Neowin: BlackBerry Z30 review

[Neowin]

BlackBerry is in a tough spot, with consumers leaving the brand faster than a burning platform, and with carriers now turning a cold shoulder to the once dominant smartphone vendor, what’s a company to do? Well, for now, it seems, you keep pumping out new phones that you hope consumers will adore.

And that’s what BlackBerry has done with the newly released Z30. The phone, which is the follow-up to the Z10, is another attempt by BlackBerry to produce a modern device that does away with its old ‘business only’ image and hopes to appeal to those who want a touchscreen device. This new appeal comes on the back of BB10, which I noted was far from perfect the last time I reviewed a device running the refreshed OS.  With the Z30 running an updated version, it will prove to be a good testament to see if BlackBerry has been able to refine its OS or if the company is still residing on the values of yesterday in hopes of making it successful tomorrow.

The Z30 is for sale on Verizon with a two-year contract price of $199.99 or an off contract price of $549.99.

Read the rest of the review.

This article is brought to you in partnership with Neowin.

Permalink to story.

https://www.techspot.com/news/54898-neowin-blackberry-z30-review.html

 

[Lionvibez]

That review is lacking!

And the reviewer seems like a novice.

"activate a ?sleep? mode by swiping down from the top to show an analog clock."

This has been available on the phone since launch not the 10.2 update.

"If you are used to having a ?Home? button like Android, Windows Phone and iPhone all have, using BB10 can be a bit frustrating."

What is so frustrating about swiping up from the bottom instead of hitting a home button. If someone can't learn to swipe up,down,left,right then you shouldn't own a smart phone.

"Along with app crashes, there were times where the display became unresponsive, forcing a hard reset of the device."

I've seen application crashes on andriod and windows phone so how is this a minus for blackberry and not the others.

There is plenty more of which I don't agree with in this review but I have other things do to with my time currently.

As always folks talk to someone that owned this phone has used it for more than 6 months to get a more accurate review.

 

[Guest]

This review reads like the guy used the phone for a good 30 minutes. Not enough time to evaluate any phone, let alone something that's actually trying to be different. Claiming the gestures aren't superior to home button, while an opinion, is a little like saying training wheels on a bike are better because you never fall over.

Never mentioned the spectacular speakers that put any other phone on the market to shame. No mention of the self-seeking contacts app. Glossed over the actionable notifications. You can be in the middle of a game, your message pops up at the top, you type your reply, all without leaving the app.. Which is really cool for focusing on what you're doing. This guy would have you believe it makes more sense to hit a home button, go into the messages, tap the message, and then reply.

And for the record in 10.2.1, you can run essentially any android apk directly on the phone. There's no more using the app argument against blackberry anymore with that update.