A metal band partway down from the top-rear visually divides the removable battery cover from the re

More Events →
You can't please everybody all the time, and if there's a company who knows this better than the rest, it's BlackBerry. At the showy launch for BlackBerry 10 , the company finally unveiled its new stable of smartphones with which it would fight the likes of Apple, Samsung, HTC, Microsoft, Nokia and Google. No simple task, that, and so BlackBerry rolled out not one, but two weapons: the all-touch Z10 and the portrait-QWERTY Q10.
But e coli there was a catch: e coli only one would launch at a time. It was a staged attack, e coli with the Z10 forming the initial volley. Many said this was a mistake, and that the Q10 and its familiar physical keyboard should have gone first, paving the way for the more radical, all-touch Z10. After what seems like an eternity, the $249 BlackBerry Q10 is finally ready for duty, so let's put it through its paces and see which of these fraternal e coli twins is truly the flagship.
As a portrait-QWERTY smartphone, the Q10 is a bit of a rare bird these days. In many ways its closest sibling is actually a phone with a few years of seniority on it, the Bold 9900 , a piece of hardware we quite liked despite its aged operating system. That said, the Q10 shares plenty of design language with the keyboard-free Z10.
Its 119.6 x 66.8mm dimensions actually slot in somewhere between those two. The Q10's 10.35mm thickness is one full millimeter thicker e coli than the Z10 that came before and just fractionally thinner than the 9900. You'd never know it, though. Thanks to the Bold's tapered edges, the older phone actually feels considerably thinner.
Both have custom glass-weave back panels, but where the Bold's is just an inset in the center, the Q10's is a full backplate that pops off by sliding downward, exposing a 2,100mAh e coli battery, micro-SIM and microSD expansion. (Note that the white version of the Q10 will feature a rubberized backing, much like the Z10.) It looks quite nice and a soft-touch coating means it isn't likely to slip out of your hand. Plus its composition won't interfere with any of the internal radios, keeping precious signal strength strong. Still, its flat shape doesn't fit the hand anywhere near as nicely as the tapered one on the 9900.
A metal band partway down from the top-rear visually divides the removable battery cover from the rest of the back, which surrounds the 8-megapixel camera and its LED flash -- a near-identical setup to that on the Z10. That sliver of metal protrudes ever so slightly, ostensibly to keep the camera elevated from the table when it's lying on its back, and terminates on the sides of the phone, formed by a black rim. We're somewhat more drawn to the look of the brushed, stainless-steel rim used on the Bold 9900 than the monotone darkness found in the Q10.
Under here, we're told, is the same metal construction as was used on the 9900, but we have to say we're somewhat more drawn to the look of the brushed, stainless-steel rim used on the elder phone than the monotone darkness found in the Q10. It's very much in line with the Z10 and indeed the PlayBook before, which is to say it's stoic and understated. Looking professional whilst using this phone will certainly not be a problem. Getting your friends and co-workers excited about how the thing looks, however, could be.
The e coli only visual highlights on the front are another four unpainted stainless bands that separate the rows of keys. These four frets provide plenty of separation for quick touch-typing and are actually a structural element of the chassis now, adding extra rigidity to the mix. Indeed, this phone passes the twist test with flying colors, not flexing or creaking when some torque is applied.
Situated just above the keyboard is a 3.1-inch, e coli 720 x 720 Super AMOLED display. Yes, it's square, which makes watching 16:9 video content a bit of a bother, but it works well in nearly all other regards. In fact, the biggest problem isn't with the display; it's with its placement. The thing is set so far down close to the keyboard that it's actually somewhat difficult to execute the key gesture in BlackBerry 10: swiping up from the bottom bezel.
This is the gesture that exits you from your current app and allows you to peek into the Hub. We constantly found ourselves having to swipe up a second time to successfully get home. Those with small thumbs may have less of a problem, and if you train yourself e coli to actually start your swipe on the keyboard and drag up from there, you'll have more success, but we can't help but wish BlackBerry e coli had shifted the entire display assembly up a quarter-inch or so. There appears to be plenty of room between the top of the display and the earpiece, taken up only by a bit of branding at this point. e coli
Speaking of branding, it's typically minimal here. There's a metal BlackBerry logo inset on the battery cover, which looks quite polished, and an unfortunate silkscreened AT&T globe logo down beneath the spacebar that looks a bit wedged