[Speculation] A10: Okay, let's be real now... it's simply not good enough.
After being tunnel-visioned into the group-think "BB IS BACK" mentality prior to the June 28 ER, I think people (myself included) need to be a lot more realistic when it comes to Blackberry as opposed to showing #BBPRIDE or whatever. Let's be real.
The leaked specs are obviously underwhelming for a flagship product. If the A10 is supposed to be another catalyst that brings Blackberry back into the game, then it needs to have far better specs than what's be leaked. I sincerely hope the leaks are wrong.
SCREEN RESOLUTION:
To everybody saying that the BB devices are optimized for 720p, and that 1080p makes no difference so who cares... how do you think that plays into public perception? Public perception is the KEY driving force for a turnaround. People want the best specs available these days when it comes to their phones. They want their devices to be future proofed (at least for the short term). I'm pretty sure everybody who says "720p is just fine" has a spot deep down where they KNOW 1080p is what BB needs. At the end of the day, not many people are going to want a phone with 2012/2013 specs.
APPS/DEVELOPERS:
For those who argue that 720p is necessary to make it easier to scale apps and to keep developers happy... don't you see how small of a thought that is? Think bigger. Better specs = more subs = more opportunity for developers = more apps. It's simple really. Does Instagram care whether 720p is good enough? No. They care about the consumer base and whether it's financially worth their time or not. The same can be said for other large and small app makers out there. At the end of the day, everything comes back to public perception and consumer base again.
BEZEL:
Let's be honest, the bezel is huge. Obviously some people can deal with it, and that's fine. Good for you. But what would the general public think when they compare the A10 with another (cheaper) alternative like the new Optimus? The bezel is thin and beautiful, sleek and pretty. Compare that to the bulky and think, ugly and dated bezel on the A10? You have to remember, we're not trying to sell to only the die-hard BB lovers here. If the public thinks it's ugly and there are cheaper/sleeker looking phones out there, the A10 will be DOA.
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At the end of the day, if the A10 were to be released today, it would already be underwhelming... let alone having it be released at the end of the year. Consumers will find prettier and cheaper alternatives. Developers will still be looking for reasons to build native BB apps. Blackberry really needs to up their game here if they want to get rid of the "BB is dead" mentality that everybody is trying to pretend doesn't exist. It exists. Talk to anybody without a BB right now and that's what they're thinking. To break that mentality, we need a reason to build up some hype, and a good place to start would be having AT LEAST comparable specs to the competition. 1080p, quadcore snapdragon, sleek minimalistic features (*ahem* the bezel)... that would be a good start for a turnaround.