky and unreliable via touchscreen alone — but neither are they intrusive. Around the left side, centred, is a microUSB charging port, while on top of the device is a headphone jack. The lock button has been built into the top, too, again contiguous with the front glass. Instead of being a separate button like on most phones, RIM has integrated the function without disturbing the form: more OEMs would benefit from such design edification.

The battery cover is made of plastic that, while relatively secure while attached, seems immediately like it’s going to break into a thousand pieces when removed. The company has done a great job unifying its battery line, though: both the new Bold 9790 and the Curve 9380 use the same JM1 battery found in the Bold 9900. Whether this translates into sufficient longevity we’ll talk about later.

I must say that one thing RIM is doing quite well is the continuing honing and simplifying of their designs. There isn’t another mobile company in the world that has honed a single design element to such an extent as to be instantly recognizable and yet modern and thoughtful. To compare the Curve 9380 to, say, the original Curve 8100 would be a lesson in refinement and careful, mindful planning.

The Display & Keyboard

While sufficient resolution for the size, the quality of the LCD is another matter. Low-quality, with noticeable gradient banding and a distracting, visible digitizer layer, I’ve seen better from RIM. Compared to the high-density display on the Bold 9900 or the fantastic, crisp LCD in the Torch 9860, this is clearly the Curve’s weakest trait.

Couple that with a stubborn digitizer that wouldn’t always register our key taps, we were loathe to try to type on this Curve. My frustration abates, however, when I keep in mind this device is meant for entry-level smartphone users, many of whom will have never used a touchscreen before. Comparing the quality to, say, that of entry level Android or Nokia device the Curve’s display is unequivocally better, even if $100 more expensive.

Colour reproduction is a strength, with solid contrast and accurate whites. Text, while large, is crisp and readable, which is a good thing because as a BlackBerry user you’ll undoubtedly doing a lot of reading and scrolling. Viewing angles are great, as is maximum brightness.

My main concern with the display is its responsiveness. Occasionally I would be scrolling down the BB7 home screen only to have a touch register as a press when it should have registered as a fluid scrolling motion. Similarly, when typing, the cursor would move randomly as if being roused by a phantom. Rarely could I get through an entire sentence without the cursor finding its way magically back to the beginning of the text input box. I could type quickly or slowly, it did not matter; the keyboard would register my presses incorrectly more often than not.

This is a problem for a BlackBerry device. As I’d come to learn with the mostly-excellent Torch 9860, RIM’s virtual keyboard is a different beast altogether than the one I was used to on iOS and Android. Key placement aside, it just feels strange, as if you need to be more deliberate, more evenly-paced. With the Torch, however, once I found a rhythm I was fine; the Curve, in portrait or landscape, full QWERTY or reduced, I continued to have recognition issues.

Granted, I did have a pre-production model, and RIM emphasized that hardware was not yet final. Let’s hope that this batch I got mine from was not fit for public consumption.

Camera

The 5MP camera on the Curve 9380 is decidedly better than that of the previous Curve generation. Anyone upgrading from the 8520 or 9300 will be delighted at being able to make out actual details in images. Such things I take for granted, certainly, but it always astounds me the number of friends I have happily snapping portrait and lanscape shots on their entry-level BlackBerry devices.

This isn’t to say the Curve 9380′s camera is good by any means, just significantly improved. Its EDoF nature makes actual focusing impossible; the idea is that the camera, past a certain point, is always in focus. As a result, taking photos is much faster because there is no focusing motor getting in the way of a quick photo. The upshot is that macro photography is impossible: shots closer than, say, five inches, are fuzzy and out of focus.

The flash does an excellent job in close proximity, wisely under- instead of over-compensating. It suffices for nearby portrait photos or in a dimly-lit room. There is a good amount of detail in each 5MP photo, though a fair amount of grain to go along with it.

Video is taken at a maximum of 640×480, likely due to the limitations of the 800Mhz processor than the optical sensor. While chugging along at a smooth 30fps, the quality is poor and appropriate for base YouTube fare or sending an email of your cat around the office.

In its default state, the phone comes with space for fewer than 30 photos and no video. It is incumbent on you, or your carrier, to provide a modestly-sized microSD card so that you may enjoy your music, video and photos to their fullest extent. Because we received our demo unit straight from RIM itself, I can’t comment on individual carrier phone bundles but it is more than likely the Curve 9380 will come with a 2GB card.

