So I received my BlackBerry Q5 about a week ago. Here is the review I posted on amazon.co.uk if anyone's interested.
5/5
Bad professional reviews but...
I love it. I love it's gesture based UI. It just seems so intuitive compared to android (I've had a Motorola Milestone, Nexus S, Orange San Diego, HTC One SV, Samsung Galaxy S3).
In android, when I'm in an application, so often I would press the 'back' key and instead of going back to the previous screen it would instead just exit the whole thing because it's an inconsistent command and is different in different apps, so I'm regularly closing apps without meaning to. Also, when I do exit an app by pressing 'back', does it mean the app is actually closed? or is it still running in the background? Unless I have experience of the app by checking a task manager I don't often know.
In Blackberry OS 10 with one swipe the app is minimized on the "home" screen; this means it is still running in the background and any data in that app is saved and hasn't disappeared. Say for example I am entering data on a website, maybe registering on a forum; if I leave the browser half way through by minimising it to go and play a game or make a phone call, I know that all the information I've entered will still be there when I comeback, as long I haven't closed the minimised browser.
Apps don't close completely unless the user closes them (whereas android will close apps automatically). It might sound laborious to close every app yourself but I personally prefer it. In the BB 10 OS as soon as I leave an app it's minimised right in front of me on the home screen; clicking the 'x' on the corner closes it. BB 10 therefore feels much more transparent than android but not quite as laborious as having to enter a dedicated task manager interface like on the IPhone; On the BlackBerry I tend to close apps as I go along.
Other good points: - Multi-colour LED, this allow you to set different flashing colours and sequences for different contacts but you need to download an app from the store.
- It has a nice screen, colours are vibrant and the pixel density is very good @ 328.
- It has a big battery for a phone with this size of screen and I've found screen-on time to be very good.
- A micro SD card slot is included so the memory is expandable.
- Volume keys I like; not too stiff, with a nice-ish feedback.
- The speaker is on the bottom of the phone which is good as the sound doesn't get muffled when someone's holding it and it is loud.
- Blackberry World is BB's app store and it has a wide selection of music available for purchase. They don't use any special format like iTunes, they just download as mp3 files. Singles are charged at 99p, albums vary.
- It comes with a file manager.
- The QWERTY keypad is pretty good IMO. One review I read said it was unusable and I completely disagree. It isn't as nice as the Q10's but I still like using it. I did not for example enjoy using the Motorola Milestone's keyboard which was awful. The only thing is: it works a lot better if you use two hands while typing, as opposed to using just one and so maybe this was what the reviewer was referring to. With two hands I can type away very quickly and accurately; more accurately than I could on a touchscreen keyboard.
- You can be watching a youtube video and look something up on a new tab with the youtube video's audio still playing in the background. Then, when you want, you can open the first tab and continue watching it again. You can also minimise the browser and continue to listen, even when using a different application.
- The browser allows the user to choose the search type from the address bar. The options are bing, google and yahoo!
- I like the BB 10 OS layout, it goes from left to right and right to left with swipe gestures.
From left to right the layout starts at 'the hub' and then goes to the 'home screen' and then to the 'app draw'. The hub shows all messages, calls, emails, twitter posts etc. The home screen features minimised screens of all your minimised apps, up to 4 on the screen. If there are more than 4 you can scroll down to view them. In the app draw the icons can be reorganised, so the most useful apps can be made accessible on the first page, reducing scrolling. Each page allows up to 12 icons or by long pressing the screen and dragging an icon onto another icon a folder can be created. Each folder can hold up to 12 icons. Moving icons around can be very fiddly at first until you realize how the icons flow and how to place them. TIP: it's best in my experience to not focus on the blue line that appears when trying to place an icon and instead better to just move the icon, physically, to the middle of the two icons where you want yours to be placed.
- Swipe gestures start from the outside of the screen i.e. from the glass bezel; so if you were worried about accidentally making scroll gestures whilst just trying to do something else (like navigating a website) don't worry it doesn't happen usually at all.
One swipe upwards minimises whatever application you're in and takes you to the home screen; where a swipe to the left takes you to the first page of your apps draw and a swipe to the right takes you to your messages, emails etc in the hub.
