TechCentralTechCentral
    Facebook Twitter YouTube LinkedIn
    Facebook Twitter LinkedIn YouTube
    TechCentral TechCentral
    NEWSLETTER
    • News

      The great crypto crash: the fallout, and what happens next

      22 June 2022

      Winter 1, Eskom 0

      22 June 2022

      What it will take to bring the Guptas to justice

      22 June 2022

      Inflation in South Africa spikes higher

      22 June 2022

      Eskom announces massive escalation in load shedding

      22 June 2022
    • World

      Tether to launch a stablecoin tied to the British pound

      22 June 2022

      Tech giants form metaverse standards body, without Apple

      22 June 2022

      There are still unresolved matters in Twitter deal, Musk says

      21 June 2022

      5G subscriptions to top one billion in 2022: Ericsson

      21 June 2022

      Crypto lenders face a DeFi drubbing

      21 June 2022
    • In-depth

      Goodbye, Internet Explorer – you really won’t be missed

      19 June 2022

      Oracle’s database dominance threatened by rise of cloud-first rivals

      13 June 2022

      Everything Apple announced at WWDC – in less than 500 words

      7 June 2022

      Sheryl Sandberg’s ad empire leaves a complicated legacy

      2 June 2022

      Tulipmania meets the real economy at WhatsApp speed

      30 May 2022
    • Podcasts

      How your organisation can triage its information security risk

      22 June 2022

      Everything PC S01E06 – ‘Apple Silicon’

      15 June 2022

      The youth might just save us

      15 June 2022

      Everything PC S01E05 – ‘Nvidia: The Green Goblin’

      8 June 2022

      Everything PC S01E04 – ‘The story of Intel – part 2’

      1 June 2022
    • Opinion

      Has South Africa’s advertising industry lost its way?

      21 June 2022

      Rob Lith: What Icasa’s spectrum auction means for SA companies

      13 June 2022

      A proposed solution to crypto’s stablecoin problem

      19 May 2022

      From spectrum to roads, why fixing SA’s problems is an uphill battle

      19 April 2022

      How AI is being deployed in the fight against cybercriminals

      8 April 2022
    • Company Hubs
      • 1-grid
      • Altron Document Solutions
      • Amplitude
      • Atvance Intellect
      • Axiz
      • BOATech
      • CallMiner
      • Digital Generation
      • E4
      • ESET
      • Euphoria Telecom
      • IBM
      • Kyocera Document Solutions
      • Microsoft
      • Nutanix
      • One Trust
      • Pinnacle
      • Skybox Security
      • SkyWire
      • Tarsus on Demand
      • Videri Digital
      • Zendesk
    • Sections
      • Banking
      • Broadcasting and Media
      • Cloud computing
      • Consumer electronics
      • Cryptocurrencies
      • Education and skills
      • Energy
      • Fintech
      • Information security
      • Internet and connectivity
      • Internet of Things
      • Investment
      • IT services
      • Motoring and transport
      • Public sector
      • Science
      • Social media
      • Talent and leadership
      • Telecoms
    • Advertise
    TechCentralTechCentral
    Home»Gadgets & Reviews»BlackBerry 9720 review: living in the past

    BlackBerry 9720 review: living in the past

    Gadgets & Reviews By Craig Wilson12 September 2013
    Facebook Twitter LinkedIn WhatsApp Telegram Email

    BlackBerry-9720-640

    Nostalgia can evoke wonderful feelings when it stems from childhood homes revisited, 8mm home movies rewatched or old friends reunited. But it’s altogether disconcerting when it’s induced by a brand new mobile phone. Such is the experience of using BlackBerry’s brand-new-yet-all-too-familiar 9720.

    When BlackBerry introduced the Z10 smartphone, powered by its BlackBerry 10 (BB10) operating system, the company said it would continue to support and release devices running the earlier BB7 system.

    Given the bulk of the company’s customers still use BB7, and the fact that BB7 handsets tend to be considerably cheaper than their BB10 counterparts, there’s some sense in the move.

    The question we have to ask is whether making new products running legacy software is a more sensible decision in the long term than pushing the newer software on budget hardware. Maintaining two platforms causes continuity problems.

    The 9720 looks a lot like a smaller version of BlackBerry’s other new budget smartphone, the BB10-powered Q5. Both are hybrid touch-and-Qwerty devices with plastic, Chiclet-style physical keyboards. The Q5, however, is the more premium device, reflected in its R4 999 price over the 9720’s R2 599.

    BlackBerry-9720-Black-sideThe 9720 stacks up reasonably well for its price. It’s 2,8-inch capacitive display offers a resolution of 480×360 pixels and it’s responsive and bright. Though there’s only 512MB of internal storage — and a matching amount of RAM — the microSD card slot supports cards up to 32GB, and it’s unreasonable to expect more substantial storage for the price.

    BlackBerry’s four-way optical trackpad is back, flanked by two buttons on each side. On the left are dial and BlackBerry Messenger (BBM) buttons, while the right houses back and hang-up/power buttons. The arrangement is logical, but the need for so many buttons shows BB7’s age. With the touch display, the 9720 teases you into thinking you can navigate its menu with touch alone; the buttons beneath the display remind you that you can’t.

    Although there’s only one camera on the 9720, it’s a respectable 5-megapixel offering and includes an LED flash and support for geo-tagging images. There’s also an FM radio built in, one of the things that made the Curve range so popular and always a good idea on low-end devices with limited internal storage.

    Unsurprisingly, there’s no support for 4G/LTE, but there are plenty of 2G bands (850/900/1 800/1 900MHz) and 3G bands (850/900/1 900/2 100MHz) offered. Data transfer tops out at 7,2Mbit/s.

    Though the user-replacable battery is only 1 450mAh, the small display doesn’t tax it too much and you’ll easily get a day of use out of it.

    The biggest problem with the 9720 is really the dated BB7. Not the most elegant operating system to begin with, it is cumbersome and non-intuitive next to Android, iOS and Windows Phone.

    The one advantage the software has is apps. There are far more apps available than there are for BB10.

    For now, the 9720 gives BlackBerry something new to offer in emerging markets, but sooner rather than later, the company will have to find a way of making budget BB10 devices and get developers fully behind the new platform.

    The 9720, then, represents the end of an era rather than the start of a new one.  — (c) 2013 NewsCentral Media

    Share. Facebook Twitter LinkedIn WhatsApp Telegram Email
    Previous ArticleScreamer saga comes to a head
    Next Article Future’s bright for UHD TV: Deloitte

    Related Posts

    US allies urged to shun Huawei equipment: report

    23 November 2018

    Podcast | Digital terrestrial television: the state of play in SA

    18 October 2017

    Interview: Roger McCleery on the future of motoring

    18 October 2017
    Add A Comment

    Comments are closed.

    Promoted

    More than card machines – iKhokha diversifies to reach more SMEs

    22 June 2022

    What does it cost to be a student in 2022?

    22 June 2022

    Rugged PCs bring AI to the edge in industrial settings

    21 June 2022
    Opinion

    Has South Africa’s advertising industry lost its way?

    21 June 2022

    Rob Lith: What Icasa’s spectrum auction means for SA companies

    13 June 2022

    A proposed solution to crypto’s stablecoin problem

    19 May 2022

    Subscribe to Updates

    Get the best South African technology news and analysis delivered to your e-mail inbox every morning.

    © 2009 - 2022 NewsCentral Media

    Type above and press Enter to search. Press Esc to cancel.