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Dissatisfied office user - suggestions? Kaiser?

I use my PDA mainly to effectively stay organized and want to execute the most commands with the hardware keyboard. The Hermes (TyTN) was great for that purpose but I wanted something faster and had better camera and so on, so I bought Raphael.
The Raphael is great in many ways but it has slowed down my organizing and irritated me and I´m wondering if I can do something about it, see things differently, or if you have suggestions for recomending something else, like Kaiser or Xperia?
More specifically...
-The input method with auto suggestion seems crappy (see separate thread)
-The soft keys above the keyboard are gone
-It actually takes longer time to open Word-documents (than with Hermes) - it takes 15-25 seconds for a 50kB doc (!)
-The screen is not placed in the middle
Lot´s of complaints , but I am looking for a solution here, so please enlighten me
/Dan

Hardware shortcuts.
PQzII for hardware shortcuts. Have you changed from the default ROM this may speed up word.

[email protected] said:
PQzII for hardware shortcuts. Have you changed from the default ROM this may speed up word.
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Does PQxII work even for the soft keys - menu and...?
Are the ROM:s available here language-specifik, or can I use any one of them? (I have a Swedish model.)
And thanks

Anyone coming from the TyTN II or Kaiser?

How is the new experience with the TP? Is it worth the money for the average Joe? Which features are notoriusly superior? Thanks for any details...I´m on the fence about the upgrade....

asolano895 said:
How is the new experience with the TP? Is it worth the money for the average Joe? Which features are notoriusly superior? Thanks for any details...I´m on the fence about the upgrade....
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There is a similar thread asking the same/similar question - do a search.

1. Missing key mapping, kaiser can map a hardware key u want, TP cannot. (no app support remap hard key on TP)
2. Slow, rearly slower than kaiser, may be 640 x 480 device more hungry?
3. Keyboard miss "win" key & "ok" key.

Yana said:
1. Missing key mapping, kaiser can map a hardware key u want, TP cannot. (no app support remap hard key on TP)
2. Slow, rearly slower than kaiser, may be 640 x 480 device more hungry?
3. Keyboard miss "win" key & "ok" key.
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1 can be done through registry editing or using a program like (AEBPlus) I think it was?
3, the American version has that. :O
Oops, just realized the OP is from CR, so the American version won't help him much.

asolano895 said:
How is the new experience with the TP? Is it worth the money for the average Joe? Which features are notoriusly superior? Thanks for any details...I´m on the fence about the upgrade....
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Not for the average joe I guess lots of eye-candy goodness for VGA, but still slow imo when using touchflo3d. Still need to get used to TomTom in VGA.. it's renders the streets really small compared to my tytn II before!

asolano895 said:
How is the new experience with the TP? Is it worth the money for the average Joe? Which features are notoriusly superior? Thanks for any details...I´m on the fence about the upgrade....
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I am pleased with TP, as it open up more options for VGA and G-Force appliaction. I used to flash a lot of ROMs since I was using Kaiser, but I am quite satisfied with TP original rom, only doing some tweaking here and there...
I agree that the speed is slower than Kaiser, but I believe with more people using TP, there will be better solution in XDA. Would everyone agree on this?

Black93300ZX said:
1 can be done through registry editing or using a program like (AEBPlus) I think it was?
3, the American version has that. :O
Oops, just realized the OP is from CR, so the American version won't help him much.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
AEButton Plus can't map more than a few hard keys on the face and sides of a device, as far as I know (and I have it installed on my Mogul)

I don't regret going from my Kaiser to the TP at all.
After following some of the "Tweaks" suggested in the below threads and installing most of the programs to my memory card I honestly don't feel a speed difference.
I just see the TP as the Kaiser done properly - OK anything running on WM will have small bugs, but as ecoline said the more poeple using the TP the more we'll clear the bugs and improve the TP's performance.
Raphael Tweaks
Advanced Configuration Tool v3.2
Tweak collection for the HTC Touch Pro