Swiping down brings down a sliding toggle screen that includes toggles for: wifi, alarm, notifications, bluetooth and a shortcut to the settings.
Swipe up gesture is the only "universal" gesture across all apps that will work in everything. Swiping downwards doesn't always bring down the toggle controls, in fact it only works when in the screens I've just outlined i.e. it doesn't work in any apps (that I've tried); instead swiping down usually shows options relating to that application. I kind of wish swiping downwards in the browser would show the toggles because I often turn my wifi off when I'm not using it and I'm often in the browser when I decide to but it's not a big deal.
Some bad things about the Blackberry Q5: - Non-removable battery, I sometimes wonder if phone manufactures are working with us or against us and sort-of wonder if they understand that giving customers what they want is a good strategy in business? But at least it's a biggish non-removable battery.
- Plastic body creaks at times and some of the panel gaps look a little larger then I would have hoped for. The little plastic cover over sim card and micro sd slot is a bit flimsy but it stays closed just fine and although it looks flimsy I don't think it's in danger of snapping off. The only danger would be if it opened unintentionally and snagged on something but it seems to stay closed just fine so I don't think it really matters (for me anyway).
- BBC iplayer isn't working, but it should work, it plays 4oD just fine and youtube. It states on iplayer "To play programme you need to enable Abode Flash on your phone" but it is enabled in options so it's a little annoying it won't work. FYI I'm trying over wifi, not 3g so that's not the problem. <<<FIXED!>>> In the browser settings I went to 'privacy and security' and pressed 'clear history' and now it works. I have read about others having the same problem so hopefully they'll figure it out. I'm listening to it on my Q5 as I write this (writing this on my Q5 also) and it feels pretty cool. Everything just flows instead of stop/starting all the time which I like alot. The speaker seems very good at reproducing the talking from 'Master Chief', I would guess because of the strong low end and high volume it can produce. The higher pitched sounds aren't nearly so good but talking really does sound surprisingly good to me.
- Apps or a lack of apps is the phones biggest problem from my perspective. It hardly has any games. Riptide, Angry Birds - Star Wars, Stick Tennis and beach buggy blitz are the only ones I am interested in at the moment. There are a few nice looking puzzle games (with gems) but I don't know if I'll buy them since there's no refund option. Some games have a lite version available to try. Personally I think BlackBerry should make it compulsory for developers to include a trail version of their games or apps if they aren't going to provide a way to get a refund.
- The video selection on blackberry world is poor IMO.
- Amazon don't have an app for the blackberry so you can't download mp3's from their store. (Update: Apparently this is not the case and mp3's can be downloaded without an app)
- I haven't used the Skype app yet but it hasn't been well received, lots of complaints about it on the BB store.
More good things about the Q5: - I like the overall feeling of the phone despite it's slight creakiness and larger then expect panel gaps.
- It has an app called 'DocsToGo' already installed which I really like. It is a simple word processor with some basic formatting and a spell check which works really well. Types of documents it can produce are: "doc", "xls" and "ppt". I've just used 'doc' so far.
- It also has a feature app called "PrintToGo" installed. From what I've read, as I've not tried it yet, you download a "PrintToGo" app for your PC and then select the Q5 as the printer in the printer setup options, the PC then sends your Q5 a copy wirelessly.
- An app called 'Mireo don't panic' is an off-line maps application, where you download the app for free and then pay for the maps you want. Obviously the main advantage of this over google maps is that you don't need a data signal, it just uses the maps installed on your phone and the phones GPS. Someone commented that UK maps were £10, I've not paid for them yet as they offer 7 day trial. (Update: turns out the UK maps are £14 and are 2013 TomTom maps.)
- A really nice thing is that by swiping upwards just a little you can see how many messages or missed calls or anything else you have, without leaving the application you're in; even in riptide, a fast moving 3D game. You can just slide your finger up from the bezel at the bottom of the screen and the game pauses and starts to shrink and then you can see to the left various symbols representing unviewed emails or missed calls etc. At the top you'll also see signal strength, time, battery and wifi signal; continue to swipe upwards and it will minimise.
- The music app is simple but works well.
- The video player works well from my limited experience.
