BlackBerry has announced its fourth new BlackBerry 10-based smartphone of the year with the Z30, a five-inch screen device that will become the company's flagship smartphone.
The OLED touchscreen will offer a resolution of 1,280 by 768 - the same as the Z10, but with fewer dots-per inch - 295 - due to the larger screen size. However, it will sport a much bigger (and much needed) 2,880mAh battery.
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This is non-removable, but should overcome the battery life problems of the Z10, providing 25 hours of "mixed use", according to BlackBerry.
It also has a newly designed radio antenna intended to maintain reception better in "spotty" locations and offers 4G compatibility, but with different devices to cover the different bands used in different countries - as opposed to the single-chip solution adopted in Apple's latest iPhone 5S and 5C devices.
Powering the device is a 1.7 gigahertz (GHz) Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 Pro, a dual-core ARM-based microprocessor with a Qualcomm Adreno 320 graphics controller alongisde. It has two gigabytes (GB) of RAM and 16GB of flash storage - but a microSD slot to add an extra 64GB.
The Z30 has an eight megapixel rear facing camera and two megapixel fixed focus front-side camera for video conferencing. Intriguingly, the Z30 has dual stereo speakers, like the HTC One, but offering "BlackBerry Natural Sound".
The device will sport the BlackBerry 10 operating system, version 10.2, an update that will also be rolled out to users of BlackBerry's other 10-series devices at about the same time. This will introduce a new Priority Hub to manage conversations - not just messages.
"It collects priority messages across your email, social networking and other accounts and gives you instant access to the conversations most important to you," according to BlackBerry.
It is not clear whether BlackBerry's "global creative director" Alicia Keys was on hand to offer design advice to BlackBerry's engineers.
While pricing, availability and other details have not yet been revealed, it ought to be released in mid-October in the UK and Middle East first. BlackBerry is also demo'ing the device on its website following a launch event today in Malaysia.
