The BlackBerry Torch 9800 is RIM’s first hybrid BlackBerry, packing in both touchscreen and QWERTY keyboard. From the outside, with its keyboard slid out, it looks not unlike the Palm Pre, while closed it’s very similar in design to the BlackBerry Storm 2.
Around the back, the BlackBerry Torch 9800 echoes the design of the most recent BlackBerry Bold. Read on, gawp at our hands-on pictures, and find out how the BlackBerry Torch 9800 performs in the flesh.
Despite a comparatively low clock speed (624MHz), the BlackBerry Torch 9800 is speedy. That’s mainly thanks to the completely re-worked BlackBerry 6 OS humming away inside it. RIM says almost every app has been re-coded from scratch to make BlackBerry 6 lightning fast and more powerful too, and while we can’t honestly say it looks a great deal more attractive, there have been definite functionality improvements.
While BlackBerry OS 5 already boasted respectable Facebook and Twitter apps, they’ve both been sucked into one stream, like Friend Stream on HTC Sense smartphones. Things felt eerily Storm like otherwise, until we fired up the browser. The BlackBerry browser has been behind the times for three years now, but the Blackberry 6 browser on the Blackberry Torch 9800 finally fixes things.
It’s fast, HTML5 friendly, and finally, finally, allows for tab switching. This will undoubtedly change how you use your BlackBerry: the days of waiting to get home to look something up on a site you know doesn’t work on your phone are over.
While we couldn’t test out the Wi-Fi media syncing offered in BlackBerry 6, we did get to test out the new universal search on the BlackBerry Bold 9800. It’s nowhere near as smooth and impressive as that found on webOS, but being able to type to launch an app makes for quicker opening times than burying down through folders every time.
In the hand, the BlackBerry Torch 9800 feels solid. The sliding mechanism is smooth, and locks in nicely. While we like the back of the phone (Which is best described as, er, ribbed), we can’t say it’s much of a looker otherwise. The chrome finish and top remind us of 2006 BlackBerry models more than anything else, and the 3.5mm audio port is still on the side, rather than the top of the handset, which is a big red cross for anyone who carries their phone in their pocket.
The keyboard itself looks almost identical to the QWERTY on the Bold 9700, and it rests above a lip that’s not nearly as sharply as the deadly blade on the Palm Pre. We had a quick go bashing out an email and we’d say it’s not quite as easy to type with as the 9700, mainly because you have to reach down below the front face of the phone to get it. But it’s still better than any physical keyboard on any Android phone, and we’ll save a full verdict for some more thorough speed tests.
The capacitive 3.2-inch touchscreen on the BlackBerry Torch 9800 meanwhile is a revelation for RIM, if one that’s come a few years too late. SurePress is finally gone, though the 3.2-inch, low res 480×360 panel stays, but it’s responsive to all your taps, gentle or heavy.
It looks fine for video and web browsing, but looks suspiciously grainy on the menus and homescreen. We have a feeling this is going to be the biggest stickler for us comeme review time. But the onscreen QWERTY keyboard is eminently usable, and pinch to zoom works on the browser – sometimes smoothly, sometimes staggered, but it’s still better for it.
We’re intrigued by the Blackberry Torch 9800. Physical keyboards still have their place, and to offer one plus a screen slightly bigger than a Garibaldi biscuit, that incorporates a touchscreen browser seems like a great compromise. But with no visible “Wow” factors, whether it can pull converts back from Android and the iPhone however, remains to be seen.
Have a look at the BlackBerry Torch 9800 right here – is it what you were hoping for?
Out TBC | £TBC | BlackBerry
