[zensen]

I'm not at all excited about the KeyOne's release, because the phone has only got 3GB of RAM. The Passport that I'm using, was released with 3GB of RAM, and that was 3 years ago.

I realise that the phone is being marketed as a mid-tier device, but with the price of the phone being $599, it should have been equipped with at least 4GB.

Posted via CB10

Is the ram on the passport the exact same as on the KEYone? Maybe the speed of the ram is better on the keyone.

Ultimately I'm not sure how many apps need to be running to finally push an android device over the 3gb.

Do people on the dtek60 regularly go over that. I'm assuming intensive gaming will?

I'm not to familiar how multi tasking apps work if they freeze or keep ticking along like BlackBerry 10 etc.

From all accounts it seems 4gb is a good number for most high end phones but at least the reviews I've read with phones using 3gb ram don't seem to suffer.

Future proofing is all well and good. But realistically your buying the phone for now and I still think it'll be a good performer 2 years down the line and if there's an app that requires 3gb+ off the bat you'll be looking for a
At dtek60 or something else.

If you need a keyboard well, who else you going to go to on android? There may very well be a high end keyboard end of year or next year etcm

Posted via CB10

[DickDorf]

My dtek60 has 4 GB and doesn't run more apps faster than my DTEK50, at least not in my case and I am a pretty serious multitasker. More ram uses more power so if yore not using it, it does nothing except consume battery life. Now if you're actually using it, then more is better, but more is not better if not. Extended battery life was a primary goal in the design of te KEYone. And I didn't find my DTEK50 slower than my DTEK60, both are quite capable, just ran out of room with 16 gb storage.

PP Silver Ed. and DTEK60 soon to add a KEYone!

[Drael646464]

Probably because the law of diminishing returns occurs very rapidly with android after 2 gb. 2gb is to android what 4gb is to windows. 3gb is really probably the eqivilant to android that 6gb is to windows. And the difference in windows between 6gb and 8gb is very slight.

Android like windows has an effective disk caching system.

The spec wars that go in in commercial circles, and have for years, are a joke.

The main bottleneck in any computers speed is disk access, because its the slowest. Yet while everyone is looking for a phone with 1 billion gigabyte ram, no one checks the disk speed, and no manufacturer is doing SSD yet, only eMMC.

If you are really concerned about the speed of the KeyONE, find out its disk access times.

[TheBirdDog]

Probably because the law of diminishing returns occurs very rapidly with android after 2 gb. 2gb is to android what 4gb is to windows. 3gb is really probably the eqivilant to android that 6gb is to windows. And the difference in windows between 6gb and 8gb is very slight.

Android like windows has an effective disk caching system.

The spec wars that go in in commercial circles, and have for years, are a joke.

The main bottleneck in any computers speed is disk access, because its the slowest. Yet while everyone is looking for a phone with 1 billion gigabyte ram, no one checks the disk speed, and no manufacturer is doing SSD yet, only eMMC.

If you are really concerned about the speed of the KeyONE, find out its disk access times.

Oh no!!! We were just finally figuring out what RAM was and now you're already going to tell us that it's not the most important spec?

Well, somebody better find out what the disc speed is so that we can compare it to phones that are cheaper and find more 'proof' that it is overpriced and underspec'd!

(*Note: I really do appreciate you sharing your knowledge with us and apologize for my sarcasm. I just think that people like to complain more than they care about facts.)

[bobshine]

Probably because the law of diminishing returns occurs very rapidly with android after 2 gb. 2gb is to android what 4gb is to windows. 3gb is really probably the eqivilant to android that 6gb is to windows. And the difference in windows between 6gb and 8gb is very slight.

Android like windows has an effective disk caching system.

The spec wars that go in in commercial circles, and have for years, are a joke.

The main bottleneck in any computers speed is disk access, because its the slowest. Yet while everyone is looking for a phone with 1 billion gigabyte ram, no one checks the disk speed, and no manufacturer is doing SSD yet, only eMMC.

