No Jitter is part of the Informa Tech Division of Informa PLC

This site is operated by a business or businesses owned by Informa PLC and all copyright resides with them. Informa PLC's registered office is 5 Howick Place, London SW1P 1WG. Registered in England and Wales. Number 8860726.

BlackBerry 10 Debuts With Surprises, Some Not So Good

In a series of PR events staged around the world, RIM (who will now be referring to itself as "BlackBerry") introduced the much-anticipated and oft-delayed BlackBerry 10 (BB10) operating system. Based on the QNX operating system RIM acquired in 2010, BB10 will be offered on two models initially, the touchscreen Z10 (pronounced in the English form as "Zed 10") and the qwerty-equipped Q10. The Z10 was to go on sale in the UK this week and in Canada next Tuesday; US availability is expected in March. RIM claims the delay in the US introduction is due to the extensive testing done by the US carriers.

More importantly, the Q10 keyboard model won't be available until April (no specific date provided). As I noted in a post last week, the lack of a keyboard model is critical given that the keyboard is the feature most prized by the few remaining BlackBerry loyalists.

I haven't had the chance to play with a Z10 yet, though I have pored over all of the videos I could find. It appears to be essentially what RIM described at BlackBerry World back in May and over the several months leading up to the launch. The full specs are now out, and on paper at least, the Z10 compares quite favorably with the iPhone 5 and the top-end Samsung Android models like the Galaxy SIII, as well as the Motorola Droid DNA. Like the Galaxy SIII, the Z10 has a 1.5 GHz dual-core processor, though the Z10's is a TI OMAP where the Samsung uses a Qualcomm Snapdragon; the iPhone 5 uses a dual-core 1.02 GHz A6 processor.

The Z10 has a 4.2-inch display versus 4-inches on the iPhone 5, 4.8-inches on the SIII, and 5-inches on the Droid DNA. The Z10's resolution is actually better than the iPhone's "Retina Display," boasting 1280 x 768 pixels versus 1136 x 640 pixels on the iPhone 5; the SIII matches the Z10's resolution. The Z10 supports LTE on the cellular side as well as 802.11a/b/g and n Wi-Fi, and it operates in both the 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz bands. It also has NFC capability like the BlackBerry Bold 9900. If you'd like a full feature-by-feature comparison, Daniel Ionescu did a good one in PCWorld.

However, anyone who has had any exposure to the smartphone business will know that a feature-by-feature comparison will yield little insight into how a device will fare in the market. Hey, WebOS got great reviews. As I regularly point out to my pals who try to get me to dump my iPhone for an Android, this business isn't about "speeds-and-feeds", it's about the overall user experience, which is greatly influenced by the "feel", the user interface (UI), and app availability.

It is clear that RIM has not forgotten how to build good solid mobile devices with good battery life and excellent audio quality. The Z10 went for the "thinner-and-longer" profile of the iPhone 5 rather than the "my-screen-is-bigger-than-your-screen" posture of the Galaxy SIII.

For the core software functions, the Z10 has some well-thought-out features. The BB10 software provides three primary views: the Apps Home Screen (that can display up to 16 icons); Active Frames (similar to Windows Phone's "Live Tiles") that allows you to see all open applications and any updates they receive; and the clever BlackBerry Hub.

The Hub is a customizable central repository for all emails, messages, and other notifications. The nice thing is that you can view the Hub at any time by dragging your current application to the right, and the Hub appears on the left side of the screen. It's kind of like the Hub is "hiding" back there all the time and you can peek at it any time you like.


BlackBerry Hub Display

RIM continues to offer BlackBerry Balance, which they featured in earlier releases, that allows a corporate "sandbox" to be configured on the device, allowing business and personal information to be kept separate. Not only is the information separated, no business information can be transferred out of that sandbox.

Finally, BB10 devices will be compatible with the BlackBerry Enterprise Server (BES), and with the addition of BlackBerry Fusion, the BES management platform can now support iOS and Android devices as well. RIM has also added video chat to the popular BlackBerry Messenger service, and the browser is also greatly improved, something that's long overdue.

Next page: Predictive Typing

In his very balanced review in CIO, long time BlackBerry fan Al Sacco points to the touch-screen keyboard, which he calls "the best touch-screen, virtual keyboard I have ever used, hands down." Besides adapting to how you hit the "keys", it has a great predictive text feature. Where most predictive systems display next word above what you're typing, the BB10 can provide several "guesses" for the next word and positions each above the letter it starts with. So if the next word is "but" it's right there above the "B". The software also learns to shape those predications based on phrases you use regularly. As a result, when you're "rolling", you can effectively be typing each successive word with a single tap.


BB10 Predictive Typing Display

RIM has also come up with a feature that, while it has virtually no business value, is a neat trick: TimeShift camera. When you take a picture, the camera actually takes several pictures over a second or so. So if someone has their eyes closed or is making a face, you can select that face and dial through all the images that were captured and select the best one. You can actually do that on multiple faces so the image you wind up with might be one that never actually existed!

So the feel is good, the user interface has some interesting new capabilities, but what about the apps? RIM is claiming that there are 70,000 apps posted with more to come. While I didn't see it called out specifically, one of the demo screens has the icon for BlackBerry Travel, which for my money is still the best travel app around (and it's free). BlackBerry App World has also been redesigned and is now more on par with the iTunes store and Google Play (Note: I really don't know how Google expects to entice enterprise users to an app store with "Play" in the title).

On the plus side Twitter, Foursquare, Untappd, and Facebook are available for BB10, but it's missing Netflix, Instagram, Spotify, and most importantly, Pandora. Mr. Sacco also points out that a number of the current apps are buggy and unstable, and he cites problems in the location services, the calendar, and even the browser.

While RIM claims that other big name developers will get on board once the platform begins to gain traction, that could turn out to be the fatal "chicken-and-egg" for BB10. Without sales, developers are reluctant to get on the bandwagon, but without apps, you're not getting sales. Virtually every developer I talk to (including most of the UC vendors) says they are currently taking a wait-and-see view toward BlackBerry. If they "wait" too long, there won't be anything left to "see."

All in all, RIM has done a good job with BB10--other than getting into the market a year or two too late. The Z10 has the good solid feel that is characteristic of BlackBerry devices, and there are certainly a number of fresh and innovative features--and we haven't seen too much that's "fresh" out of Cupertino of late. But the fact that RIM is still weeks away from a US launch is demoralizing, particularly when the keyboard model is even farther in the future.

Speaking for the US market, I don't think BB10 is going to move the needle for RIM--or whatever they want to call themselves. The real BlackBerry loyalists want the keyboard, but they're going to have to wait for it. Users who really want a touch screen but are stuck with BlackBerry due to their companies' policies will get a boost with the Z10.

I think RIM's biggest hopes will lie in the global markets where they still hold a significant presence, and that's where the greatest success for the Z10 will come. However, as the Apple and Android footprints expand, there's no reason to believe that those buyers won't follow the same pattern we've seen here in the US.

RIM is taking a stab at it and will even be running an ad (content undisclosed) during the Super Bowl. One last piece of news, the company also announced that it has hired the very talented Alicia Keys as global creative director. I don't actually know what a "global creative director" does, but I can just hear her singing, "This phone is on 'fi-yah'!"

Follow Michael Finneran on Twitter and Google+!
@dBrnWireless
Michael Finneran on Google+