US consumers have been at the edge of their seats ever since reliable leaker Evan Blass tweeted a sneak peek photo of the Blackberry Venice early Wednesday morning, reported CNET. Because of this, tech-savvy fans' excitement has subsided a little as the leaks provided a good look into the phone before the end of the year.
In case there was any doubt... pic.twitter.com/yfFfyqEg5v
— Evan Blass (@evleaks) August 19, 2015
"BlackBerry Venice confirmed for November release on all four national US carriers," read the tweet from Blass, who also goes by the Twitter handle @evleaks.
One image of the Blackberry Venice shows the Google Play logo on a screen, while another photo reveals a BlackBerry Hub portal showing how e-mails, text messages and social network updates ae viewed. Another feature worth mentioning is the Blackberry Venice's Content Transfer.
The Blackberry Venice was reportedly demoed at Mobile World Congress in March. Perhaps what's making it unique is its dual-curved, all-touch display and a sliding keyboard. The keyboard is placed underneath the slider display and is reportedly made for more heavy usage, like sending emails. In addition, the Blackberry Venice will be the first BlackBerry phone to run on Google's Android Operating System.
The struggling company perhaps saw that it would be wise to use the OS with their smartphone market share now being less than 1 percent. Other efforts to boost sales include the release of the BlackBerry Classic and the BlackBerry Passport over the past year. The move to the Android OS is certainly a radical move since the BlackBerry Venice would be their first phone to leave the weakened BlackBerry operating system.
While the BlackBerry Venice runs on Android with a 16:9 display, Tech Crunch already saw the downside of the soon-to-be-released smartphone. First of all, Tech Crunch simply saw the BlackBerry Venice as an awkwardly tall smartphone in the leaked Twitter updates, with the site comparing it to a huge TV remote.
The slider keyboard didn't bode well for the site too. Akin to old 2005 smartphone designs, the slider, which was supposed to make the BlackBerry Venice fit better into a user's pocket, will unfortunately reduce its life. Sliders are known not only to break phones, but they make them less durable, adding inconvenience as well due to its weight and thickness. In addition, because the keyboard appears too flat, typing on the BlackBerry Venice will not be as feel good as the old ones.
While very little is known about the actual BlackBerry Venice, rumors suggest that it will have a 5.4-inch 2,560x1,440 pixel QHD LCD screen, a Snapdragon 808 processor, and 3GB of RAM.
Despite what Tech Crunch assumes, the BlackBerry Venice might still work for those who want the classic BlackBerry hardware but with Android features and apps.
The two sneak peak videos of the BlackBerry Venice were posted Thursday, according to NDTV Live. Watch them below.
Eye candy. pic.twitter.com/GtJwOfOus8 — Evan Blass (@evleaks) August 19, 2015
.@halfnibble More of an "Android Maya job," innit? pic.twitter.com/4Fhll0Bfv0
— Evan Blass (@evleaks) August 19, 2015
