Several sites are reporting that BlackBerry Mobile seems to be prepping a new QWERTY phone after the modest success of the KEYone. From GSMarena:
The new BBF100-1 has a physical QWERTY keyboard too and it will keep the screen resolution of the Keyone, namely 1,080x1,620. It's unclear if the screen size will stay the same at 4.5", but it wouldn't be surprising if it did.
A clear upgrade will come in processing power, because the Keyone's successor will sport Qualcomm's Snapdragon 660 chipset. It comes with a 2.2 GHz octa-core Kryo 260 CPU and the Adreno 512 GPU, along with the X12 LTE modem enabling up to 600Mbps peak download speeds and 150Mbps peak uploads. All in all, it should definitely provide better performance than the Snapdragon 625 inside the Keyone.
So not the Passport 2 many people have hoped for, but good news for the few still demanding a physical keyboard on their mobile devices. It seems that BlackBerry, or now TCL could do well just releasing updated models of a handful of devices every few years rather than brand new devices and formfactors every time.
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Tuesday October 31 2017, @12:12AM (2 children)
Looks nice, but it's just a bit too big, because it tries to enable touch typing. Typing without putting it down on a flat surface has to be sub-optimal.
I had a Moto side-slider in the 4" range, and the keys were just right (darn screen controller died on two separate ones). I would love an updated one (less bezels for a bit more screen, in the same small overall size), or a clamshell version of that.
The Priv is great, but the keys are not that big, for a phone which barely fits in my pockets.
(Score: 3, Funny) by Phoenix666 on Tuesday October 31 2017, @12:31AM
You wear, now what do they call those things?...non-cargo pants?
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by KiloByte on Tuesday October 31 2017, @01:41AM
Yeah, that's my primary concern. At the moment, the only way you can get my N900 is over my dead body, and I backed Gemini precisely to get a N900 replacement. I use it extensively, multiple hours per day, and always in positions where I don't have a flat surface to put it on.
N900's keyboard is awesome as long as you remap it (Nokia's setup is pants-on-the-head retarded, with a touchscreen menu required for most non-alpha symbols). You type with two thumbs, but that's quite comfortable. Let's see if moving from 11.09cm to 17.14 will remain ok. Since I already paid, I'll let you guys know. They currently promise shipping in Dec (a remark hidden inside one of updates says about a 3 weeks delay, not mentioned on the main page), which, based on experiences with similar projects, means somewhere in April, but we'll see.
Ceterum censeo systemd esse delendam.