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BlackBerry 10 Review: Good, But Too Late?
An anonymous reader writes "Ars has an extensive review of the newly-released BlackBerry 10 operating system. Since it's such a late entry into the market, the tech community has been eyeballing the new operating system with trepidation — would all that time go to waste with a poor offering, or would BlackBerry 10 be a reasonable alternative to iOS and Android? Well, it seems BlackBerry (the company formerly known as RIM) actually put the time to good use. The review finds most of the UI innovations to actually be.. innovative. "BlackBerry took a lot of time to see what the competition is doing, and then it worked to refine its operating system. It essentially had an excellent cheat sheet, filled with everything that has worked wonderfully and all the things that have bombed. That said, BlackBerry still has to mold its product for its two huge core audiences: the business-oriented multi-tasker and the developing smartphone markets. To that end, it has included all of the essential features and apps to appeal to both of those parties. The corporate user has his or her share of content to watch on the train ride to work, games and apps to help keep busy when not entrenched in a meeting, and the perfect Hub for messaging (not to mention the literal split between work and personal environments)." However, the review also notes that the system is not really designed to make people drop their Android or iOS devices, so uptake is going to be slow at best. The question for the platform's success (and the company's) is no longer 'Is it any good? but 'Is it too late?'"
There's also a review of the z10 smartphone itself.
BB appears to think is is an OS company. It even seems to be describing a backup plan that involves selling BB10 into embedded markets.
Surely, this is a mistake. They have/had great smartphone features, particularly around messaging, and they have server software running in most corporations around the world. But they have let these advantages slip away as they pursued the perfect OS.
Instead, they could have done as Amazon did, and skin Android to their liking. This would have got them to market at least a year sooner with a product that could easily still have been uniquely BB on the surface - and the surface is the only thing the smartphone user sees.
Its too late for everything but the RIM shot...
Until the perfect smartphone has been invented, there's always a chance. If BB could hit a homerun with this thing they could rock the smartphone world for sure.
Karma: Bad
Longtime Nexus owner, I got a Z10 yesterday and I am impressed. Die-hard Apple fanboys, iPhone 5 owners, admitted their envy and said they will to get it as company phone (yes, they can do that).
Laudele lor desigur m-ar mahni peste masura.
Are new cellphones no longer being sold? If its compelling, then people looking to upgrade might go for it. Companies looking for a standard set might elect to use it. Not saying whether it is compelling or not, but the idea that it is too late is just a bit silly.
How is it like iOS and Android? did you read the review or watch and of the videos of it? It's nothing like either of them. And how can you say 'that is what's killing it'? They just reported record sales in Canada and UK for the history of BlackBerry. Where do you get this stuff from.
It may be a mix of iOS and Android. It may be very late. But how is it the wrong product? What else could they have done? What should it have been?
Does it still need a BES server to interact with the corporate environment? Is it still a mess of expensive licensing and support? The first person who walks into my office to show me their shiny new BB10 and wants to get his company e-mail on it is going to be sorely disappointed when he finds out that he just blew $300 and a two year contract on a phone that won't work with our network because there isn't a chance in Hell that I'm spinning up another BES. Not now, not ever again. It was Good Riddance when I finally kicked that crap to the curb.
"Tell me doctor, with all of your defenses, are there any provisions for an attack by killer bees?"
Because I've used it and after using it I can 100% say that it's as if iOS and Android had a baby. Everything has record sales on release, wait a year and lets see how the sale are going to do. Everyone is just excited right now because of the new release.
Any company that lets a 'new guy on the block' run with your ball for 6 years before you challenge him has been smoking way to much weed.
If Steve Jobs weren't dead already, he would be so regretful of the fact that he could have produced a phone with no button on the front.
No, I consider that a full-blown bug, even at best.
If the device is simply not telling you what it knows about the battery charge, then you'll leave it on your outlet too long and raise your energy bill. That's a minor bug, but still a bug and one conquered long ago on other devices (where their current worry is which sleek patented brittle design will help sell their walled garden).
Now, if the device itself doesn't know its own battery life, that's a straight drive past Minor Bug Township into VERY VERY BAD Land, and klaxons should be going off and black helicopters should be armed and airborne because do you really want your phone (and pant pocket) with a side of kersploded lithium or whatnot due to overcharge? (I do not, kthx.)
You can hold down the "B" button for continuous firing.
It's the unspoken assumption that BB cannot possibly make any headway against iOS/Android. It has to be tanking... right? Because that's what it's expected to do.
