If you work in the mechanical, electronic or electrical industry then a rugged phone with built in thermal camera is the way forward. It used to be a market dominated by Bullitt phones with CAT branding, but now the market is widening with the Chinese rugged phone manufacturers adding the Flir Lepton sensors to their flagship phones.
The Blackview BV9900 Pro is one of those flagship phones. It may not be a flagship phone to fashionistas clamouring after the latest Apple or Samsung product - but to a technical person, having a waterproof, ruggedized phone with built in thermal imaging makes it the blue collar equivalent of a flagship phone.
I've been using this phone for 4 months now and while I've not "tested" its water and impact resilience as much as some might wish, it's been in a holster pocket of my work trousers every day, and it's been fine. More than that, it's the fastest phone I've ever had. That's quite unusual for ruggedised phones as they tend to lag a bit behind the normal phones in processing power.
The thermal imaging is very handy for spotting overheating connectors, cables, motors, circuit boards, bearings etc at a distance. It can spot problems before they become more serious, and shorten the time required to find a fault. The thermal sensitivity is so good that you can even pinpoint a faulty unit when everything has been turned off. Or see if something has been active recently by its residual heat or lack thereof. Thermal cameras can also indicate water ingress in walls and allow tracing of hot water pipe routes under floors.
I reckon that in the future, many phones will have a thermal imaging camera as standard.
One other unusual feature this phone has is the ability to work at very low temperatures. Between -15 and -30C it will go into a low power mode to protect the battery, but still allow use as a phone and basic camera. I don't really plan on testing that.
The firmware is more or less stock Android and the phone is rootable for those who like such things. (The CAT S61 was locked down in that regard.)
I bought this phone from the Aliexpress store linked to from the manufacturer's site, but it's also available from Amazon and other sources. Note the difference between the BV9900 and the BV9900 Pro. Only the "Pro" one has the thermal imaging camera.
Here's a link to the manufacturers website:-
https://www.blackview.hk/shop/all
They have quite a wide range of rugged phones, some with thermal imaging and some without.
If you enjoy these videos you can help support the channel with a dollar for coffee, cookies and random gadgets for disassembly at:-
http://www.bigclive.com/coffee.htm
This also keeps the channel independent of YouTube's advertising algorithms allowing it to be a bit more dangerous and naughty.
The Blackview BV9900 Pro is one of those flagship phones. It may not be a flagship phone to fashionistas clamouring after the latest Apple or Samsung product - but to a technical person, having a waterproof, ruggedized phone with built in thermal imaging makes it the blue collar equivalent of a flagship phone.
I've been using this phone for 4 months now and while I've not "tested" its water and impact resilience as much as some might wish, it's been in a holster pocket of my work trousers every day, and it's been fine. More than that, it's the fastest phone I've ever had. That's quite unusual for ruggedised phones as they tend to lag a bit behind the normal phones in processing power.
The thermal imaging is very handy for spotting overheating connectors, cables, motors, circuit boards, bearings etc at a distance. It can spot problems before they become more serious, and shorten the time required to find a fault. The thermal sensitivity is so good that you can even pinpoint a faulty unit when everything has been turned off. Or see if something has been active recently by its residual heat or lack thereof. Thermal cameras can also indicate water ingress in walls and allow tracing of hot water pipe routes under floors.
I reckon that in the future, many phones will have a thermal imaging camera as standard.
One other unusual feature this phone has is the ability to work at very low temperatures. Between -15 and -30C it will go into a low power mode to protect the battery, but still allow use as a phone and basic camera. I don't really plan on testing that.
The firmware is more or less stock Android and the phone is rootable for those who like such things. (The CAT S61 was locked down in that regard.)
I bought this phone from the Aliexpress store linked to from the manufacturer's site, but it's also available from Amazon and other sources. Note the difference between the BV9900 and the BV9900 Pro. Only the "Pro" one has the thermal imaging camera.
Here's a link to the manufacturers website:-
https://www.blackview.hk/shop/all
They have quite a wide range of rugged phones, some with thermal imaging and some without.
If you enjoy these videos you can help support the channel with a dollar for coffee, cookies and random gadgets for disassembly at:-
http://www.bigclive.com/coffee.htm
This also keeps the channel independent of YouTube's advertising algorithms allowing it to be a bit more dangerous and naughty.