Update: I'm correcting spelling mistakes to this review on my Q5 now and it has a spell check on the browser which works very well, it underlines mis-spelt words in red and corrects simple spelling mistakes automatically.
- It has voice recognition and uses a dedicated button to activate it (long press), between the two volume keys. It works really well and can take notes and call people and probably various other things. I also have noticed that there is a more advanced voice recognition app in the store that can answer maths questions and even has it's own encyclopedia to answer more advanced things. I haven't tried it but it seems well received judging by reviews.
- The browser works very well but I don't think it can save pages for offline viewing by default which is annoying, but there is a 'read it later' app available on the store. It does have a surf history and an 'incognito' mode.
- The camera I haven't used very much, but I notice that it takes photographs very quickly but the phone needs to be held very still to take a picture without blurring. There's no dedicated camera key on the phone; Once in camera mode you just press anywhere on the screen to take a picture. In my opinion this is much better than having to press a tiny icon because on a sunny day it can become very difficult to see.
- The interface feels smoother than androids.
A minor rant: the calculator on my android version didn't show any workings so if I wanted to check a calculation I would have to type the whole thing out again. I searched many, many calculator apps on android to find a calculator that would do this. I did find one and I think it was called panceal. I can safely say that the BB calculator does record your workings so you can check them and it was the one it shipped with. I get the overall impression that the guys or gals who helped develop the BB OS thought about it rather carefully; yes it's not perfect, but I never really got that impression with android. (After having used google phones for while now, I think I now hate google; using their software/hardware is bit like: 'you can't do this, you can't do that, sign up for this' - google. And often their software's buggy and carelessly designed as well).
Update: this phone is very capable at typing out text on websites; even a long review such as this one, it is handling it very well. Going back to edit text is not a problem and the cursor goes where I tell it to; if I miss the right spot with my finger I can press on a ring that appears around the cursor; pressing on the right side of the ring moves the cursor one to the right and pressing it on the left moves it one to the left. It goes up and down too. Scrolling is very smooth and there's no lag when I press a key on the keypad at all. It also hasn't crashed once, in fact I don't think anything has crashed so far but I've only been using it for about 5 days.
Update: I use Hotmail and I can access my junk folder easily from within the hub which is very good but I can't mark something as not junk as far as I know (or vice versa). Also, something I found is, if I'm writing an email from within the hub and I get another email it won't let me just swipe to the right and view it. I have to save and exit the email I'm writing first and it's a little clunky and goes against the grain a lbit. More annoyingly I seem to have somehow merged my junk emails with my inbox in the hub. I would like to go back to just inbox emails being shown in the hub but I can't seem to be able to work it out or it's a bug.
There are hotkeys available to do things quickly using the keypad but I don't know many of them; I know pressing 't' in the browser makes it go to the top of the page and 'b' the bottom.
Update: the hub on mine went a bit nuts. The hotmail account would disappear, re-appear, disappear, re-appear and I couldn't read any of my emails either-way because my account said there were no entries even when it was visible; So I ended up deleting the account and just made a shortcut on the first page of the app draw to my hotmail inbox using the web browser. If you ever do the same you should make hotmail into it's fully sized desktop version so that you have the ability to select 'keep me logged in' and then make the shortcut; otherwise you have to login every time to check your email. Luckily, my inbox still displays itself in mobile mode so it fits the screen perfectly and I'm logged in.
One super cool thing is: there are widgets on the q5, kind of. For example: 'BeBuzz pro 10', an LED app, while minimised turns into a battery widget that displays the battery percentage and also it looks rather nice. I love it because any app running needs to be minimised on the home screen anyway and because the information on the 'minimised' version of the app can be changed and updated by itself, it means it can be turned into a useful widget by the app developer if they want. The multi-alarm app I downloaded for example displays my next 2 alarms whilst minimised and of course opens the main app when pressed.
One bad thing is that the "widgets" of the minimised apps move around quite a bit while other apps are being opened and closed. If someone's going to have an LED or alarm app running 24/7 in the background it would be better if the 'widget' could be locked in one place so viewing the information was always displayed in that same place; it would make viewing them non-annoying.
