Hardware
BlackBerry has a close partnership with Qualcomm to use the Snapdragon family of mobile processors in BlackBerry smartphones. BlackBerry Z10 houses a dual core 1.5 GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon MSM8960 mobile processor paired with a massive 2 GB RAM. BlackBerry is also offering 16 GB on-board storage along with a memory card slot to expand storage. It was indeed smart of the company to let users choose the volume of data they wish to stuff in their smartphones. Another reason for offering the capability to add a memory card is to store full HD quality videos.
The BlackBerry Z10 has an 8 megapixel camera at the back with LED flash to click high quality photos. The camera is good enough to compete with the other Android devices with 8 megapixel cameras. However, we found that the autofocus in the camera was a bit slow whenever the distance between the subject and the phone changed.
The camera brings a new Time-Shift mode feature that lets the user choose the best facial expression for the person in the picture. Indeed, that is the limitation of this function. Basically the phone's camera captures a person's face in burst mode. Then the user is presented with a circular ring with a level that needs to be rotated anti-clockwise for choosing the best expression. However, this is not some magical feature that can add cosmetic expressions to someone's face.
BlackBerry Z10 also features a 2 megapixel front facing camera to hold a video chat or video call.
The phone is not as heavy as it seems; it weighs 138 grams approximately, including the battery. There is a large slim battery under the back panel. The only cumbersome aspect is that users will have to remove the battery in order to insert a micro-SIM or memory card.
