Ouch!! Blackberry Z10 for Rs. 43,490/-. Tweeters not so happy!

Image Courtesy: Google Images

Yea you heard it right. The newbie from Blackberry is launched in India for Rs. 43,490/-. You can surely brag about it launching in India before it launched in the US but at this price, only a handful of people would want to go for the device.

Twitter users in the country expressed amusement and anger at the sky-high price tag of Rs 43,490 for the phone and made several funny statements on the public forum.

Here are some interesting ones

‏@Craftpenter: Rs 43,490 for a Blackberry! Woohooo. Sell kindey for 50k. Buy it. And then the rest are for BBM and Internet expenses.

@VarunVandi: #Z10 for Rs 43,490 ... I think they're selling it by the kilo.. #BeingRippedOff !

@trickstreasure: Rs 43,490 for a Blackberry is like releasing a Tusshar Kapoor movie in an IMAX theatre.....and then setting the ticket prices at Rs 1500.

@womaniya_salia: "I went with Rs 43,490 in my pocket by bus to purchase Blackberry 10 today... Came back on new Bike, with some savings. #Win"

@Abhijaykapoor: A book soon going to release, A monk who sold his BlackBerry. Rs.43,490

@fakingnews: Lava mobiles showroom costs Rs 43,490

@GappistanRadio: Don't get scared after noticing the twitter trends. Rs 43,490 is the price of new BlackBerry phone and not a new petrol hike..

@GhantaBabaJiKa: BlackBerry Z10 for Rs 43,490 giving tuff competition to bajaj discover, splendor and passion..... 2 minutes silence for them

@asarode: BlackBerry for Rs 43,490 RGV can make 3 movies in that budget.

@ravibudania: BlackBerry Z10 for Rs 43,490 With tagline "kya aap c*&^%ye hain"

@Ohmmeee: #BB10 phone launched in India at Rs 43,490. It has this remarkable feature where friends laugh at you if you still have a Blackberry. :P"

(Tweet Source: Twitter)

Blackberry Z10 Reviewed!!

Image Credit: Google Images

The BlackBerry Z10 is the rebirth of a fallen leader in the smartphone market. It's completely different from the past with a big touchscreen and brand new OS. Except, this time BlackBerry has also added a dash of fun unlike BlackBerry's previous generation of touch-driven smartphones.

BlackBerry 10 OS that powers the phone is a modern operating system with a brand new gesture-based interface and support for powerful dual-core CPUs. If you think dual-core is old news on Android and Quad core processors are in, you'd be right, but the Z10 is closer to the iPhone in this regard - the OS has been optimized to run on very few devices, allowing for maximum efficiency.

The Z10 is equipped with a 4.2" WXGA screen - slightly bigger and sharper than the iPhone 5's retina display - but kept the package more compact than certain massive droids. Then came all the connectivity features, hardware ports and slots.

Here's what they ended up with, the good and the bad of it:

Image Credit: Google Images

Key features

·         Quad-band GSM/GPRS/EDGE, tri/quad-band UMTS/HSPA, optional 100 Mbps LTE

·         4.2" 16M-color WXGA (768 x 1280 pixels) capacitive touchscreen TFT

·         Dual-core 1.5 GHz Krait, 2GB RAM, Adreno 225

·         BlackBerry 10 OS; advanced on-screen keyboard; Office document editor

·         BlackBerry Hub with extensive social networking connectivity

·         BBM with video chat and screen sharing

·         8 megapixel auto-focus camera with face detection and Time Shift; LED flash, 2MP front

·         Full HD (1080p) video recording at 30fps; 720p recording with front-facing camera

·         16GB storage, microSD card slot; built-in Dropbox and Box integration

·         Wi-Fi a/b/g/n, Wi-Fi hotspot; Wi-Fi sync

·         Bluetooth 4.0

·         NFC

·         standard microUSB port, microHDMI

·         3.5mm audio jack

·         GPS receiver with A-GPS

Main disadvantages

·         Brand new UI has a steep learning curve

·         BlackBerry World missing key apps

·         BlackBerry Maps are even worse than Apple Maps

·         Camera offers little control over image quality

Image Credit: Google Images

Image Credit: Google Images

As with any newborn OS platform, there will be growing challenges. The biggest concern is whether the sleek new interface will put people off. It's fast and intuitive once you get used to it, but doesn't have the level of familiarity of the iOS or Android.

That's the mission ahead of the BlackBerry Z10. It can't single-handedly recapture the market and bring BlackBerry to its former RIM glory, instead it sets the stage for future devices (the Q10 is a couple of months away).

That does not mean that the Z10 won't achieve popularity - with quality hardware and software, the Z10 can easily net both people who need a BlackBerry but are tired of the OS 7 devices and new users (like me) who are equally tired of iOS and Android.

So, revolution or evolution? The hardware is miles ahead of Berries of old, but you'll have to jump over to the next page to see how it stacks up against current Androids and the iPhone.Thanks for reading. Please give your views & comments below.