The phone speaker sounds surprisingly bassie to me. It's not amazing quality but I've set a dubstep song as my ringtone and I think it sounds surprisingly good ('Trouble' by Zeds Dead ).
If you're not sure about the integrity of 'the hub' there is a dedicated Gmail application available which has good reviews. There is no dedicated hotmail app yet but making a shortcut works very well but it needs to be clicked on, rather than the phone notifying the user automatically of a new email arriving.
If you like or need to refer to a document or picture often there is an free app called 'DocuShortcut' available, it will allow the user to make a shortcut in the app draw to any document or picture or mp3 and works well.
The middle button, between the two volume buttons, pauses music with a short-press and videos too. There is an option to make the volume buttons change track on long-press but it doesn't work very well because the volume buttons aren't particularly stiff and this results in them accidentally changing the track while it's in my pocket. As a concept I think it's great. In fact I used it on my Nexus S, with a custom rom, and I thought why is this not standard? But the buttons need to be a little stiffer to work properly unless it's just on a desk or table or something, in my opinion.
Update: pressing volume up and volume down at the same time takes a screen shot (no extra software required).
Update: I had the volume turned all the way up when I used my earphones and holy **** it's loud. I love it because if I need it that loud it's there. For now however it's considerably turned down.
Update: I bought the official flip case from amazon.co.uk and it arrived today; it fits very well and looks nice. It's not quite as good to type on with the leather screen cover flopping down or folded back but I think I can get use to it. The sound from the speaker with it on sounds a little more tiny to me but it does offer good protection since the back of the case is made from hard plastic. The screen turns on and off automatically on the opening and closing of the leather screen cover.
Update: Flip case review continued: the screen turns on when I open the flip cover even when I had previously turned it off manually (I do this out of habit sometimes); it seems quite clever to do this or at least it seems a nice touch. The cover has some nice grip on the back due to the leather strip that wraps around from the front flip cover. I said previously that the volume keys weren't exactly ideal for changing tracks on a long-press but I think now, with the case on, they're less likely to be pressed accidentally since they're now slightly recessed and not sticking out.
The phones camera module is recessed slightly too for protection from scratches I would guess.
Update: The volume buttons and middle button between them sometimes refuse to work. I use them all the time for listening to music and now and again they stop working. They always work again with a phone restart so I am guessing it's a software bug rather than a hardware one.
Once, the voice controls activated themselves in the background with no sign of being active and so I couldn't see how to close the app because it was basically invisible. A pressing of the middle button briefly and a voice command of 'exit' made the app close itself. A phone restart would have no doubt fixed the problem too.
An actual hardware issue seems to be that: my earphones when twisted to a particular angle in their socket now turn the music off if it's playing, as if they had been removed. This is annoying because the music now sometimes switches off unintentionally whilst in my pocket. This fault is a new development and I hope the earphone socket doesn't stop working altogether... I don't know that it will but the fact that this fault has developed so early on in the phones (potential) life isn't exactly confidence inspiring. A bluetooth headset would be a solution if it does go or a repair job under warranty.
Update: It isn't possible to connect the Q5 to a new pc and transfer files to or from the device without hassle because you must first install the blackberry software. Annoyingly, you have to have an internet connection to download the software to the pc; I tried to move files from a pc to the BB which did not have the internet without realizing I needed the internet to do this and of course it wouldn't let me (UPDATE: This last part is wrong, the Q5 does allow a user to install drivers without an internet connection but you don't download the full BlackBerry 'Link' software, instead you just install the 'blackberry device manager' software and this will let you drag and drop files to and from your pc or your Q5; like you would do when using a usb memory stick. If you have a password on your Q5 then the device will not appear in the computer directory until you have clicked on the 'BlackBerry device manager' application and have entered your password, which might be the reason for my previous confusion). If you go to a public library and would like to transfer something from your Q5 to one of the computers there, installing applications is restricted from my experience so you wouldn't be able to do this.
Update: A high quality review of the Q5 can be found at notebookcheck (dot) net. It tests the battery life of the Q5 and they have similar statistics for various other phone models and so comparisons are possible if you search their site. The results for the Q5 were: Idle (without WLAN, min brightness)= 34h 00min ; Surfing with WLAN = 10h 47min ; Load (maximum brightness) = 8h 10min.
