Hasta La Gadget!

Today at RIM‘s launch event in New York City for BlackBerry 10, the company (which has renamed itself to just “BlackBerry”) officially unveiled two new devices, one of which we’ve already heard about plenty of times. The BlackBerry Z10 is one of RIM’s first devices that will run the company’s new BlackBerry 10 operating system, and it comes with a full touchscreen display, which isn’t the first time RIM has done this, but it certainly isn’t common for them.

The BlackBerry Z10 has a 4.2-inch display, with a pixel density of 356 ppi and a 1280 x 756 resolution. It’s a slightly smaller display than most other Android devices out on the market currently, but the impressive pixel density will surely please any BlackBerry user. The back of the device has a “textured surface” that makes it “really comfortable to hold.”

The device will come in both black and white models, and essentially, the rumors and leaks have turned out to be mostly true. It has the overall rectangular shape with the rounded corners, as well as the camera and LED flash up in the top-left corner. The new device also has what’s called Time Shift Mode, in which it allows users to take a photo, and then go back in time to find the exact moment of a particular facial reaction — a pretty clever feature for those that are avid camera slingers.

Not a lot of specifics have been revealed just yet, but I’m sure we’ll hear more as the event continues. However, it’s nice to finally see the BlackBerry Z10 in all its official glory, rather than those sneaky shots taken from within the shadows, as seen in BlackBerry’s recent teases. Stay tuned for more BB10 news!

BlackBerry Z10 officially announced is written by Craig Lloyd & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

The four biggest smartphone applications in social — Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, and Foursquare — are headed to BlackBerry’s latest software platform, BlackBerry 10, via BlackBerry World. Not exactly a surprise considering that somewhere in the ballpark of 70,000 apps are planned for BB 10 at launch, eh? The first three were demonstrated on-stage during today’s BB 10 launch event, and were all shown as integrated with BB Hub (as partially revealed in a recent leak).

We’re also seeing Angry Birds Star Wars featured on BBW, but we expect to hear a lot more about applications any minute now.

Filed under: Cellphones, Handhelds, Mobile, RIM

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The BlackBerry keyboard is dead, long live the BlackBerry keyboard. Despite the full throttle touchscreen focus of its new mobile platform, BlackBerry 10, the company formerly known as RIM has not forgotten its most fervent fans’ adoration of those little plastic keys and has thrown them a bone — or rather a handset.

Meet the hybrid BlackBerry Q10 (below right, next to the full-touch Z10), a touchscreen smartphone that also packs in a full physical Qwerty keyboard for those who just can’t bring themselves to stop stroking plastic keys. The lack of an optical nav pad may still cause long-time BlackBerry lovers a spot of angst.

The company showed off the Q10 at the launch of BB10 today. “We know there are a lot of physical keyboard lovers out there,” said CEO Thorsten Heins.

The Qwerty-packing handset resembles the N Series BB10 device which leaked in a promo video last September – with a ‘classic’ BlackBerry shape housing a relatively generously sized touchscreen that’s nonetheless considerably smaller than the Z10 full-touch device that RIM also unboxed today.

Another difference between the Z10 and the Q10 is that the latter necessarily lacks some of the ‘smart keyboard’ software features found on BB10 full-touch devices. The full touchscreen keyboard includes a predictive text feature that positions suggested words above the next letter you’d have to type to spell the word out — so you can quickly swipe up to add the whole word. That smart positioning just isn’t possible with plastic keys getting in the way.

The Z10′s virtual keyboard also customises to its owner in a way that the Q10′s physical Qwerty never can: the central strike points of each key can move by up to half a key to adjust to your particular typing style (with the aim of reducing typos). Again, good luck trying to wear down plastic keys to suit your sausage fingers.

As with the Z10, the Q10′s BB10 software analyses your messaging history to learn more about the language you use — and will apparently incorporate what it learns about your vocab and slang into its next-word suggestions.

Despite RIM’s efforts to oust the old and usher in the new with BB10 it’s not a surprise the company has kept a toehold in the physical keyboard camp. Back in September Heins reaffirmed RIM’s commitment to keys, telling attendees at the BlackBerry Jam developers’ conference that both full touchscreen and physical keyboard BB10 devices would be unboxed. Today he made good on that pledge.

Heins also described the keyboard as one of the main points of focus for RIM in BB10, along with productivity, reliability, security and multi-tasking.

Although the Z10 will be available in the U.K. from tomorrow, in Canada from February 5 and in the U.S. from March – with an estimated retail pricing of $149.99 on a three year contract – there’s no word (yet) on the Q10′s availability or pricing.

This week the folks at RIM ushered in BlackBerry 10 with a series of bangs, President and CEO of RIM Thorsten Heins making congratulations as well as thanks around the globe for what he (and RIM) hopes will be the most massive launch they’ve ever pushed. The official BlackBerry 10 event took place today in New York City with streams shown live throughout the planet, this being just one example of what Heins noted was RIM’s hopw for a “hyper-connected” environment for the future. BlackBerry 10 will be all about “people who need to get things done, and people who need simplicity and balance.”

The keys for this launch are, as Heins has made clear, the fact that “BlackBerry 10 [is] built to keep you moving.” RIM has made clear that “a good browser, apps, camera, and fast network” are simply expected in any smartphone – but that BlackBerry 10 will go beyond that. Heins spoke on “secure communications and a real-time platform” for the future – this is no tiny release.

Noting that “today represents a new day for the history of BlackBerry”, Heins spoke about the hard workers at QNX, former RIM CEO Jim Balsille, and Mike Lazaridis as well, thanking them all for everything they contributed to BlackBerry 10 over the past two years. “We made the decision to go it alone”, Heins assured the world, letting them know that it was either that or adopt “someone else’s platform.”

This has been encapsulated in RIM’s new brand: BlackBerry. That’s right – no more Research in Motion, just BlackBerry. That’s the new brand name, the vision for this brand being “One Brand. One promise.” Heins said quite clearly that “from today on, we are BlackBerry everywhere in the world.” Keep your eyes peeled to the SlashGear BlackBerry 10 tag portal for more BlackBerry action today and through the future!

RIM CEO: “Today is not the finish, it’s just the starting line” is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Here it is. It’s the new Blackberry 10. It’s official, it looks exactly like the leaked photos and the renders we published. More »