BlackBerryPassport 4.5-Inch SIM-Free Smartphone - Black

Having had a Q10 for several years, and prior to that a classic Blackberry, the move to a Passport was natural, and I was not disappointed. Especially at £365 (Feb' 2015.) In the interim I had taken a spin with an iPhone 6 and absolutely hated the way it dragged the user constantly towards Apple branded cloud and iTunes online services (in a similar way to some android devices incessantly pointing users at Google services). That much is said because the Passport does not behave that way. Blackberry don't constantly send end users to their own online portal, which is a good thing. Bad points? Blackberry have a bug in the OS 10.3x operating system, which will be fixed, but is causing some screen flickering - a slight annoyance - it's a known bug and the developers are working on an update to solve matters (look on Crackberry for affirmation). In every other respect this is a fine piece of kit and it performs flawlessly and for the most part, it's intuitive. It's a pity we can't have the AT&T version, which has the rounded corners, but that said it's purely an aesthetic change. From late 2014, just like the iPhone 6, this device won't run Flash (due to security fears surrounding that platform) so there are some webpages which don't work as intended because those elements won't run. Solid and flawless design of this phone gives the impression its far better engineered that Samsung and Apple offerings which flex and creak in the hand, this phone feels right and has just the right weight. Battery life estimations and claims, thirty hours? I didn't find it too hard to deplete the battery in less than half that time, but I did have multiple app's and setup screens open whilst initially playing with it. After a day or two when I'd fine tuned all the settings to suit me the autonomy increased considerably and it seemed much more willing to go the distance - and in any event it's battery is bigger that those of its competitors. Value for money, it's great. App's now available from the home screen Blackberry World and Amazon Store icons. Not all of them like the square 1440 x 1440 screen resolution though. None of the minor drawbacks outweigh the fact this is a brilliant bit of kit. Buy one.PS... The screen flickering bug in the release OS of 10.3x can become very annoying indeed, to the point where it ruined the functionality of some app's. Blackberry haven't publicly released a fix/upgrade yet. None the less you can overcome it by loading OS v10.3.1.2558 (which is going to be available OTA shortly). An autoloader for a Windows PC (works through USB cable connected to a mainboard USB outlet, not a hub) is available from this link:- http://www.filefactory.com/file/158csszcjjtf/PPS... As a result of the comments made on my review, about Flash, I've added this - even if the comments were somewhat farcical. The reason it's been abandoned is because it's deemed a security risk by Adobe, who are no longer developing or updating the application as a result. In other words there is clearly a caveat about using it on your Passport, especially in the native browser. For those who absolutely 'must have' Flash working in their browser there are two options. One is to download an Android Browser from the Google App's Store that still has native Flash support. The second is to follow the instructions on the following link, which shows how you can re-enable it in the native Blackberry Browser. Link:- http://www.filearchivehaven.com/data/YeahSo/

Finally a mobile with every thing i need The Canadian company just outed its latest attempt to get back on track, the BlackBerry Passport, a smartphone it says aims to help mobile business professionals boost their productivity.The new device is certainly an interesting one, challenging industry trends in a number of ways, from its construction to its physical keyboard. We take a look at what actually matters with the BlackBerry Passport.Hip to Be SquareThe BlackBerry Passport looks, well...different from other mainstream smartphones these days. It's square-shaped, for starters, with a 4.5in screen (1,440 x 1,440 pixels) sitting atop BlackBerry's trademark QWERTY keyboard. The device's physical keys feature functionality similar to a touchscreen, though, so you can perform lots of common tasks, like scrolling websites and sliding along the keys, straight from your keyboard. The idea is to leave the screen itself free for viewing (and multitasking), with the company saying that the Passport's keyboard is akin to a laptop touchpad on a smartphone. An added benefit is that websites that aren't necessarily optimised for mobile are likely to display better on this screen shape than other devices. There's also Corning's new-gen Gorilla Glass 3 for added durability.BlackBerry 10.3 OSThe new BlackBerry 10.3 OS comes pre-loaded on the Passport and includes a bunch of new features, including BlackBerry Assistant, Amazon Appstore integration, and BlackBerry Blend. BlackBerry Blend aims to help users quickly and easily transition to their desktop platform. So far, it supports Mac OS X (10.7 and above), Windows (7 and above), and Android tablets (4.4 and above). BlackBerry Assistant is the company's rival to Siri/Cortana/Google Now with a specific focus on managing your work life - email, contacts, calendar, and relevant apps. Speaking of apps, as well as being broadly compatible with Android apps and BlackBerry World - which highlights productivity apps - BlackBerry 10.3 now also comes pre-loaded with the Amazon Appstore, so you can grab popular consumer apps for your downtime. All of BlackBerry 10.3's features will be integrated into an 'instant action' bar, so that commonly used functions are front and centre.Battery Life and SpecsBlackBerry goes and packs a mammoth 3,450mAh cell into its new machine. The company claims that will give the device "up to 30 hours of mixed use" though results will obviously vary. Endurance is obviously key for out-and-about professionals, so this could be a real selling point. The Passport's other specs aren't bad either - there's a quad-core processor clocked at up to 2.2GHz augmented by 3GB of RAM, 13-megapixel camera (because we all take selfies in the boardroom), and 32GB of on-board storage (plus a microSD card slot).The BlackBerry Passport won't be right for everyone. If you're locked into Apple's ecosystem, you're probably going to stick with an iPhone, However, it still seems like there's plenty to like about the Passport, from the added accuracy of a physical keyboard to the potentially industry-best battery life. finally this the passport picture down to left in front of iPhone 6 plus to the right.