5/5
Bad professional reviews but...
I love it. I love it's gesture based UI. It just seems so intuitive compared to android (I've had a Motorola Milestone, Nexus S, Orange San Diego, HTC One SV, Samsung Galaxy S3).
In android, when I'm in an application, so often I would press the 'back' key and instead of going back to the previous screen it would instead just exit the whole thing because it's an inconsistent command and is different in different apps, so I'm regularly closing apps without meaning to. Also, when I do exit an app by pressing 'back', does it mean the app is actually closed? or is it still running in the background? Unless I have experience of the app by checking a task manager I don't often know.
In Blackberry OS 10 with one swipe the app is minimized on the "home" screen; this means it is still running in the background and any data in that app is saved and hasn't disappeared. Say for example I am entering data on a website, maybe registering on a forum; if I leave the browser half way through by minimising it to go and play a game or make a phone call, I know that all the information I've entered will still be there when I comeback, as long I haven't closed the minimised browser.
Apps don't close completely unless the user closes them (whereas android will close apps automatically). It might sound laborious to close every app yourself but I personally prefer it. In the BB 10 OS as soon as I leave an app it's minimised right in front of me on the home screen; clicking the 'x' on the corner closes it. BB 10 therefore feels much more transparent than android but not quite as laborious as having to enter a dedicated task manager interface like on the IPhone; On the BlackBerry I tend to close apps as I go along.
Other good points: - Multi-colour LED, this allow you to set different flashing colours and sequences for different contacts but you need to download an app from the store.
- It has a nice screen, colours are vibrant and the pixel density is very good @ 328.
- It has a big battery for a phone with this size of screen and I've found screen-on time to be very good.
- A micro SD card slot is included so the memory is expandable.
- Volume keys I like; not too stiff, with a nice-ish feedback.
- The speaker is on the bottom of the phone which is good as the sound doesn't get muffled when someone's holding it and it is loud.
- Blackberry World is BB's app store and it has a wide selection of music available for purchase. They don't use any special format like iTunes, they just download as mp3 files. Singles are charged at 99p, albums vary.
- It comes with a file manager.
- The QWERTY keypad is pretty good IMO. One review I read said it was unusable and I completely disagree. It isn't as nice as the Q10's but I still like using it. I did not for example enjoy using the Motorola Milestone's keyboard which was awful. The only thing is: it works a lot better if you use two hands while typing, as opposed to using just one and so maybe this was what the reviewer was referring to. With two hands I can type away very quickly and accurately; more accurately than I could on a touchscreen keyboard.
- You can be watching a youtube video and look something up on a new tab with the youtube video's audio still playing in the background. Then, when you want, you can open the first tab and continue watching it again. You can also minimise the browser and continue to listen, even when using a different application.
- The browser allows the user to choose the search type from the address bar. The options are bing, google and yahoo!
- I like the BB 10 OS layout, it goes from left to right and right to left with swipe gestures.
From left to right the layout starts at 'the hub' and then goes to the 'home screen' and then to the 'app draw'. The hub shows all messages, calls, emails, twitter posts etc. The home screen features minimised screens of all your minimised apps, up to 4 on the screen. If there are more than 4 you can scroll down to view them. In the app draw the icons can be reorganised, so the most useful apps can be made accessible on the first page, reducing scrolling. Each page allows up to 12 icons or by long pressing the screen and dragging an icon onto another icon a folder can be created. Each folder can hold up to 12 icons. Moving icons around can be very fiddly at first until you realize how the icons flow and how to place them. TIP: it's best in my experience to not focus on the blue line that appears when trying to place an icon and instead better to just move the icon, physically, to the middle of the two icons where you want yours to be placed.
- Swipe gestures start from the outside of the screen i.e. from the glass bezel; so if you were worried about accidentally making scroll gestures whilst just trying to do something else (like navigating a website) don't worry it doesn't happen usually at all.
One swipe upwards minimises whatever application you're in and takes you to the home screen; where a swipe to the left takes you to the first page of your apps draw and a swipe to the right takes you to your messages, emails etc in the hub.
