BlackBerry’s latest answer to the iPhone and Android challenge has arrived. It’s called the BlackBerry Torch 9800. It packs the best camera of any BlackBerry, a touch screen, full keyboard, and even an optical trackpad to help with navigation.

BlackBerry Torch 9800 Review

BlackBerry Torch 9800 Specs:

BlackBerry 6

624 MHz

512 MB RAM

3.2-inch 360×480 capacitive touchscreen

4 GB built-in + 4 GB microSD (expandable to 32GB)

Lithium Ion 1270mAh

5.0 megapixels, autofocus Camera

35-key QWERTY backlit slide-out keyboard

Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n; Bluetooth 2.1

5.68 ounces Weight
BlackBerry 9800 Torch Unlocked Phone with 5 MP Camera, Full QWERTY Keyboard, 4 GB Internal Storage, and Slider Card Slot Up to 32GB – International Version with No Warranty (Black)

The BlackBerry Torch is an excellent example of a great design well executed. The device feels like a quality product. It’s shiny and has a 3.2-inch display.  It uses an Marvell 624MHz CPU, 512MB of RAM, 4GB of internal storage, packs a 5 megapixel autofocus camera with LED flash, tri-band UMTS/HSDPA 3.6Mbps, quad-band GSM/GPRS/EDGE, Bluetooth, a GPS, and Wi-Fi. At 4.37 x 2.44 x 0.57 inches, though it’s a heavier handset (5.68 oz versus 4.8 oz) and in contrast with (non-QWERTY) rivals like the iPhone 4 or DROID X it’s chunky in the hand.

The BlackBerry Torch 9800 has a 3.2-inch capacitive touchscreen, featuring a portrait orientation and a HVGA pixel resolution. Text is pixelated, normally crisp images look low quality by comparison, and web browsing is unusable without zooming in constantly. At 480 x 360 resolution, the Torch’s display simply falls short when it comes to pixels.

Side by side with the Bold 9700, the Torch’s keyboard is noticeably (if marginally) slimmer, with less width to share for each of its 35 individual buttons.  Customizable keyboards and layouts, thinner, more solid, less clunky handsets — everything is moving over to touch and it’s for the better. I had no trouble tapping out accurate messages, and the predictive text was helpful when we made mistakes.

The rest of the phone remains similar to the 9700, with a 5-megapixel camera and LED flash on the back.  It takes pretty decent photos, and RIM has completely redone their photo-taking UI.

The Torch is a good voice phone with some odd audio characteristics. Reception was average. The earpiece and speakerphone are both quite loud. RIM claims its battery will give you 5.5 hours of talk time and 18 days on standby.  Battery life is reasonable; with casual use we found it lasted two days without charge.