The BlackBerry Z10 isn’t a
complete failure, as it manages to impress at first glance (hence my
enthusiastic first look at the phone). From afar it looks a lot like the iPhone
5. Up close it bears a simplicity that’s exceedingly rare as smartphone makers
obsess with screen size and design bling. It looks like an expensive device that
only business people should be using — which is great for maintaining
BlackBerry’s image but somewhat damning when attracting typical smartphone
buyers.
With its rounded corners and
soft-touch rear cover, the BlackBerry Z10 feels more like an expensive leather
briefcase than your typical smartphone. It’s also comfortable to hold and
navigate with one hand thanks to a reasonably-sized 4.2-inch screen. BlackBerry
could have tried to spar with big-screen Android phone makers, but the smaller
screen size shows a certain amount of restraint that I can’t help but
appreciate. (It’s also slightly bigger than the 4-inch iPhone 5, so BlackBerry
can still hold that over Apple.)
The BlackBerry 10 has a few
other things to like as well, though it still has a long way to go. It relies on
a gesture-based interface that quickly becomes intuitive — swipe up from the
bottom of the screen to show your running apps, swipe from the left edge go
backward, and swipe down to reveal more options. A helpful gesture — swiping up,
then right — sends you to the BlackBerry Hub, which puts all of your e-mail,
texts, Twitter updates, and other communication alerts into a single
interface.
Few apps stood out on the Z10
(more on that below), but its browser is worth mentioning. It’s fast, renders
web pages accurately, and it even supports Adobe Flash. BlackBerry clearly put a
lot of thought into the browser’s rendering engine, which feels as zippy as
Chrome on Android and the latest version of the iOS browser.
The phone also sports
BlackBerry Messenger, which for some fans may be the only reason they’ll need a
new BlackBerry device. At this point, modern messaging apps and services like
iMessage and Kik are far more useful than BlackBerry Messenger. But for business
people who’ve lived with BlackBerry phones over the past year, it’ll be tough to
give up BBM.
Just like the BlackBerry
PlayBook tablet, which runs an operating system that serves as the core of
BlackBerry 10, moving between multiple applications on the Z10 is fast and
seamless. It’s powered by a fast 1.5 GHz dual-core processor and 2GB RAM, so
it’s certainly no hardware slouch either.
Call quality and reception was
impressive, though that’s something BlackBerry should have mastered by now. Its
touchscreen keyboard is fashioned after the physical BlackBerry keyboard, and
it’s also helped by some impressive predictive text technology (though
BlackBerry hasn’t confirmed this, I believe it’s powered by SnapKeys, the folks
behind the excellent Android keyboard).
But despite those few
positives, the Z10’s problems make it impossible to recommend.
The bad: No compelling features or apps
For a device that should
remind us why BlackBerry is a smartphone brand that matters, the Z10 is
surprisingly average.
It has 70,000 apps, but few
that you’ll actually want to use. Apps for popular services like Twitter work,
but these are riddled with bugs and errors. Twitter would often just stop
refreshing my timeline and mentions, and sometimes I had to reboot the app to
get it working again. It’s also still missing popular apps like Spotify and
Instagram. Don’t expect to keep up with the cool kids with this
phone.
Core applications are
surprisingly lacking as well. For maps, the Z10 relies on a modified version of
Microsoft’s Bing Maps, which doesn’t have nearly as much location data as Google
Maps. Simply using the maps application was a pain — it would often take forever
to load, and it had issues finding my location. It’s inexcusable for a modern
smartphone platform to have unreliable mapping — just look at the backlash
against Apple Maps.
The Z10 is all about
productivity, except it doesn’t always work properly. My Gmail account stopped
updating for days on end, apps crashed frequently, and the phone often got stuck
in landscape orientation. All of this led to me completely rebooting the Z10 far
more often than I would have liked.
Battery life is somewhat
disappointing as well. Sometimes the Z10 would last for a typical workday, and
sometimes I had to charge it in the middle of the afternoon. I was never able to
figure out what was draining the battery on certain days. At least the battery
is removable — it’s an increasingly uncommon feature in smartphones, but
something that BlackBerry road warriors should appreciate.
Boring and soulless
What bothered me the most
about the Z10 was perhaps more aesthetic than functional. It’s simply boring.
The home screen is uninspired (down to generic-looking icons), BlackBerry Hub
feels like a messy block of text, and I’ve yet to find an app that truly felt
interesting.
I’ve always felt that one of
Android’s biggest problems over its first few years was that it didn’t really
have a soul. It wasn’t until former WebOS designer Matias Duarte joined up as
Android’s director of user experience that Google’s mobile OS finally got a
swift dose of personality.
The BlackBerry Z10 doesn’t
have that problem. It definitely has a soul, but it’s one of a buttoned-up and
humorless corporate drone. Forget about attracting new users: With an image like
this, BlackBerry will have trouble holding onto its 80 million
users.
I have a feeling BlackBerry
knows just how boring BlackBerry 10 currently is, otherwise it wouldn’t
have named Grammy-winner Alicia Keys its global creative director. Right now
it’s unclear if Keys will have any actual creative input or if she’s just a
celebrity name to make younger buyers pay attention. But hopefully her mere
presence will be enough to inspire the company.
BlackBerry already has a
strong hardware lead in Todd Wood, its VP of design, but the company needs a
strong software designer like Duarte to give BlackBerry 10 some character.
Judging from some of the most popular apps on iOS and Android, consumers are
beginning to recognize the importance of good design. It’s not something that
BlackBerry can avoid for too long in its software.
The verdict: This phone isn’t meant for you — or anyone
The BlackBerry Z10 isn’t the
worst phone I’ve come across, but I can’t in good conscience recommend it to
anyone. BlackBerry still has a lot of work ahead of it in terms of software
updates and attracting developers. And maybe along the way, it can also figure
out who the heck needs this phone.
BlackBerry-faithful should
keep an eye out for the keyboard-equipped Q10. Pricing and availability of that
model still hasn’t been announced.
The Z10 won’t be the phone
that saves BlackBerry, but at least the company has finally gotten the ball
rolling on its next-generation devices.
Hopefully by the next round
BlackBerry will figure out who it’s actually serving.
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