Swiping down brings down a sliding toggle screen that includes toggles for: wifi, alarm, notifications, bluetooth and a shortcut to the settings.
Swipe up gesture is the only "universal" gesture across all apps that will work in everything. Swiping downwards doesn't always bring down the toggle controls, in fact it only works when in the screens I've just outlined i.e. it doesn't work in any apps (that I've tried); instead swiping down usually shows options relating to that application. I kind of wish swiping downwards in the browser would show the toggles because I often turn my wifi off when I'm not using it and I'm often in the browser when I decide to but it's not a big deal.
Some bad things about the Blackberry Q5: - Non-removable battery, I sometimes wonder if phone manufactures are working with us or against us and sort-of wonder if they understand that giving customers what they want is a good strategy in business? But at least it's a biggish non-removable battery.
- Plastic body creaks at times and some of the panel gaps look a little larger then I would have hoped for. The little plastic cover over sim card and micro sd slot is a bit flimsy but it stays closed just fine and although it looks flimsy I don't think it's in danger of snapping off. The only danger would be if it opened unintentionally and snagged on something but it seems to stay closed just fine so I don't think it really matters (for me anyway).
- BBC iplayer isn't working, but it should work, it plays 4oD just fine and youtube. It states on iplayer "To play programme you need to enable Abode Flash on your phone" but it is enabled in options so it's a little annoying it won't work. FYI I'm trying over wifi, not 3g so that's not the problem. <<<FIXED!>>> In the browser settings I went to 'privacy and security' and pressed 'clear history' and now it works. I have read about others having the same problem so hopefully they'll figure it out. I'm listening to it on my Q5 as I write this (writing this on my Q5 also) and it feels pretty cool. Everything just flows instead of stop/starting all the time which I like alot. The speaker seems very good at reproducing the talking from 'Master Chief', I would guess because of the strong low end and high volume it can produce. The higher pitched sounds aren't nearly so good but talking really does sound surprisingly good to me.
- Apps or a lack of apps is the phones biggest problem from my perspective. It hardly has any games. Riptide, Angry Birds - Star Wars, Stick Tennis and beach buggy blitz are the only ones I am interested in at the moment. There are a few nice looking puzzle games (with gems) but I don't know if I'll buy them since there's no refund option. Some games have a lite version available to try. Personally I think BlackBerry should make it compulsory for developers to include a trail version of their games or apps if they aren't going to provide a way to get a refund.
- The video selection on blackberry world is poor IMO.
- Amazon don't have an app for the blackberry so you can't download mp3's from their store. (Update: Apparently this is not the case and mp3's can be downloaded without an app)
- I haven't used the Skype app yet but it hasn't been well received, lots of complaints about it on the BB store.
More good things about the Q5: - I like the overall feeling of the phone despite it's slight creakiness and larger then expect panel gaps.
- It has an app called 'DocsToGo' already installed which I really like. It is a simple word processor with some basic formatting and a spell check which works really well. Types of documents it can produce are: "doc", "xls" and "ppt". I've just used 'doc' so far.
- It also has a feature app called "PrintToGo" installed. From what I've read, as I've not tried it yet, you download a "PrintToGo" app for your PC and then select the Q5 as the printer in the printer setup options, the PC then sends your Q5 a copy wirelessly.
- An app called 'Mireo don't panic' is an off-line maps application, where you download the app for free and then pay for the maps you want. Obviously the main advantage of this over google maps is that you don't need a data signal, it just uses the maps installed on your phone and the phones GPS. Someone commented that UK maps were £10, I've not paid for them yet as they offer 7 day trial. (Update: turns out the UK maps are £14 and are 2013 TomTom maps.)
- A really nice thing is that by swiping upwards just a little you can see how many messages or missed calls or anything else you have, without leaving the application you're in; even in riptide, a fast moving 3D game. You can just slide your finger up from the bezel at the bottom of the screen and the game pauses and starts to shrink and then you can see to the left various symbols representing unviewed emails or missed calls etc. At the top you'll also see signal strength, time, battery and wifi signal; continue to swipe upwards and it will minimise.
- The music app is simple but works well.
- The video player works well from my limited experience.