Software & Performance

This is BlackBerry 7. An improved, touch-friendly, Liquid Graphics-filled operating system, with most of the same elements that made BB OS either indelibly attractive or untenable repulsive to the masses over the past few years. For BlackBerry Lovers, the new experience is a necessary and functional refresh; to BlackBerry Haters, it’s too little, too late. Leaving behind the love it/hate it debate, however, how has BlackBerry 7 iterated since its release?

Quite well, to be honest. In spite of this particular model’s touch issues, BlackBerry 7 is responsive and attractive, with a modular framework that allows you to see exactly what you want to, and hide what you don’t. Since the first wave of BB7 devices, RIM has released numerous bug fix and performance improving updates to its first-party apps: BBM, BlackBerry Protect, News, Traffic, Podcasts, as well as BBM Music, its newest foray into social music. There really is a lot to like here, and out of the box it covers most of the “primary needs” of a mobile OS: phone, email, SMS, news, music, media.

If you’ve ever used BlackBerry OS, things are going to be pretty similar and much, much faster. If you are upgrading from a previous Curve, say an 8520 or 9300, either the Curve 9360 or this phone will seem like a huge upgrade. Both in terms of speed and fluidity, RIM has done an excellent job with overall performance. Rarely will you see that dreaded BlackBerry “spinning clock” and we noticed few, if any, app crashes. Since this is the last version of BlackBerry OS — next year RIM is moving over its entire fleet of phones to the BBX platform — it’s about time the Java-based framework reached a modicum of maturity. As I touched on in our Curve 9360 review, BlackBerry 7 is not a cure-all, rectifying all problems from previous versions. Rather it completes the shaky cycle of iterative software and hardware improvements, and we can happily say the BB7 line didn’t let us down as it neared its sunset.

In many ways the interface is still touch unfriendly. All those keyboard shortcuts — “T” to the top, “B” to the bottom, “C” to compose, etc. — are missing here. You will do a lot thumb flicking when scrolling long web pages or through email threads. Indeed, the entire text-and-selection procedure is more frustrating than it should be. Companies like Apple and HTC have implemented them rather well, but RIM seems to hold onto the “peck-and-hope” technique. Sure, there is a blue line that appears underneath next, but getting it to go where you want and copy what you want is entirely unintuitive.

Despite the niggling issues with text input and selection, the email, browsing and BBM experience remain as robust as ever, and that’s really why you’re buying a BlackBerry, right? With the unified BlackBerry ID you can transfer BIS data including email accounts (and therefore synchronized Gmail contacts and calendars) from device to device without issue. With remote restore you can retain your BBM list. With BlackBerry Protect you can backup all that data to the cloud, and locate your phone in case it is lost or stolen.

Browsing is also much, much better on the all-touch Curve 9380. Unlike the 9360 with its 2.2″ screen and lack of touch, even BlackBerry 7′s Liquid Graphics couldn’t save it from a disastrous browsing fate. Thankfully, the Curve 9380 has the chops to render web pages accurately — even high-bandwidth HTML5-heavy ones — and relatively quickly. The 800Mhz processor does, at times, show a modicum of checkerboarding, but nothing like in previous generations.

One of the biggest advantages to having a larger screen is when looking at photos and watching video clips. While it’s not recommended to catch up on your favourite movies on such a small screen, the experience is far better than a traditional QWERTY BlackBerry device. Flipping through pictures in the Gallery or reading through long emails is less exhausting with a bigger screen.

Call Quality & NFC 

We used our trust Bell SIM to power the Curve 9380′s 3G network connection — which maxes out at 7.2Mbps — and call quality was, as expected, excellent. Though the network is theoretically slower than RIM’s flagship devices, because data is so highly compressed through BIS, we hardly noticed the difference.

Maximum call volume also exceeded our expectations, as did the tiny speaker on the back of the device. While aimed at consumers, the Curve is a great business device: making phone calls has always been a strength of BlackBerry.

RIM’s continued inclusion of NFC in their entry-level devices is meant to solidify its place in the mainstream. While use is limited at the moment, once BlackBerry 7.1 arrives, and with it BlackBerry Tags (which we showed off the other day) it will become really useful.

Battery Life

Because the 9380 uses the same battery as the Bold 9900, we tempered our expectations and as a result were pleasantly surprised. The 1230mAh battery is plenty to power the device through the day, and then some. We looped a video clip for 7 hours and 15 minutes before the battery finally gave out. In real-world usage, the Curve lasted us nearly 26 hours based on stats in the usage menu.

If you are looking to repeat the multiple-day battery life of non-touch BlackBerry devices, you’re out of luck, and you might as well get used to the new modus operandi. As RIM incorporates touchscreens into their phones, battery life will continue to go down. And considering this generation may be the last of the non-touch BlackBerries, I’d get used to it.

