Up close with BlackBerry 10 Dev Alpha (photos)

The BlackBerry 10 Dev Alpha sports a high-end Playbook-like design, 4.2-inch touch screen, and no physical keyboard to speak of.

On back of the BlackBerry 10 Dev Alpha test device is a camera lens, iconic BlackBerry logo chiseled in silver, and a rubbery black coating.

The bottom of the BlackBerry 10 Dev Alpha is a rather menacing-looking speaker and bolt-style screws.

The left side of the BlackBerry 10 Dev Alpha holds its micro USB port, HDMI connection, plus what looks to be a micro SD card expansion slot.

On the right edge of the Dev Alpha is a PlayBook style volume bar.

On top of the BlackBerry 10 Dev Alpha are a good-sized volume button, 3.5mm headphone jack, and what could be a recessed reset button.

One of the BlackBerry 10 Dev Alpha's mobile tricks is an NFC chip for transferring info between devices through close proximity bumping.

Sadly the BlackBerry 10 Dev Alpha we saw at BlackBerry World 2012 ran the PlayBook OS and not BB 10.

We couldn't resist checking the BlackBerry 10 Dev Alpha for a software update, BB10 perhaps?