BlackBerry London gets aesthetic makeover

03 February 2012 - 16:03:11

Melanie Rawlins

The next flagship BlackBerry smartphone, which is codenamed the London during its development, has appeared in a leaked slideshow image, which suggests that manufacturer, Research in Motion (RIM), has overhauled the exterior styling of the device.

RIM was reportedly ditching two other new smartphones in order to put all of its efforts into making the BlackBerry London as good as possible and if the slide is legitimate, then it could be on the way to cracking the top end of the market.

The most notable thing about the artist's rendering of the London is the slimness of the chassis, which looks to be at least as slender as something like the iPhone 4S or Samsung Galaxy S2, if not more so.

The shell of the handset seems to be all black and features the BlackBerry logo on the rear, but this, too, is a change, as snaps of an earlier prototype suggested that it might come in a brushed aluminium casing.

RIM seems to have made the BlackBerry London look more consistent with its Playbook tablet, which makes sense, given the similarities between the software found on each device.

The London is likely to be the first BlackBerry smartphone to use the BB 10 operating system, developed on the QNX platform, which powers the Playbook.

A dual core 1.5GHz processor is anticipated to be onboard, with 16GB of storage space and 1GB of RAM rounding things out nicely. While quad core chips will rule the Android roost in 2012, if RIM can make efficient use of the London's power, then it will not be any less appealing.

Hopefully, it will be possible for RIM to get the BlackBerry London out of the labs and into the hands of its customers as quickly as possible, to avoid getting swept further behind in the smartphone market.