BlackBerry L-Series Caught Cavorting With iPhone 5

RIM's BlackBerry L-Series smartphone has been caught in the wild again, with the BlackBerry 10 handset this time cosying up to Apple's iPhone 5. The image of the all-touch handset, shared by BBin, does not show it functioning – though a video demo back in October did - though it does give an idea of scale in comparison to Apple's latest iOS device.

With an iPhone bumper applied, however, the two phones are surprisingly similar in their dimensions. That's down to very similar screen sizes, predominantly, with the iPhone 5's 4-inch panel just slightly smaller than the 4.2-inch LCD screen we're expecting on the L-Series.

However, the BlackBerry will have a more pixel-dense panel, thanks to a higher resolution; it's tipped to run at 1280 x 768, just as on the 10 Dev Alpha units RIM has been distributing to developers. That works out to a pixel density of 355ppi, versus the iPhone 5's 326ppi.

The iPhone 5 will likely win on thickness, though, at 7.6mm; in contrast, preliminary specifications for the "London" L-Series pegged the all-touch device at 9mm thick.

The L-Series is believed to be one of two devices RIM is readying for launch, the other being a QWERTY-equipped N-Series. RIM will officially reveal the first BlackBerry 10 phones on January 30, the company has confirmed, with senior executives saying that sales should begin "not too long after" that

[via Crackberry]