Final Thoughts
Considering Telus is launching the Curve 9380 for $49.99 on a 3-year term and $369.99 outright, which is presumably the same price the other carriers will launch at, RIM is positioning it as a high-tier entry-level device. We have no doubt it will quickly hit $0 on a 3-year term, but it’s hard to imagine the swaths of teens currently using keyboarded Curves primarily for BBM trading them in for an all-touch BlackBerry, just for a little extra screen real estate. As we’ve learned with the tepid response of the Torch 9860, selling an all-touch BlackBerry is a difficult proposition.

Insofar as RIM has built an excellent device, the Curve 9380 does everything right: it’s premium-feeling, fast and stable, with a nice big screen and sleek design. But it’s the little things that suffer: the keyboard is awkward and unreliable, and the resolution is low. The camera is a big step up from previous Curves but doesn’t compete with the industry-standard results we see in the iPhone 4 or Galaxy Nexus.

In short, you already know if this is the phone for you, or for your daughter. If you can master the virtual keyboard, it’s a great device. If not, you’ll long for that Curve 8100. I know I’m still nostalgic.

Rating: 6.5/10

Pros:

-     Excellent design, well-built
-     Good battery life for a BlackBerry 7 device
-     Solid screen quality
-     Good performance for the price
-     BlackBerry 7 is fast and stable (compared to previous versions)
-     Camera takes decent shots
-     Great call quality
-     Good sound from the speaker
-     NFC a nice inclusion

Cons:

-     Video quality subpar
-     Low-resolution screen makes for a lot of scrolling
-     Keyboard is awkward and unreliable
-     High outright price
-     Disappointing battery life compared to previous Curves

The Curve 9360 is significant for a number of reasons. It’s the first BlackBerry 7-compatible Curve, and while it eschews the aluminum backing of the 8900 series, it keeps, and improves upon everything else. It sports a faster CPU than the previous-generation Bold devices, a sharp display, 5MP camera with flash, and most of all, it’s waif thin. Is this your next phone? Read on to find out.

Specs:

- 2.44″ 480×360 pixel display (non-touch)
- 800Mhz processor with BlackBerry 7
- 512MB RAM / 512MB eMMC storage (expandable with microSD card up to 32GB)
- 5MP Camera with flash / VGA video capture
- WiFi (b/g/n), aGPS, Bluetooth 2.1 w/ A2DP, NFC-capable
- 1000mAh battery (5hrs talk time)
- 109 x 60 x 11mm
- 99g

The Phone

You’re not going to buy a BlackBerry without knowing exactly what you’re getting. That also includes the form factor, which is the standard screen-buttons-keyboard design. So be in for a pleasant shock when you first hold this in your hands. At 11mm thick, the Curve 9360 is extremely, impossibly thin, and at 99g, feels fantastic to hold. It resembles in some ways BlackBerrys of a previous generation, the 8830 especially, which was squared off at the top and bottom, with a no-nonsense front.

The keyboard is very similar to previous Curves but the keys are slightly less raised, and due to the slight 60mm width, narrower, though unless you have giant thumbs typing should be quite natural. Coming from a Bold 9900 took some getting used to, as there is a good 6mm extra to work with, but this is easily the best Curve typing experience to date, with a slightly stubborn weight to each key that we appreciated when typing long emails. They take a bit more work to activate, but produce far fewer errors than the bouncy, loose keys of the 9300.

The screen is relatively high resolution; on the 2.44″ screen, the 480×360 pixels produces a ratio of 246 pixels per inch. Text, which is arguably the most important faculty of the BlackBerry, is clear even at minute sizes, with the most serif of fonts not belying their aliased nature. Colours are vibrant and true, while black levels fairly deep, though not up to par with the Bold 9900. There certainly isn’t the ‘Wow’ vibrancy of the Bold or the ‘OMG improvement’ of the Torch 9810, but compared to the muted, fuzzy text of its predecessors, the Curve 9360 is in a league of its own.

Around the device buttons that formerly had substance — the volume rocker and convenience key — are whisp-thin and barely noticeable. RIM wisely maintains the rubberized overlay and makes them protrude even more than necessary to make up for their tininess. The lock button sits alone on the top of the device — the forward/back/play of previous generations have been merged with the volume buttons — right next to the 3.5mm jack.

Around the back, the 5MP camera and flash are separated by a ‘Curve’ insignia, and this is where we run into the first spat of trouble. The battery cover, if you could call it that, is a glossy fingerprint magnet that is so flimsy you can feel it moving when you press down on the keys with your thumbs. Mind you, it’s not much —  we found the Curve 9300 to be much more flagrant in its cheapness — but the incidence mars an otherwise-flawless usage experience.