:(
I'm excited for my current contract to be up so I can renew and get my hands on a Q10. Still a year away though
Ohh ok, so "cause I say so" is your stance. LOL very persuading. I've used it to and it's nothing like either of them, so there. "wait a year", excuse me? you just said something was killing it, now it's 'wait a year'. You're beyond repair, I'm not even gonna try
because: http://i.imgur.com/x7oce.jpg
Silence is a state of mime.
I don't care if it doesn't have hundreds of thousands of apps. From what I've read, BlackBerry 10 appears to be the answer to the horrific privacy problems known as iOS and Android. User-selectable application permissions so I can put a leash on those apps that want more of my data than they should. File encryption so a lost/stolen phone is a little less risky. Built-in CalDAV and CardDAV so I can sync my calendar and contacts with the server of my choice instead of handing all that information to Google. Yes, please!
Okay well first of all lets look at how you navigate both iOS and Android, you swipe! Now on the big impressive, new, completely redesigned, full blown ground up rework of the mobile platform!!!! Your swipe. BB10 Implements a software keyboard with predictive word guessing ( really poorly done, like all phones ), Android and iOS implement a software keyboard with bad predictive word guessing, so far VERY different! On BB10 you swipe left and right to pull apps open, on Android you swipe left / right to pull apps open.
On BB10 you swipe down for more settings on Android your swipe down for settings!!! OMG BB10 really pushed the limits so far. On BB10 you can rearrange you "desktop", on Android you can rearrange your "desktop". On BB10 you can use your settings menu to change everything, on iOS and Android you can go into the settings menu and change everything!!! Most if not all Android phones ressemble the iPhone, BB10 ressembles the iPhone.
On BB10 you can full utilize NFC, on Android you can fuilly utilize NFC to greater extent. Now I can keep going but so far BB10 is well done implemenation of Android + iOS. What Rim should of done is to include a HARD keyboard, they work much better. Include hard buttons that have multiplexed funcationlity to do away with swiping and made everything eye driven ( it exists!! ). Face it all BB10 did was copy the market and well that would work for anyone doing great in the market already, I don't think it does enough for a company who needs to relanch and start over.
It may well be that no matter how good BB10 really is, it just might be too late to save BlackBerry. Or maybe it will turn out to be so spectacularly good that all other platforms will be abandoned. The thing is, we have no idea what BB10's impact will be on BlackBerry until it's been out in the market for a while. It isn't up to writers to determine BB's future, it's the paying customers who have the most say. Here's the case for BB's survival: 1) Smartphone market penetration isn't 100%, not even in the US--every month there are new users entering the smartphone market 2) Not all smartphone users even care about apps; in fact, I've come across a number of people who seem to be almost "anti-app"; these users won't be so invested in either iOS or Android that migrating to a different platform will pose much hardship 3) Many seasoned smartphone veterans have come to HATE the iOS keyboard, and I can tell you anyone who sees the BB10 walks away impressed (in fairness, there ARE good alternative keyboards for Android, but even there BB10 enjoys an edge) Finally, BB10 seems to have had more thought given to actual, day-to-day usability. That isn't sexy, and it isn't easy to demonstrate in 3 minutes in a phone shop. What I think it stands a chance of doing, though, is building a base of committed customers who will spread legitimate word of mouth.
The playbook was released as an unfinished product, and they pretty much gave up trying to fix it.
It's getting BB10 though, which by the way is a whole new OS. I'm not sure your experiences are applicable to BB10, though they do show a disappointing disregard for customers. With RIM in such dire straits, I've got a mind to give them a pass on that one though. MS has done pretty much the same crap (my HD2 *couldn't* synch with Win7, and both were the current MS OSes at the time...), and MS never had any excuses.
The Cloud - because you don't care if your apps and data are up in the air.
WordPerfect?
"You can lead a horse to water but a pencil must be lead!" - Stan Laurel
It was Good Riddance when I finally kicked that crap to the curb.
I don't doubt that a system with the number of security/maintenance/update options as BES is a challenge to get your head around, and that is has some very strange quirks indeed, but I worry that you are more concerned about how easy your life is than about the security of your company's data.
BES is difficult/complex in order to enable the granularity of its offerings so that the company has secure content and up-to-date apps, and that this is virtually invisible to the many phone users. Undoubtedly it could be better written, and pricing is an issue, but there is precious little out there that can achieve the same security at present (beyond basic email).
Obviously it depends on what kind of content your users need mobile access to, and the risks to the business if security is compromised, but I do wonder if you undertook a proper risk assessment before you got rid of your BES.
Although I guess they're technically doing away with the traditional BES for BB10 devices, they still have some type of server product you have to install that serves a similar function. This is both a key to the power of BB10 and a real roadblock to adoption -- especially if the software is going to cost money!
