Tuesday, 18 November 2008

Blackberry Torch 9800


Here goes. I bought this device because I love that it combined the full qwerty keyboard with a touchscreen. I found out that not everything that glitters is gold.



I love:



Full keyboard, camera and display on this device. It has a very smooth track to open the keyboard. It's simply a perfect idea in its conception.



I hate:



It's slow and I mean slow on the processor end. It takes some getting used to in order to delete multiple messages, but the WORST is that when I am on a call, the darn thing intermitently pushes numbers (like if your toddler was trying to get your attention and starting pushing the button on the phone to make them beep). It also has put people on speaker phone while we are talking which is a big no-no for me. Lastly, it hangs up while I'm on a call, which is the worst insult of all. And no, I don't have a fat cheek.



I can't imagine that RIM's engineers and beta testers didn't run into the problem. At least with my IPhone, the screen goes black when you put it up to your ear so this doesn't happen. I say back to the drawing board and I'm sending this back. BlackBerry 9800 Torch Unlocked Phone with 5 MP Camera, Full QWERTY Keyboard, 4 GB Internal Storage, and Slider Card Slot Up to 32GB - International Version with No Warranty (Black)

I've been through a couple 8220 Flips and a 9550 Storm 2 that I've owned and I've used a few Curves and Bolds and this is by far the best Blackberry, hands down. Trying to compare it to previous BB models is downright unfair as it blows the all out of the water. The touch screen is a huge improvement over the Storm 2 and its nice to see standard gestures like pinch to zoom are supported. The fact that it has the full querty keyboard and trackpad makes it an easy transition from non-touch phones and also makes it more efficient in general as a lot of operations feel more natural doing it the "old-fashioned" way instead of touch-screen.

The camera is much improved and BB OS6 is a huge improvement over previous versions. I love Social Feeds and how tightly the apps integrate with your contacts and the phone sofware in general. The new search feature is great too; just start typing and it brings results from contacts, emails, social feeds, applications, etc.



So basically, as far as Blackberrys are concerned, you can't go wrong!



Compared to other smartphones and mainly the iPhone4 you can tell that the touchscreen still has a ways to go before it reaches the same maturity as the others who've been doing this for longer. Also, as far as apps go, its definitely lacking. There are very few good free apps and games and the games are just downright terrible compared to the amazing stuff that's coming out for iPhone. That said, gaming probably isn't a big priority if you want a Blackberry.



All in all, I'm very satisfied! I've been wanting this phone for over 6 months and watched tons of reviews and hyped the thing up so much and despite all of that I still managed to get surprised with this phone. It's awesome!



Pros

----

+ Real touchscreen with all gestures

+ Trackpad and QWERTY Keyboard = best of both worlds

+ BB OS6 is great

+ 5MP camera



Cons

----

- Touch is a little awkward at times

- Freezes/chokes for a few seconds occasionally

- Lacking in app department

- Crappy games

I bought the phone to be used in India and so far it has been a good phone and works as expected. Below are pros and cons in my opinion



Pros

1. Good looking and sturdy feel.

2. It has the most recent blackberry OS which is a bit more user friendly and intuitive than the previous version

3. The touchscreen interface is similar to iPhone and much better than the BB storm



Cons

1. The touch keyboard is not as reponsive as the iPhone. It may get better with more practice but atleast initially it feels a bit clumsier and tad too sensitive. The physical keyboard is good.

2. The OS is still not as user friendly as the iPhone's iOS.

3. The BB appworld is a joke compared to Apple. Also the fact there are multiple sources for downloading the apps takes some getting used to. Some of the apps such as Vonage and Skype are not available for blackberry torch. I hope this gets resolved soon.



Overall, not a bad phone.

I had this phone for over a month now, and here are just some thoughts about it.



I enjoy reading online novels, and having this phone I am allow to sit in my car reading something while just chilling or waiting for someone.

It works perfectly fine with some short stories. But when it goes to loading huge amount of texts (300,000 and up), it takes quite some time(maybe 3 or 4 minutes or even more) to just finish downloading the page, and then it will take another 2 minutes to adjust the format as you zoom in. And if you are not careful enough holding the device up tight and so happen to flip it just a bit (or maybe just taking a sip of a drink or a call), it will automatically change its viewing from straight to side and here goes another extra 2 minutes again.

I don't know if iphone or android have the same problem; yet I am actually fine with waiting the initial 3 minutes of the loading part.

But honestly, I think it should have some sort of applications to lock the viewing as you are surfing the internet.



And sometimes, it doesn't happen very often, while you are surfing the internet, the page somehow freezes and the back of the device starts heating up. And within 1 or 2 minutes period, the battery life suddently drops about 30%. I kinda worry if this is goning to damage the device.



The actual keyboard is awesome, but the touch screen keyboard is just retarded. You often typed in the letter below the one you actually typed.



The camera doesn't have a tiny mirror next to it, so it's really hard for you to take a picture of yourself.



The back cover became a bit lose after I accidently dropped it six inches height to the desk, but it is probably my own fault (however I still haven't found the part that makes the cover lose).



I think it's an ok device, and if rim fixes the touch screen keyboard and make some adjustments to the internet surfing, I'd rate it as 4 stars.'


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