Update: I'm correcting spelling mistakes to this review on my Q5 now and it has a spell check on the browser which works very well, it underlines mis-spelt words in red and corrects simple spelling mistakes automatically.
- It has voice recognition and uses a dedicated button to activate it (long press), between the two volume keys. It works really well and can take notes and call people and probably various other things. I also have noticed that there is a more advanced voice recognition app in the store that can answer maths questions and even has it's own encyclopedia to answer more advanced things. I haven't tried it but it seems well received judging by reviews.
- The browser works very well but I don't think it can save pages for offline viewing by default which is annoying, but there is a 'read it later' app available on the store. It does have a surf history and an 'incognito' mode.
- The camera I haven't used very much, but I notice that it takes photographs very quickly but the phone needs to be held very still to take a picture without blurring. There's no dedicated camera key on the phone; Once in camera mode you just press anywhere on the screen to take a picture. In my opinion this is much better than having to press a tiny icon because on a sunny day it can become very difficult to see.
- The interface feels smoother than androids.
A minor rant: the calculator on my android version didn't show any workings so if I wanted to check a calculation I would have to type the whole thing out again. I searched many, many calculator apps on android to find a calculator that would do this. I did find one and I think it was called panceal. I can safely say that the BB calculator does record your workings so you can check them and it was the one it shipped with. I get the overall impression that the guys or gals who helped develop the BB OS thought about it rather carefully; yes it's not perfect, but I never really got that impression with android. (After having used google phones for while now, I think I now hate google; using their software/hardware is bit like: 'you can't do this, you can't do that, sign up for this' - google. And often their software's buggy and carelessly designed as well).
Update: this phone is very capable at typing out text on websites; even a long review such as this one, it is handling it very well. Going back to edit text is not a problem and the cursor goes where I tell it to; if I miss the right spot with my finger I can press on a ring that appears around the cursor; pressing on the right side of the ring moves the cursor one to the right and pressing it on the left moves it one to the left. It goes up and down too. Scrolling is very smooth and there's no lag when I press a key on the keypad at all. It also hasn't crashed once, in fact I don't think anything has crashed so far but I've only been using it for about 5 days.
Update: I use Hotmail and I can access my junk folder easily from within the hub which is very good but I can't mark something as not junk as far as I know (or vice versa). Also, something I found is, if I'm writing an email from within the hub and I get another email it won't let me just swipe to the right and view it. I have to save and exit the email I'm writing first and it's a little clunky and goes against the grain a lbit. More annoyingly I seem to have somehow merged my junk emails with my inbox in the hub. I would like to go back to just inbox emails being shown in the hub but I can't seem to be able to work it out or it's a bug.
There are hotkeys available to do things quickly using the keypad but I don't know many of them; I know pressing 't' in the browser makes it go to the top of the page and 'b' the bottom.
Update: the hub on mine went a bit nuts. The hotmail account would disappear, re-appear, disappear, re-appear and I couldn't read any of my emails either-way because my account said there were no entries even when it was visible; So I ended up deleting the account and just made a shortcut on the first page of the app draw to my hotmail inbox using the web browser. If you ever do the same you should make hotmail into it's fully sized desktop version so that you have the ability to select 'keep me logged in' and then make the shortcut; otherwise you have to login every time to check your email. Luckily, my inbox still displays itself in mobile mode so it fits the screen perfectly and I'm logged in.
One super cool thing is: there are widgets on the q5, kind of. For example: 'BeBuzz pro 10', an LED app, while minimised turns into a battery widget that displays the battery percentage and also it looks rather nice. I love it because any app running needs to be minimised on the home screen anyway and because the information on the 'minimised' version of the app can be changed and updated by itself, it means it can be turned into a useful widget by the app developer if they want. The multi-alarm app I downloaded for example displays my next 2 alarms whilst minimised and of course opens the main app when pressed.
One bad thing is that the "widgets" of the minimised apps move around quite a bit while other apps are being opened and closed. If someone's going to have an LED or alarm app running 24/7 in the background it would be better if the 'widget' could be locked in one place so viewing the information was always displayed in that same place; it would make viewing them non-annoying.
The phone speaker sounds surprisingly bassie to me. It's not amazing quality but I've set a dubstep song as my ringtone and I think it sounds surprisingly good ('Trouble' by Zeds Dead ).