The BB users don't really see or care much about the server side of things, but corporate I.T. sure does. Traditionally, small businesses were in for a pretty serious expense if they wanted to add BES to the corporate Exchange server. The last small business I worked at went with Android and iPhone but never Blackberry for that reason alone. The cellular plans and user support were enough of a hassle without adding the high licensing cost of the BES product on top of all of it.
On the flip side, I *really* like the dual profile feature of BB10 (which relies on the back end server-side product). Companies can define all the apps they allow for business use on one side, and then users are still free to install whatever apps they like on the "personal" side of the phone. The two are firewalled off from each other, so for example - Facebook on the personal side won't allow pasting of content that was copied from apps on the business side. That could save a lot of people from carrying 2 phones around ... and is a pretty elegant solution to a long unaddressed issue.
Yeah, the dual profile feature sounds really nice. I wish more phones did that. It'll be interesting to see how well that works out and what kind of security holes will appear.
"Tell me doctor, with all of your defenses, are there any provisions for an attack by killer bees?"
How is it like iOS and Android?
let me turn that around. how isn't it like android? if you showed me those screenshots and said BB had skinned android, i wouldn't have argued.
really, i'm curious what you are thinking.
Even outside of the mainstream Canadian media, it seems like the new BB is getting a good reception and is moving out of stores. I'm guessing that a lot of people are like me: they buy a phone and keep it for at least a couple of years; they use it heavily for e-mail and related tasks; they don't care about "skins" or Angry Birds or iTunes or YouTube - they want a reliable tool.
I'm looking at the new Blackberrys to replace my Google phone not because I want or need BIS, but because I find the Nexus just isn't cut out for creating and handling information. By which I mean, writing an e-mail more than three sentences long.
I've been looking for BB reviews to get a better idea how well it will work for me, but until these Ars reviews have been frustrated by the fragmentary and biased nature of everything I've found. Between the anti-RIM bitching, and the BB fanboi commentards, there is bloody little useful information to be had.
At least now I know how it will play with Gmail, which I use pretty much exclusively. I think I read that the BB will work OK with Google calendar. I'm happy to finally get a reasonable idea of:
Real world battery life - not "if you turn off 4G." Battery with GPS, WIFI, and full phone function running.
How does the mapping and GPS compare to Google, or can I use Google's product on the phone?
Still to be answered:
How is the BB to use in cold or wet conditions - this is Canada after all, and the Nexus touchscreen can be pretty irritating in snow and ice.
Does the BB, unlike my JB powered Nexus, allow me turn off the shutter click?*
And, now that I think about it, and realizing that somewhere along the line I seem to have become a Linux geek, how flexible is this beast? What can I turn on or off? How rich are the settings that I can choose from? Will BB and/or the cel companies promise me regular and current software updates - unlike Android, where there are still ICS and even Honeycomb phones being sold!
*Yes, it matters to me. And please don't jump in with "But it's THE LAW in some places that you can't do that" unless you can offer a cite.
Three Squirrels
My Playbook does VOIP and video calling. The app was free, too.
BBM is through a tethered connection to my phone, though my Playbook has an option for its own cellular data connection. I've no idea if that would make it BBM capable, I'm not going to pay for a second connection to find out when the Bluetooth link reaches throughout my home and my office.
You can load Android apps on it if you wish, though you do need a bit of knowledge or just some Google-Fu to find the instructions on how to do it.
Android's just another layer on that layer cake called Linux.
Where as QNX is a fair dinkum realtime OS & the favourite OS of nuclear reactors & machines that go beep in hospitals
They've got their critics and the best thing anyone can say is their revenue looks to be trending downward. Call me when they've declared bankruptcy. They have a neat looking phone on the market and all I hear about it is "well they can't possibly compete with Apple or Androids."
I swear to God...I swear to God! That is NOT how you treat your human!
No
Your list are things that are kind of issues, but I see three bigger ones:
1) User aspect of the security model is not good. By asking for all permissions upfront, you are really just begging for everyone to not pay attention to any of them. There is no context around what you are agreeing to.
2) Many, many Android devices are rooted and it's very easy to root systems, which weakens the internal security model. Add to taht that most technical users (read: company workers) will also allow app installation from other sources.
3) (BIG GINORMOUS ISSUE) SD card security. Since people can and will install apps on SD cards, it leaves a LOT of data vulnerable to being copied from other applications. Even if the files are encrypted just being able to get to them and send them off means someone else gets all the time they like to try and decrypt them.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
At the core, QNX and Android are based on kernels providing POSIX services. The kernel system calls/API do not translate into a strong phone or a weak phone.