If you are really concerned about the speed of the KeyONE, find out its disk access times.

Not completely true. Speed is an overall experience. Yes, disk access can slow down the experience but once an app is loaded in RAM, disk access speed won't be an issue.

So an OS that leaves lots of available RAM for apps will feel more crisp and faster, all else being equal. And we all know that we pretty much always use the same apps: Facebook, Instagram and all those standard phone apps... those process will pretty much be loaded all the time. Too little ram combined with inefficient OS will have higher battery consumption and feel slow

[Adam Kowalczyk1]

Bottom line is more ram is always beneficial. I never had problem with 3gb ram though. My passport 3gb feels very solid.

Posted via CB10

The Passport only let you have 8 apps running. I haven't decided if this is a good or bad thing now that I'm on an Android phone with 4GB or RAM.

[anon(3732391)]

One friend wants more memory, another wants more storage, another wants a better SoC, another wants a better camera. Where does it stop?

I'm waiting for someone to create a camera with a phone app!

[bobshine]

I'm waiting for someone to create a camera with a phone app!

I think it already exist... Kodak had one. It was horrible

[keyboardweeb]

Probably because the law of diminishing returns occurs very rapidly with android after 2 gb. 2gb is to android what 4gb is to windows. 3gb is really probably the eqivilant to android that 6gb is to windows. And the difference in windows between 6gb and 8gb is very slight.

And remember, free memory is wasted memory. (actually, Windows seems to do pretty well about not wasting memory these days )

[glossywhite]

"Only" 3GB?

Lol. What a crazy world.

[Drael646464]

To clarify:

Benchmarking on PC clearly shows the law of diminishing returns for RAM. The same is true for android, it matters a lot to a certain point, and then less and less after than point. I'd say its about 2gb, or perhaps 3gb for very high res big screens. Its established as 4gb for a PC.

Not saying it doesn't matter, just saying that the difference between 1gb and 2gb is huge, the difference between 3gb and 4gb is slight. So yes, having 2gb is very important. Having 4gb instead of 3gb is comparatively minor.

Disk access occurs all the time. Windows and Android both pass things in RAM out to disk when you switch applications. Its called a "cache". Applications also write and read from disk all the time. Disk access is the slowest part of a machine. Install an SSD in a computer, you'll see its the more significant performance factor.

Yes, its more important when loading apps, installing apps, booting, waking from hibernation/sleep iike it is on a computer. But its also relevant in multi-tasking like ram, and for apps that make heavier use of the disk (like games). And yes I agree speed is an overall experience. But what I was pointing out, that with the level CPUs are at, the level RAM is at, and the level that android software is generally at (the OS is light, and the applications light compared to full desktop software), by far the most significant performance factor is disk speed.

I'd also say that RAM speed is probably more important than total ram, especially after 3gb.

Not that having a phone with 8gb wont be slightly faster, especially in multi-tasking than 3gb. But for the price, for the specification, its the wrong thing to be looking for. It's like wanting a PC with 16gb of ram, rather than an SSD.

Although you do make another good point - ram and disk speed both take load off the CPU. The difference might be slight though compared to the SoC power draw.

[Lobwedgephil]

I think you also forget how the phone will perform in one year. Android phones are notorious for being slow and laggy after about a year, regardless of ram. I see why TCL did what they did, they are focusing on battery improvements. I only hope the phone performs much better then the Priv, as that became almost unusable to me after about a month with how slow and laggy it became.

[phuoc]

This is why I like coming here, I'm not tech savvy but I do learn something new every time I post. You guys and gals are a trove of knowledge for people like me. Can't wait to get my Keyone, so looking forward to it. Thanks for all your help!

[murphy_thom]

The original passport was released almost 3 years ago, and it shipped with 3GB of RAM. In the current market place with the reputation that BlackBerry phones have, it would surely have been better to release a phone with the best available specifications.

