BlackBerry Reaches Out to QWERTY Lovers With Classic Smartphone: Is the Price Right?

BlackBerry's Classic has been touted as the company's foray into the premium mid-end category. The Classic, now available for purchase in India, is an upgrade to the original BlackBerry Bold 9900.

With the BlackBerry Classic, the company aims to lure a certain section of consumers who still have a faith in the BlackBerry-made security driven phones. Priced at Rs. 31,900, the Classic appears to have impressive design coupled with a great keyboard, unmatched security and all-day battery life.

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However, we're not sure whether the BlackBerry Classic's reach may go beyond the business community. Here's a quick look at the BlackBerry Classic in regards to its specs, features, usability and price.

Design

Basically, the BlackBerry Classic is a larger version of the BlackBerry Bold. The Classic, as seen in pictures, is a solidly build handset. Plus, it has a stainless steel frame around the edges, and a rubber back cover that keeps the phone from slipping. The device, however, is still made out of plastic.

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Keyboard

It's hard to imagine BlackBerry without a physical keyboard. The BlackBerry Classic comes with a fantastic keyboard. It has the four straight rows of keys proved comfortable to type. There's also an optical touchpad that acts like a cursor.

Display

The device sports a 3.5-inch LCD touchscreen display with Gorilla Glass 3 protection. It has a 720 x 720 pixel resolution and 1:1 aspect ratio. Well, the display appears to be aged and depressing in nature. If you want to use the BlackBerry Classic to watch movies, then you're wasting your time.

Software and Processor

The BlackBerry Classic runs the latest version of BlackBerry's mobile OS, v10.3.1. The UI seemed to be fairly fast and jittery free. The native OS offer an array of software features (Universal Search, BlackBerry Assistant and more) that are limited to BlackBerry 10 OS. Missing apps remains a challange for BlackBerry. The Classic is powered by a dual-core processor (Qualcomm), paired with 2GB of RAM and 16GB of on-board storage.

Camera and Battery

There's an 8MP rear-facing camera with auto focus and focus. The secondary camera is 2MP. Camera features include several modes, time shift and HDR.

The BlackBerry Classic is stuffed with a 2,515 mAh battery fitted inside. The battery is expected to last a full day, given the lower resolution display. Notably, you can also control the CPU and turn off data and location services.

Bottom Line

The BlackBerry Classic is a great device for loyal BlackBerry customers. Then there's the price of the BlackBerry Classic. We consider the BlackBerry Classic's price to be the biggest hurdle standing in the way of the success. The Classic is priced at Rs. 31,900, but as far as we're aware the Samsung Galaxy S5 easily overshadows the BlackBerry-made handset, at least, in terms of price and added specs.

The Classic is a very practical handset, but its price needs to come down sooner, then only the company can sell the device in large numbers.

Stay tuned to GizBot for more updates!