The userland is wildly different between these devices. Android relies on the Dalvik JVM to translate a synthetic bytecode, while the QNX phone focus is Javascript among others.
In theory, either kernel could be used to run either userland. For the QNX phone, this is also practice, as it runs Android apps.
Android runs on Linux. Do we argue that Linux is inherently insecure?
There are lots of other kernels that provide POSIX. Building a phone out of the SCO Openserver kernel would not in itself make an insecure phone. Flaws in phone security flow from userland design, not the kernel.
No keyboard no way. Without the keyboard they got nothing I can't get from other sources cheaper.
They keyboard is if anything BB10's strongest point. Yes it is virtual but they really, really thought through how to make it as usable as the old-school Blackberry keyboard.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
If you showed me iOS and said it was an Android skin, it would be plausible. If you showed me Windows Phone 8 and told me it was an Android skin, it would be plausible (you swipe to get between two views? shocker!). On the surface, all touchscreen OSs work in a pretty similar way. Unless you care about kernels and SDKs, the rest is just rearranging the furniture.
BB10 has a few distinguishing features that I can tell. The sandboxing thing sounds like a very novel feature. The security is still promised to be top-notch. BB messenger is still a big selling point to certain demographics. If it can combine these with a pleasurable user experience, decent build quality, rounded app store selection, and a compelling price- I don't see why it shouldn't do well.
I recall the exact same BS coming from Linux zealots a 10 years ago - buy a Zaurus it runs Linux!!! Yes it did and the device was still an expensive, battery sucking, heap of shit compared to a Palm or even a Windows Mobile devices of the same vintage. Palm devices especially were popular not for the prowess of the kernel but because they actually did what they were built for.
...Firefox and Ubuntu, both of which are hatching new smart phone platforms. Surely they must be "too late" as well, or does that somehow only apply to Blackberry? If they're too late, how can Firefox and Ubuntu be so misguided as to bother trying?
The market at the moment is basically the iPhone vs. a collection oversized, outdated, poorly-skinned Android phones. For all the "choice" there is supposed to be on the Android side of things, I can't think of one single phone that doesn't require you to compromise in some way. So no, it's not too late. It's absolutely possible for one (or two, or three) manufacturers to release a platform that features phones of consistent quality. The problem is lies solely in getting app developers onboard.
hi
QNX offers a RTOS. Linux, WinNT kernel and Xenu are all fundamentally server kernels. For smartphones, and for that matter desktop/laptop the extra responsiveness are likely worth lower throughput. It is an edge. I don't know if it is a huge edge but the functionality isn't quite analogous.
I think you meant XNU, which is more properly referred to as Darwin. It's definitely not "Xenu". That's the big bad guy in Scientology
LOL. I did, and I think you are right about what I mixed up :) That's funny.
Whether it's an RTOS is essentially irrelevant. RTOSes are about providing guaranteed scheduling or IO response latency. A hard RTOS can provide an absolute, will-never-exceed delay, a soft RTOS will do it most of the time with rare exceptions. Either kind usually requires a fair degree of design cooperation between the kernel and userland code. (Particularly the hard flavor. You can't call a kernel in isolation hard-RT, it's a characteristic which applies to a complete system running a particular set of userland processes.)
Agreed. QNX also includes a fairly rich stack. I don't know enough about BB10 if it propagates all the way up.
____
I'm losing you on the rest of your argument. If the kernel can treat input as high priority and guarantee that any app that gets an input gets Y amount of CPU within Z time how does that not effectively guarantee responsiveness if apps are written to give feedback within Y?
"in the context of a phone or tablet"... An RTOS is not necessary for a phone, and other kernels are quite capable of powering their respective phone operating systems. There is no reason to believe that a BB10 running over any one of them would be noticeably less performant than it would be over QNX. The kernel is largely an irrelevance to the end user. It's the functionality that matters. It may be that BB10 kicks ass - I own a Playbook and I like a lot of things about it - but I don't ascribe much of that to it running QNX.
The issue isn't performance it is responsiveness. And kernels aren't irrelevant to end users. If you are on windows try loading Enterprise Server if on linux take your desktop kernel and tune the config file setting it like you would configure the prioritizer as if were a database server with several thousand clients. You'll see the difference rather instantly.
Most of the cool things in BB10 have nothing to do with QNX. But QNX is a rather unique advantage.
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because it bought an existing OS business (QNX). That they decided to use QNX for phones does not nullify that other existing revenue stream, or any decision to double down on it for telematics etc.