Another thing I want to add-- TP is like Kaiser buffed for VGA processes. Bigger images to render = more power and memory to do it. All of my contacts in my Kaiser has a full screen contact picture for S2U2, and checking them in TP they've been reduced about 1/3 their size. It was fast browsing them, but as soon as I changed the pictures to match the size of my TP screen browsing them was slow. S2U2 for VGA needs more memory than the QVGA.
So it's like using Kaiser but VGA. Still slow in my standard, but lots of VGA goodness

I found the Kaiser with Touchflow 2D installed (along with the other cabs for all the other apps that are on the Touch Pro) was actually a lot nicer to use. The screen updated instantly (e.g scrolling left and right on the tf bar, you could see the cursor under your finger and the screen always kept up); whereas on the Pro you see the cursor follow your finger and the screen update is about 12 frames a second.
All in all, with the Kaisers screen update and finger following speed makes Touchflow a nicer experience.
But.... the Touch Pro screen is fantastic and in VGA which makes everything so crisp. The keyboard is even better than Kaisers and has full querty 5 lines. The look of the phone is sexy for once. The size of the phone is much better even though it is only 1cm shorter (a couple of mm thinner and it would be perfect). The camera actually takes good pictures that I actually keep, the first for a camera on a phone for me, though the LED flash is just like any other - bit of a gimmik. Everything else hardware wise is at least as good as on the Kaiser or better.
In my first week I found the Touch Pro to be very buggy and slow. It's crashed a couple of times, freezed for no apparent reason (from 1 to 20 seconds), the screen update in the interface is slow and annoying, the finger detection sometimes seemed to miss now and then making it annoying to use at times. Typing messages would freeze randomly at about 100 typed chars intervals and then come back 10 seconds later!!!
Sounds bad doesn't it?
But, I have since fixed most of the problems. Have since upgraded to the DXS v15 ROM, done a few of the tweaks from this forum, fixed the typing freeze bug by turning WiFi power to "best performance" (strange but it fixes it). I'm hoping the WiFi power setting fixes other freezes I've experienced.... time will tell. I've even managed to stop it auto connecting to GPRS data with Pocket Toolman 2 (I have have to pay for data on my contract), prefer to use WiFi, this should be an option in Windows Mobile but isn't.
Now, after a lot of fiddling the phone seems to be very usable, dare I say very nice to use. My main gripe is that the interface doesn't run quicker with fast screen update and have better finger input accuracy from being faster. I can't see why this can't be fixed, if the Youtube app can show videos at 20fps (or whatever it is) whilst downloading & decoding mpeg and read the touch screen, why doesn't Touchflow manage to display 10 2d image at a decent framerate (as you finger scroll the bar to select the view, all it is doing is displaying static screens to show which you have selected).
Oh, and there are a couple of things missing or wrong with the Touchflow apps too. For instance, the 3d email view is very nice but there is nothing to show which emails in the view are unread; And there is no way to tell if you are at the first or last email.... or any other. The image view needs an option to rotate the image (it rotates if you turn the phone, but if the image is wrong and needs rotating, it will just rotate to the screen orientation and still be wrong). The email view does really need updating as it is like a dumb blonde - pretty but useless, you end up having to go into the normal email list view to actually manage your emails.
I'll conclude with this though: At the end of the day I wouldnt go back the the Kaiser, the Touch Pro is much sexier, nice to hold and show. The usability is pretty good after you update and tweak it. I can only see things improving with updates. And as for worth the money, Vodafone do the phone free with 600 mins & unlimited texts on a £35 contract..... great value to me.