Hah! I recognize that circuit board… 🙂
They've been out of stock on the website for months.
Yes or No! Admit? Have you Thermal imaged your "Johnson?"
Was it 37oC? Or was it Poorly & giving erratic results ?
Thank you so much for reviewing it, I bought a BL8800 pro recently instead of the cat and am very happy with it.
sorry to do another comment on the blackview. however blackview customer service has been no help at all. and their website has saved itself as the home on my browser.
I would personally suggest staying away from Blackview products.
Thanks for the review, I just got a bl8800 PRO, very nice phone.
I have had the Phone for a year. Sound stopped working. I have to try 3 – 4 times to get Bluetooth to connect. The ouch function does not work on some apps. Some functions on Strava and Signal dont work. Two days after the one year mark, the phone restarted itself and all data was gone. Thats when i had to order a new phone. /// Blackview customer service was not a help.
I have used BV5500, from the same company and I find they stop charging after a year, maybe because the port wears out. Then you bump into its drawback. It's impossible to repair!
My only gripe with these integrated ones and the little micro USB and USB-C thermal cameras is that they kinda have a limited lifespan, not so sure about the USB ones if they'll manage to have software support for a really long time but the phones will definitely slow down over time and might even become too laggy to navigate to the camera app itself
I'm sure they have their uses but I'm thinking I'll get one of those standalone cameras for my dad's upcoming 60th birthday, hopefully they should 'just work' for a long time and have a relatively easy to access battery to last a decently long time
As a fellow bv9900 (not pro) user I will add my toughts about this.
I've had this phone for a year now, and It's garbage.
The only good thing is the speed and storage, which is okay even today, but let me tell the downsides.
When I opened it, I noticed that the rounding of the top corners of the screen hides part of the clock. Not a huge deal, but doesn't shout quality.
Cameras are worse than my moto Z or my nexus 5x s were.
The phone came with a whole lot of undeletable garbage apps.
I've put it in water a few times, it survived, but the inside of the camera got wet and took a few days to dry out.
The battery life is ok, but for a device this size and weight, this battery is jokingly small.
After a few months, dead pixels emerged, now I have a whole lot of white ones, and a centimeter-size red tint on one corner.
The feel of the rubber back is nice, but only after a few months it started to peel off.
The heart rate sensor never worked for me, displays a random number.
Gps is not accurate at all, I've never had a phone with Gps this unreliable.
One last good thing though, that I dropped it a lot, and it's still in good shape.
For this price, I think it's too much of the bad things, so I wouldn't recommend this device, and any of blackviews devices.
just saw you made the video on my phone !I have had it for over 1 year now .I have issue with battery life and the flir camera is not as good as my plug in seek thermal .it does not focus as well as my plug in seek thermal .I like the phone .I'm impressed so far but one issue is the battery. That's the only issue I have other that I can't remove their blackview family app
BV9900Pro – 0 security updates/updates at all, 0 support from Blackview. Typical designed in China product – Copy something, use reference designs, make it almost good enough and provide no support. 48mp camera dumbed down to 12mp, random parts used so Updating is not an option – read their forum for BV9900Pro. They put out updates then recalled them due to incompatibility with units out in the field – in the end there was no updates. Forum is locked down – was kept up whilst product life cycle ~ 1 year. Typical vendor in a communist country that uses the same tactics to suppress posts from owners. I would never buy from Chinese designed cellphone manufacturers again.
Great review, subbed. Enjoy the useful technical details, ty
I had a bv8000 Pro so I knew you would like the better model. Great phones
Mine came with android 10, but I didn't like it, so I contacted BV and they sent me the download link to get the program to re flash the phone to android 9. Good luck getting Samsung to do that. I have 3 Blackview phones, and they are all pretty good. The first one had a crappy speaker, and they just mailed me one and I changed it out in short order.
Thank you for your wonderful review, very useful.
I've put my BV9900 through hell and back in the past year. Dropped from over 15 feet up straight onto concrete (no case) and this absolute unit of a phone was completely unphased. I use screen protectors just because I'm a clean screen freak. Its been dunked in lakes and just hasn't cared. I literally can't kill lol