Following series of leaks, teasers, and rumors, TCL today at an event in NewYork has taken the veil off the BlackBerry KEY2. Touted by the maker as ‘the most advanced BlackBerry smartphone ever,’ the KEY2 has a slightly toned and refined design while also introducing some exciting new features.
The Key2 is made entirely of glass and Series 7 aluminum body with a squarish form factor, the Blackberry iconic physical keyboard, a 3:2 aspect screen and a dual rear camera setup.
The Key2 gets a redesigned 4-row QWERTY physical backlit keyboard with keys that respond to touch gestures, support for flick typing, up to 52 customizable shortcuts. The Fingerprint scanner is still embedded into the space button, and Blackberry says the Keys are now 20 percent taller compare to the Keyone, and that alone should ensure comfortable and accurate typing experience.
New to the Key2 is a special Speed Key which acts like the function key on a keyboard. You can customise it to make app switching faster, call a favorite contact or access functions. The key2 much like its predecessor features a 4.5-inch 1080x1620px IPS LCD display, while it is fueled by the Snapdragon 660 chipset with 6GB of RAM and 64GB of storage which you can expand via microSD card slot. There are indications that some countries would be getting a variant with 128GB storage or a dual-SIM (but no microSD) version.
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On the flip side, the Key2 gets a 12MP standard lens with LED Flash, f/1.8 aperture, 1.14µm pixel size, 79.3-degree wide-angle lens, Dual PDAF, f/2.6 aperture, and a 12MP telephoto lens with1.0µm pixel size, a 50-degree lens, while an 8MP sensor sits above the display.
With a 3360mAh battery with Qualcomm Quick Charge 3.0 and a new Smart Battery Experience feature that learns from your daily charging habits, the maker is promising up to two days battery life. The device runs Android 8.1 Oreo out of the box, with a promise of monthly security updates, one major OS update, coupled with BlackBerry’s additional security, privacy, and productivity tools.
BlackBerry KEY2 Pricing and Availability
Available in Black and Silver color options, the Key2 will roll out later this month at various price points, depending on the region.
$649 (Rs. 43,520 approx.) – U.S.
€649 (US$ 763 / Rs. 51,200 approx.) in Europe
£579 (US$ 777 / Rs. 52,122 approx.) in UK
$829 (US$ 640 / Rs. 42,920 approx.) in Canada.
Way overpriced!