The IT Nerd

I’ll cut to the chase and give you my verdict up front and then tell you why I feel this way. The BlackBerry Passport is an odd smartphone. But it’s an odd smartphone that is a winner in my eyes. If you can get past the fact that it’s a weird shape and size, you need to take a look at it. Quite simply, the BlackBerry Passport has replaced the Z30 as my favorite BlackBerry.

Now, here’s why I feel that way.

First there’s the screen. It’s a 4.5-inch square display that’s 30 percent wider than an average 5-inch phone. The logic is that you will have more real estate to read e-mails and work on documents. That’s 100 percent true. I found that text didn’t have to wrap or get cut off because of how wide the screen is. Text and documents also looked much better in my opinion as well. I will demonstrate this by showing you the same e-mail on both the Passport and my iPhone 5S:

The screen has a resolution of 1,400 x 1,400 which equates to a pixel density of 453 ppi. Image quality is good and it was generally visible in all lighting conditions. The screen was also prone to fingerprints so you’ll need to keep a microfiber cloth handy.

In terms of physical connections, you get a 3.5mm headphone jack and power button on the top, with a micro-USB/micro-HDMI port and stereo speakers on the bottom. The right side features volume up/down buttons separated by a convenience key used for BlackBerry Assistant and media play/pause.

Now over to the keyboard. Now in the interest of full disclosure, I was a long time (as in from 2001) BlackBerry user until I switched to the iPhone a couple of years ago. Thus I have an affinity for physical keyboards. This one is unique by BlackBerry standards. The three-row keyboard doubles as a touch-sensitive trackpad that adds gestures to your ability to type. Not only that, but as you type, any additional keys that you might need such as numbers or symbols will appear above the physical keyboard. This does take some getting used to. But after a couple of days, you’ll have it figured out. Now I do have a could of gripes when it comes to the keyboard. The space bar is on the small side. But that’s minor. The other gripe is that typing is strictly a two handed affair. If you want one handed typing, you might want to consider the upcoming BlackBerry Classic. But neither of those stops me from saying that the keyboard is a winner.

Now let me move to the elephant in the room. BlackBerry OS 10.3. Now, I’ll say right up front that the list of native apps isn’t as big as Android or iOS. But as far as I am concerned, that’s a non-factor. Besides, if this is really a factor for you, there are 300,000 native apps in their App Store and you can use Android apps as well along with having access to the Amazon App Store. But in any case, what is a factor is that it is still the most intuitive mobile OS out there. Features such as the BlackBerry Hub and extremely intuitive gesture set are now joined by the BlackBerry Assistant. The latter creates a Siri like interface to do whatever you need to do via voice. Now it won’t learn your every habit the way Google Now does, nor will it Shazam songs. But I’m fine with that. Another thing I was fine with was BlackBerry Blend which shows the world that Apple isn’t the only company that can integrate your smartphone with your other devices. Simply download an app on your MacBook, Windows machine, Android and iOS tablet and once your devices are connected, you’ll be able to use them to manage and move files back and forth, send and receive messages (BBM, email and text) remotely, access your contacts and calendar and view movies stored locally on your BlackBerry. You’ll note the degree of cross platform compatibility that BlackBerry brings to the table. That’s one advantage that BlackBerry has over iOS/OS X and its Continuity feature which doesn’t work with anything other than Apple products.

The Passport is fast and it can owe that speed to a 2.2GHz quad-core processor and 3GB of RAM. There is ZERO as in ZIP, NONE, NADA lag in this device. Usually when I test a device, I can usually get it to trip up if I push it hard enough, and that’s harder than 99% of the population would ever push their smartphones. But that wasn’t the case here with the Passport. That’s pretty impressive and it should give the Samsungs and Apples of the world something to think about. It also comes with a healthy 32GB of storage out of the box and it has a MicroSD card slot to add up to 128GB of storage. Data connectivity comes in the form of the following:

• LTE
• 802.11 A/B/G/N/AC
• Bluetooth 4.0
• NFC
• FM Radio

Now onto the camera. It’s a 13MP shooter with optical image stabilization that allows the user some degree of control and it supports HDR. It also shoots 1080p video up to 60 frames a second. So to test this, I headed out to Pearson Airport in Toronto and got these shots. Click on them to see them in full resolution:

Some notes:

• I went to a holiday party and wanted to take some photos in a low light situation. However my iPhone 5s and my wife’s iPhone 5 would not take acceptable pictures. However the BlackBerry Passport took high quality photos without any issue.
• The autofocus function on this camera is as quick as the LG G3 and Samsung Galaxy S5. And I do mean quick. Any picture I took was sharp and detailed.

If you want a camera to take stills in any situation, this is it.

Now the video. Set it to full screen and 720p:

One handy feature that you’ll want to take advantage of is the ability to shoot stills and video at the same time. For me, that worked flawlessly.

Battery life absolutely rocks on this device. I went for 2 and a half days on a single charge. That is beyond impressive, though I will note that the battery is non-removable. Another thing that is impressive is the sound quality. It sounds great when I was using it as a phone and it has four microphones which allows your voice to be reproduced with impressive clarity. What’s also impressive is the price. Unlocked direct from BlackBerry, it’s $699 Canadian. But the Passport is also carried by Bell, Rogers, SaskTel, and Telus. If you’re an existing BlackBerry user, it’s a no brainer to upgrade to the Passport. But if you’re in the market for a smartphone of any description, you’d be doing yourself a dis-service by not looking at the Passport. BlackBerry has hit a home run with this phone and I fully expect the Passport to give the company a lot of attention.