If you're not sure about the integrity of 'the hub' there is a dedicated Gmail application available which has good reviews. There is no dedicated hotmail app yet but making a shortcut works very well but it needs to be clicked on, rather than the phone notifying the user automatically of a new email arriving.
If you like or need to refer to a document or picture often there is an free app called 'DocuShortcut' available, it will allow the user to make a shortcut in the app draw to any document or picture or mp3 and works well.
The middle button, between the two volume buttons, pauses music with a short-press and videos too. There is an option to make the volume buttons change track on long-press but it doesn't work very well because the volume buttons aren't particularly stiff and this results in them accidentally changing the track while it's in my pocket. As a concept I think it's great. In fact I used it on my Nexus S, with a custom rom, and I thought why is this not standard? But the buttons need to be a little stiffer to work properly unless it's just on a desk or table or something, in my opinion.
Update: pressing volume up and volume down at the same time takes a screen shot (no extra software required).
Update: I had the volume turned all the way up when I used my earphones and holy **** it's loud. I love it because if I need it that loud it's there. For now however it's considerably turned down.
Update: I bought the official flip case from amazon.co.uk and it arrived today; it fits very well and looks nice. It's not quite as good to type on with the leather screen cover flopping down or folded back but I think I can get use to it. The sound from the speaker with it on sounds a little more tiny to me but it does offer good protection since the back of the case is made from hard plastic. The screen turns on and off automatically on the opening and closing of the leather screen cover.
Update: Flip case review continued: the screen turns on when I open the flip cover even when I had previously turned it off manually (I do this out of habit sometimes); it seems quite clever to do this or at least it seems a nice touch. The cover has some nice grip on the back due to the leather strip that wraps around from the front flip cover. I said previously that the volume keys weren't exactly ideal for changing tracks on a long-press but I think now, with the case on, they're less likely to be pressed accidentally since they're now slightly recessed and not sticking out.
The phones camera module is recessed slightly too for protection from scratches I would guess.
Update: The volume buttons and middle button between them sometimes refuse to work. I use them all the time for listening to music and now and again they stop working. They always work again with a phone restart so I am guessing it's a software bug rather than a hardware one.
Once, the voice controls activated themselves in the background with no sign of being active and so I couldn't see how to close the app because it was basically invisible. A pressing of the middle button briefly and a voice command of 'exit' made the app close itself. A phone restart would have no doubt fixed the problem too.
An actual hardware issue seems to be that: my earphones when twisted to a particular angle in their socket now turn the music off if it's playing, as if they had been removed. This is annoying because the music now sometimes switches off unintentionally whilst in my pocket. This fault is a new development and I hope the earphone socket doesn't stop working altogether... I don't know that it will but the fact that this fault has developed so early on in the phones (potential) life isn't exactly confidence inspiring. A bluetooth headset would be a solution if it does go or a repair job under warranty.
Update: It isn't possible to connect the Q5 to a new pc and transfer files to or from the device without hassle because you must first install the blackberry software. Annoyingly, you have to have an internet connection to download the software to the pc; I tried to move files from a pc to the BB which did not have the internet without realizing I needed the internet to do this and of course it wouldn't let me (UPDATE: This last part is wrong, the Q5 does allow a user to install drivers without an internet connection but you don't download the full BlackBerry 'Link' software, instead you just install the 'blackberry device manager' software and this will let you drag and drop files to and from your pc or your Q5; like you would do when using a usb memory stick. If you have a password on your Q5 then the device will not appear in the computer directory until you have clicked on the 'BlackBerry device manager' application and have entered your password, which might be the reason for my previous confusion). If you go to a public library and would like to transfer something from your Q5 to one of the computers there, installing applications is restricted from my experience so you wouldn't be able to do this.
Update: A high quality review of the Q5 can be found at notebookcheck (dot) net. It tests the battery life of the Q5 and they have similar statistics for various other phone models and so comparisons are possible if you search their site. The results for the Q5 were: Idle (without WLAN, min brightness)= 34h 00min ; Surfing with WLAN = 10h 47min ; Load (maximum brightness) = 8h 10min.
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