Subject: "Blackberryās are the perfect MP3 players"
My first phone was a Blackberry. No kidding. I had a Q20 and having my own device was something so cool to me. I got this phone back around 2018 and I couldnāt get my hands off of it. Itās a kind of freedom to have your own device - something you only realise when your current phone breaks. I remember everybody had a Samsung or an iPhone but I was the only one rocking a Blackberry to school.
The phone came free with an iPhone 8 my dad purchased. It was already 4 years old by then. I guess they were just trying to push old stock. Also, I wasnāt really deterred by the āinferiorityā of the device or anything. Younger me wasnāt really as self-aware as I am now. It had all the bells and whistles you would need for a phone and I was very content.
I dug it back out of the closet and man, I was shocked. The phone was still in pristine condition. I mean seriously, Iāve had 3 phones break down in the same time this phone has lived. There were lots of forward-facing features such as NFC support, BT 4.0 and 4G support. I also love the feel of the physical keyboard and the trackpad in the middle is just chefās kiss.
It has expandable storage via a microSD card slot making it the perfect candidate for a music player. The music player that is built in supports .flac and .mp3 playback as well. It has an audio jack for a wired listening experience and my favourite part, it has a dedicated pause and play button. The volume rockers can also be reconfigured to skip music when needed.
The 3.5ā square display is perfect. Album covers span the entire width of the display in the music player, letting the artwork flourish. The only downside is the battery life. It isnāt perfect but the thing is a decade old. Iāve managed to maximize it as much as I can lasting about 5 or 6 listening sessions. I would put the battery life on par with a smartwatch.
Also, I think there are ways to revive the device with modern apps but I'm not interested in that stuff nor have I tried it out. I sometimes end up double carrying phones between places which is a bit of a faff. I now keep it as a ābedsideā phone to listen to some music and chill when Iām bored. It looks very pretty on a phone stand.
As elegant as it is, I donāt think it is a phone worth buying brand new. I mostly made this guide as a means for existing owners to repurpose their old phones. Blackberry has cut OS 10 support since 2020 and only Android apps up to Jelly Bean (4.3.2) are supported.
Setting Up
The actual set-up for all this is dirt easy. All you need is an SD card and thatās it. Format it in the settings app and keep it there. Check Storage and Access > Access using USB > USB Mass Storage Mode. This allows you to plug in a cable and copy directly from PC over USB.
I used a 16GB SD card and have tried only .flac and .mp3 so far and I can confirm it works like a charm. I think loading it with .flac files is not ideal despite support. The difference in sound quality is barely discernible and it only takes up more storage. I used a little bit of python and ffmpeg to convert my local music library to MP3 256k which is just the right spot.
The biggest battery drain is the location services, so immediately turn that off in the settings. I decided against taking my Blackberry online, so I turned on Airplane mode and disabled Bluetooth to save more battery. While you are there, check Main Volume > Volume Keys > Music Shortcuts for the volume rockers to skip songs. The music players can also read .m3u files if you have playlists set-up. The battery lasts around a week without use.
The weakest point of this is the equalizer. Itās not robust and only offers presets instead of frequency bands. The presets arenāt great but I guess it is better than having no EQ at all I suppose. Also, it takes a really damn long time to bring up to full charge. Both are things I donāt have the time or skill to fix.
Lastly, I want to talk about the files you copy. The stock music player doesn't know how to sort music with multiple artists so it tends to create duplicate albums and artists categories. Make sure to sanitise this before you copy music. That's really about it. Happy listening.