The four maintenance buttons on the front — Phone, BlackBerry, Back and End — are quite difficult to differentiate. You have to press right in the middle of the painted area to hit your mark, but should loosen up over time. We had no trouble with the trackpad, which is, because the device is not touch-enabled, going to be your main mode of transportation. We also like the RIM has done away with colour on the buttons and keyboard; the entire front is an unsullied white-on-black.

BlackBerry 7

Let us explain how much the out-the-box experience is improved on BlackBerry 7. Turn on the device and you’re greeted with a lovely demo video outlining all the excellent new features of the OS. Then you log into your BlackBerry account which imports your previously-used email accounts, including Gmail with which you’ve syncronized Contacts and Calendar entries. Within five minutes you have your previous 20 or so emails from each email account along with your entire Google contact list and calendar entries. No duplicates, no fuss. You then open BBM and restore a cloud-saved contact list, and you’re ready to talk to all your friends. Enter App World and your account information, including payment info, is there waiting to re-download free and purchased apps. We cannot emphasize how far along RIM has come in terms of streamlining.

Coming from a Bold 9900, we kept on hitting the screen with our fingers, but after a while we realized that regardless of what they call it, BlackBerry OS still works better with the trackpad. We found movement and selection to be far easier than tapping aimlessly on the screen, and while we did miss the inverted scrolling in the WebKit browser, for everything else the Curve 9360 has a leg up on its peers.

The new OS, along with a beefed-up CPU, means that transitions between menus, app load times, camera shots and overall performance is greatly improved. From email to texting to tweeting, the Curve does a great job. Even firing up the browser isn’t too bad, with load times and scrolling vastly superior to even the Bold 9780, but scrolling long pages is still unpleasant, and zooming in doesn’t always reorient the text the way it should. Still, if you’re coming from any older BlackBerry, especially a Curve, it’s safe to say you will enjoy a better browsing experience. HTML5 video works just fine inside the browser, though we had issues getting embedded applets to go fullscreen.

One of the biggest advantages of the new Curve is its 3G-enabled chip. With speeds up to 14.4Mbps, downloading big web pages or multi-megabyte files is no longer the painful and laborious process it once was. That being said, unlike its big brothers which sport a 1.2Ghz processor, the 800Mhz chip and 512MB RAM can’t always keep up with what you want it to do. We did run into the occasional time where the device would just sit with its infamous clock in the middle of the screen, thinking for a few seconds before proceeding with its business, though ironically this happened less than on the Bold 9900. Forget about doing anything else when installing an app, though — go make yourself some popcorn and come back in five minutes.

The rest of the experience we’ve covered pretty thoroughly in the review for the Torch 9810. You’ve got improvements to first-party apps such as Facebook, Twitter, BBM etc., while third-party apps like Foursquare and Ubersocial are slowly being updated to take advantage of new APIs. Since that review, App World 3.0 has been unleashed with an entirely new interface and lots of excellent features. There are BlackBerry Music, Protect, Podcasts, News: all excellent apps with lots of depth. They may not be the prettiest but they are incredibly, and increasingly, functional. You have Yahoo Messenger, Google Talk, MSN Messenger, to round out the social offerings. For productivity, there is a full version of Documents To Go, and very capable Tasks, Memo, Voice Dialer and Voice Notes apps. Oh, and you can search the phone, or the internet, with your voice, straight from the home screen. There is a much-improved Maps application and the excellent social aggregator, Social Feeds, which allows you to not only add RSS feeds but, when you’ve signed into Facebook and Twitter, to see all your updates in one place.

Without a touchscreen getting in the way, and the inconsistent, sometimes achingly slow performance that comes with it, the Curve 9360 often seems quicker than its more expensive peers.

Bell includes a few of their own apps, though in reality they are shortcuts: GPS Navigator, which is powered by Telenav, is a $10/month service that is among the best turn-by-turn navigation apps on the market. Bell also offers its TV & Radio service, which for $5/month allows you to subscribe to various channel bundles. We’d recommend staying away from such offerings as the prospect of watching live, or even taped, television on a 2.4″ screen is somewhat absurd.

Camera and Media

The Curve 9360 comes with a EDoF 5MP camera, which means that it does not support autofocus — instead the camera takes shots almost instantly, as it doesn’t have to adjust its focal point to where you’re pointing. Everything beyond a few inches is in focus. This means that macro photography is not possible with this device, but, in general, photos look great. There is plenty of detail and colour saturation and detail are only slightly below that of the Bold 9900.