It's not about the smoothness of the phone, but its about challenging and changing peoples perceptions of BlackBerry. Surely it would have only cost TCL 10 bucks more to install 4GB?

Posted via CB10

Disagree. It's about the smoothness of the phone and productivity vs the specs.

Posted via CB10

[murphy_thom]

I disagree with your disagreement. I feel that specs are being looked at more and more. I think that the only ones that are scrutinized more than RAM is storage and PPI. I would state that many people don't quite understand what the specs mean necessarily though. They know the higher the number the "better" the phone is, even if they don't fully understand the categories.

I would be willing to bet 75% or higher have no idea the specs in their phone. Consumers care about apps and a decent camera to take pictures to post on social media.

Posted via CB10

[TheBirdDog]

I would be willing to bet 75% or higher have no idea the specs in their phone. Consumers care about apps and a decent camera to take pictures to post on social media.

Posted via CB10

I agree with this. Not everyone who has a smartphone spends their time on Internet forums about them.

While there may have been a few people who would have been pleased to see better specs, the vast majority are not going to even know what specs are in their current device, let alone their next one. Camera ability and battery life are the two biggest things people care about, from what I observe.

[Drael646464]

True. People seem to go to war over trivial things on the internet, no one in real life even talk about much. Models of phones is definitely one of those things.

[Scovik]

Seeing as 625 is x64, adding another GB of RAM would have been easy.
Now software wise, the kernel would have to be modified a bit to make room for more apps running in the background, but that would take a few days to do, so why is the phone shipped with 3 GB instead of 4 is beyond me.
Maybe we'll have an nice surprise and they will release it with 4, although I seriously doubt it.

[anon(870071)]

Because you can always use a micro sd card to have access to more internal memory!!!!

[tollfeeder]

Because you can always use a micro sd card to have access to more internal memory!!!!

Wrong thread I guess https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Random-access_memory

Via Pasta CB10

[thurask]

Because you can always use a micro sd card to have access to more internal memory!!!!

[Brian Embry]

If the software is optimized for the 625 and 3gigs of RAM then the KEYone should run smooth as butter. Apple iPhones ran for years on just 1 gig of RAM. In most speed test they continually smoked Android phones with more RAM. So more is not necessarily better. All these parts that make up the phone need to be designed to work together.

[co4nd]

I'm sure it will run fine but it was a bad idea. Casual non tech people when looking at specs seem to mostly focus on the RAM.

Those casuals are going to see 3GB of RAM and then see the price tag and they'll say no way. Not all but some guaranteed will skip it because of that.

They should have just gone with 4.

Posted via CB10

The casual non tech people don't know the difference between RAM and storage. The best option would have been what apple does and not even mention RAM.

[co4nd]

Because you can always use a micro sd card to have access to more internal memory!!!!

Case in point to my post above

[iUser]

I have no personal affiliations with the KEYone and I don't feel the need to defend it. I'm sure it won't take anyone's comments personally and need any defending either, not to mention it's going to get plenty of love once it's released regardless...

I just feel like a lot of people are comparing the KEYone's price to other phones with the same or similar 'specs' (read: ONLY processor and RAM) while completely omitting the rest of the hardware (battery, keyboard, fingerprint scanner, camera, etc) and software (security and consistent updates, Hub, and other BlackBerry exclusive features) and the necessary engineering required to make it all happen. Combined that with the fact that this will not sell in the same numbers as Samsung or Apple devices (not even close!) as it is a niche device with a much smaller market. Less units sold translates to higher margins per unit required for overall profit.

So, maybe I am defensive... but I also feel that I'm defending common sense at the same time. I see nothing wrong with the picture, other than the usual 'people wanting to pay less but receive more' which is just not how it works.

There's something wrong with the picture. Less units sold could mean less known. This translates to even less units in the next quarter.

Very few units, of course in comparison to what BlackBerry would need to reason further supports, could mean less budget for software updates.

Of course there will still be monthly update, with less content though. Basically, they could even just change the version number and call it an update.