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The BlackBerry KEY2 is a brand new phone that is trying to coexist with an old-school form factor, and to fight it all the way. When it comes to capturing nostalgia, TCL – which has licensed the BlackBerry brand for smartphones since 2016 – has done a great job. The problem is, it has not been so successful in the manufacture of an indispensable smartphone.
Indeed, KEY2's reviews are included – ours are included – and the general consensus is that while physical keyboards have some charm, it does not really fit the priorities of 2018. Like KEYone's year Lastly, there are some inherent compromises that you simply have to accept when you decide to press a full set of QWERTY keys on the fascia of your Candy Bar phone.
In the case of the BlackBerry KEY2, the handover of the keypad on the bottom quarter of the handset means that there is only enough space left for TCL to adapt to a 4.5 touch screen. inches. This contrasts with the LG G7 ThinQ, which is about the same height and width, yet accommodates a 6.1-inch screen. There are clearly significant benefits to showing only a keyboard when you need it.
The TCL designers have done a pretty impressive job of redoing the clbadic BlackBerry keyboard for a modern Android device. They have apparently taken inspiration from the BlackBerry Bold 9900, a seven-year-old phone that still has its fans under its deeply tactile keys. If you only look at keyboard performance, it's certainly not a bad starting point.
If you hope to get ideas for making a complete smartphone, however, the Bold 9900 would be a terrible model. The way we rely on our smartphones has changed dramatically since 2011: screens have become bigger and bigger as we consume more content. Not just photos and videos, but also apps, complete productivity suites, and more.
In this respect, the KEY2 feels like a retro-return a lot of time, and not in a good way. When sending messages or replying to e-mails, there are many things to love about your keys. The rest of the time, they just take the space that a bigger screen could have better use. TCL combines this by dedicating a large piece of space between the bottom edge of the touch screen and the top of the keyboard, just for the touch buttons on the back, the house and the application.
Look, I am perfectly happy with the keyboards on the screen at this point. The flexibility of having a QWERTY keyboard appears when I need it, and then disappears when I do not do it, personally, far better to have a configuration of physical keys that permanently occupy l & # 39; space. The fact that the on-screen keyboards can change the layout according to different languages, or show emojis, or all the different symbols we need, makes them – again, speaking personally – much more helpful.
Nevertheless, I concede that some people still like a physical keyboard. There is a lot to say for muscle memory, and the ability of your fingers to get to the right button without necessarily having to look where they're tapping. What I would like to see is that TCL is looking at another part of the BlackBerry back catalog for the 2019 KEY3 (or whatever it is called). That's the BlackBerry Priv.
I will forgive you if you have erased the Priv from your memory. Released at the end of 2015, it was the last breath of BlackBerry Limited's hardware aspirations, and the first to run on Android. Combining a complete design with a sliding QWERTY keyboard, he promised the best of both worlds.
It is difficult to describe the Priv as a success, exactly. The reviews were rather average, with praise for the form factor tempered by its subpar specifications and its stupidly high price. Sales, meanwhile, have struggled. Although the company's executives have been trying to give a positive boost to the situation, the $ 699 unlocked price has left only the most loyal BlackBerry fans ready to ship. By the time he reached the end of life in December 2017, you could not say exactly that someone would miss him.
This may not seem like a basis for building a new BlackBerry slider, but TCL has shown that it may surprise us. What the KEY2 gets – and what KEYone got right before it – is the fundamentals. TCL has opted for a midrange Snapdragon processor rather than a flagship chipset because it is both cheaper and more frugal. It paired with a huge battery, and together they offer a ridiculously solid battery life. Two days of regular use are eminently achievable.
You still get a headphone jack, and a microSD card slot. In addition, TCL does not cut corners when it comes to build quality. The BlackBerry KEY2 feels, with its machined aluminum, textured rubber and tempered glbad, as if you could throw it down in a dive, and still be able to pick it up sheepishly and keep answering emails.
What I would like to see, then, are the lessons of KEY2 applied to Priv, for a completely modern BlackBerry. Metal, not plastic, for the chbadis. The intelligent physical keyboard that also serves as a fingerprint sensor and trackpad. The battery life is measured in days, not hours, and the focus is on getting things done with shortcut keys and handy apps.
I do not mind a more humble processor, if it's done in the name of extending the life of the usable battery. The dual rear camera of the KEY2 can also stay, although I think TCL might have new blood to rework its image processing algorithms: the low light performance is particularly dismal on the new BlackBerry, even if the Well lit clichés a quantity of discouraging grain.
All this, however, combined with a full size screen that reflects the reality of the mobile web environment and the application. I do not believe that fans of physical keyboards should be left without options, but I also do not believe that they should be left behind when it comes to experiencing the same environment software than that offered by consumer phones. I can not, honestly, say that the KEY2 realizes on this front.
This is not a small challenge for TCL, I realize it. The KEY2 has already climbed the price scale compared to its predecessor: while $ 550 would have you a KEYone at launch last year, you're looking for $ 650 for an unlocked KEY2 when it starts to be delivered towards the end of the month. Anything that adds physical complexity, such as a slide mechanism, carries the risk that this worsens this growing nomenclature and turns into a more expensive phone.
If the company is serious about introducing the BlackBerry – who is kicking and shouting – in the modern era, however, it must do it right. This means that if you are engaged in a physical keyboard yourself, choose the form factor that allows you to do it in the most flexible and convenient way.
I do not know if TCL sees things the same way as me, of course. However, if that is the case, we may not even have to wait until 2019 to find out. At the top of the year, we were promised not one but two new BlackBerry handsets in 2018. Hopefully the second time will be the charm.
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