Unfortunately, likely due to the slower processor, video capture is limited to VGA, or 640×480. While not unexpected for a low-cost device, it is nonetheless disappointing. What video you can take is of decent quality, and a smooth 30fps. No front-facing camera on this one, either; you’re likely going to have to wait until QNX for that one.

The media capabilities of the Curve 9360 are quite good: photos look great, and you can smoothly scroll between shots in the Media Gallery app. Video also looks good, too, though it’s also processor-limited to low-bitrate encodings. If HD video recording or viewing is a priority, stick with the higher-end BB’s.

Music and video playback can be controlled with the volume buttons, and the play button nub in between them. Hold down on the ‘up’ button for a second and it will skip to the next song. Hit ‘down’ and it will return to the previous track. This is an intuitive, pocket-friendly way of controlling your music and videos, and along with the superb sound quality and high-speed 3G support, your Curve can now easily replace a dedicated media player.

Battery Life

Here’s where it gets good. Unlike the lacklustre (read: awful) battery life of the Bold 9900, the Curve’s somewhat tiny battery bears the brunt of a slower CPU and no touchscreen with panache. In other words, expect multiple days out of your Cure 9360. We used the device constantly over two days, and left it overnight on the third day, and woke to find it dead. That’s over 48 hours of battery life from a single 1000mAh charge.

Granted, the results are not as good as the EDGE-only Curves, the 8520 and 8900, but we’re willing to take a slight hit in battery life for the extra network speed. The screen is still quite usable at 10% brightness, which adds a few more hours, and if you use WiFi when indoors expect another few. And due to the tiny battery, charging from zero to full takes just over an hour.

NFC

Though we don’t have any way of testing Near Field Communications, or NFC, support at the moment, rest assured that most mobile payments a year from now will be using the technology. This just future-proofs a product for which you likely paid significantly less than, say, the Torch 9810, which does not support NFC.

Call Quality

We tested Bell’s version of the Curve 9360 which takes advantage of Bell’s mature and expanding 4G network. In the GTA we had no issues maintaining five bars of service, even in a basement. While the speakerphone leaves a lot to be desired in terms of fidelity, we are happy that the earpiece is loud and clear, and the device supports A2DP-enabled Bluetooth headsets.

Conclusions

We have to grade the BlackBerry Curve 9360 on, well, a curve. See, for $350 outright you’re getting a device that’s faster, thinner and arguably more attractive than any high-end Bold released in the last three years (not the 9900). You’re getting a relatively smooth smartphone experience with a capable browser, excellent media functionality and a decent camera.

See, the BlackBerry brand has suffered in the last three years at the hand of iPhone and high-end Android. But pound for pound they still beat the low- and mid-range competition, and this is where the platform shines. If you buy a BlackBerry today, even with BB7 onboard, you’re not getting Angry Birds or Infinity Blade. You’re not getting the latest apps, but third- and fourth-tier support from developers who are moving away from the platform at remarkable speeds. Yes, there are plenty of apps for BlackBerry, but they’re often expensive, ugly and do not meet the usability standards of their iPhone and Android equivalents. The exceptions are there — Foursquare, Rdio, Evernote, Dropbox, Sugarsync, TuneIn Radio, Slacker Radio, ScoreMobile, Poynt — but you’ll likely never see a Netflix app for BlackBerry, nor Instagram, nor an updated Tumblr app.

It’s hard to imagine, with BlackBerry OS being fazed out by QNX in mere months, that developers are going to create new, exciting apps for BlackBerry 7. So, know what you’re getting. Don’t yearn for apps you’ll never get; be happy instead with the multitudinous excellent functionality already available for the platform.

The Curve 9360 is one of the best Blackberrys we’ve used, and exactly the kind of send-off the OS needs. There is more to BlackBerry 7 than just BBM, but we’d imagine even if you’re purchasing the Curve 9360 for just that, you’ll more than likely be satisfied.

Rating: 8/10

Pros:

- Outstanding form factor
-  Vibrant, sharp screen
- Best Curve keyboard ever made
- BlackBerry 7 runs great, often better than on the more expensive Bold 9900
- Camera takes decent photos
- Awesome battery life for the size of the device
- Inexpensive

Cons:

- Plasticky feel may be a turn-off
- Battery cover is a flimsy fingerprint magnet
- Browsing performance lacklustre
- Keyboard not as comfortable as the Bold for lengthy typing sessions
- BlackBerry 7 does not quite meet the smartphone standards set by Apple and Google
- Video capture only VGA, no autofocus for camera

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