Design and build
At first glance, the handsome BlackBerry Z10 looks suspiciously like Apple's black iPhone 5: tall and narrow, with straight edges that meet at rounded corners, and a roughly 4-inch screen. Like the iPhone 5, the Z10 is adept at one-handed operation. That's where the similarities end.
You see, the Z10 has no navigation buttons, either physical or capacitive. Instead, you'll operate the Z10 through gestures. The phone stands 5.1 inches tall, 2.6 inches wide, and 0.35 inch thick -- only slightly deeper than the iPhone 5. Its 4.8-ounce weight feels right with the phone's proportions, and the device has a much more comfortable grip than the iPhone, thanks to the slightly rounded edges on the back and a lightly textured, soft-touch finish.
On its face, the Z10's 4.2-inch LCD display has a 1,280x768-pixel WXGA HD resolution (that's 355 pixels per inch; the iPhone 5 has a 326ppi density.) You'll see fine lettering, crisp edges, and deep colors. I did notice, though, that with both handsets set to maximum brightness, the iPhone 5 outshone the Z10, and an HD picture of a flower looked brighter, more detailed, and had more color variation on Apple's device. On the whole, the differences between the two are minimal. The bezel surrounding the screen is frankly wider than today's edge-to-edge fashion, but this doesn't personally bother me. On the Z10's left edge are the Micro-HDMI port and Micro-USB port which only few smartphones can boast of today.
Remember the 'hanging' and 'fuss; we've known with the blackberry for all these years. They tried to fix those issues this time. Here's what you need to know about the new BlackBerry 10 OS: it looks cool, it's gesture-driven, and it'll take you at least a few minutes to pick up. In some ways it's quite advanced -- I'm a fan of BlackBerry Balance and the virtual keyboard -- and in other ways, you wonder what RIM's been doing all these years.
When it comes to multiple accounts and a unified inbox, BlackBerry 10 delivers. You can sign into multiple e-mail accounts and social networks, and populate your address book and calendar from these cross-pollinated networks. I didn't see contact duplicates, and my buddies' addresses also appeared neatly sorted in the maps app, basically the only really nice surprise there.
You'll find Wi-Fi (802.11 a/b/g/n), Bluetooth 4.0, NFC, and all the good stuff when it comes to texting, chatting with other BlackBerry users, and sharing stuff to social networks. There's a good music app, a basic maps app, and the mostly-good Documents To Go, which opens the door to reading, creating, and editing Word and Excel documents, and viewing PowerPoint and Adobe PDF files. Not forgeting Facebook, Twitter, Foursquare e.t.c.
For a long time now, the BlackBerry camera has been a weak spot. No longer. The Z10 packs a respectable 8-megapixel shooter in the back and a 2-megapixel lens up front. Both record 720p HD video, and the larger of the two can also shoot 1080p HD video.The main camera comes with autofocus, 5x digital zoom, and options for burst mode and stabilization. Pressing either volume button can snap a shot. TimeShift mode takes an array of photos, and lets you revisit them along a timeline to pick the one you like best. There are scene modes (like action and night) and you can choose to take pictures in a 3:4 or 9:16 ratio.
Business and security-conscious users have long been RIM's bread and butter. The BlackBerry Z10 serves this demographic well with BlackBerry Balance, which helps separate sensitive business apps from your personal ones, with the help of your corporate IT manager. There are privacy settings and RIM's signature encrypted servers, plus parental controls -- not to mention remote wiping with BlackBerry Protect.
So how much will it cost in Nigeria?
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