Having never dared to change my device's rom for warranty reasons, and not having been able to do any official upgrade as my kaiser was an operator version ( SFR aka Vodafone ) I must say I am very satisfied with my touch Pro. I find it superior to the Kaiser in EVERY aspect comparing two official roms : so much better battery life, much better performance even if the resolution is much better, instant landscape to portrait switching...
The GPS is said to be worst (but I didn't ever manage to make it work correctly on the Kaiser anyways).
There are some small issues compared to the Kaiser :
- the softkeys are missing (right and left keys above internet and mail keys on the kaiser - an issue for some games but in fact it was a windows mobile 5 phone edition standard and has been deprecated, so recent software work perfectly without these)
- no scrollweel on the left side and that's a real loss. The central button can be used as a "virtual scrollweel" as it is touch sensitive but it only works with opera and is not very comfortable to use. However some third party utilies can map the volume slider, not very useful in my opinion, to up and down keys.
- The four front pannel keys and directionnal keys are physical but behind the same big plastic cover, which means the whole bottom half cover of the phone presses on a button. This means the directional keys, wich are in the center of this plastic cover are nearly useless...
Reminds me of some Apple mice...
BUT
- Touchflo 3D is an extremely good addition, eye candy and actually really useful (the preview of the mails for example is really excellent). A lot of great software additions compared to Kaiser.
- Having an FM radio too is a nice feature...
- Everything looks so much better in VGA... Even QVGA apps (games) are filtered so that you don't see big ugly pixels. And it's not just a question of look. Excel can actually be used with this resolution, and web browsing - with opera - is actually possible. On the kaiser it isn't, not just for a question of software or speed...
- The new keyboard is WAY better, specially if you need to type special caracters like in french.
- I had a Fujitsu Siemens Pocket Look 720 before buying the Kaiser, the idea being not to have a phone and an organizer in my pockets all of the time, but I was disgusted with this phone which wasn't up to my expectations, inferior in many aspects to my FS pocket PC, I found it ugly, slow, too much power consuming, with a horrible screen, and of bad material quality: one of the small plastic clips of the battery panel got quickly broken... Not to mention those missing hardware drivers.
I thought I would never buy an HTC ever again.
But I did, and now I can get rid of my Fujitsu Siemens pocket pc which was so good but is now in every way inferior to my new phone (well apart from the big screen - but that's not good for a phone - and the 3.5 jack)

pfcsabre said:
Not for the average joe I guess lots of eye-candy goodness for VGA, but still slow imo when using touchflo3d. Still need to get used to TomTom in VGA.. it's renders the streets really small compared to my tytn II before!
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Tomtom already has software specifically made for the VGA/touchpro screens in beta, will be released sometime in November according to them.

Tomtom Navigator 7 posted here actually leaked (extracted) from HTC Diamond since Jun 20, 08. The newer version 7.451.9033 (VGA and QVGA) is available also.

Yup its like a Kaiser with everything fixed, looks better and is more usable in daily use. Very happy with mine.

HTC Touch Pro or HTC Touch HD?

Hi guys,
I'm trying to pick between the two. The main problem I'm having is whether I'll miss having a physical keyboard. As I wont be able to have a play with either of these phones before I make a purchase I want to be completely sure that I'm picking the phone I'm going to prefer.
So whats your opinion? Is the HD's keyboard suitable for you?
Do you miss playing silly small games on your HD? How are games on the Pro?
Also another important thing for me is the performance, I heard the Diamond can be quite laggy (With the Touchflow, which I plan on turning off anyway) but I would still like to know if the Pro is just as bad as the Diamond, and whether the HD is a significant improvement!
Cheers,
Luke

diamond rocks
There is a small lag , BUt it again depends on wether the ROM is a light one or a packed one . There are many out here , lighter ones ..for eg V7 , and there is one other fact about these phones , that if you do have a lot of calender enteries and contacts ...it lags a little ...

Calender entries aren't a big deal, don't tend to take full advantage of the calender. Though I do have 60+ contacts.

Have Diamond and I like it but wish I'd waited for the HD. I don't miss the keyboard from the hermes much as I expected.

Keyboard
I'm using a Herald. During some days I used the Diamond keyboard SIP, but after a hard-reset I did not install it again.
I'm using the physical keyboard when sitting or stopping in a comfortable place (office, train, restaurant) and I must work a lot (i.e. writing some project memories or preparing some lectures); on other cases, I usually try to use the stylus. When at building, I fear about missing the stylus (or maybe missing myself) in some concrete reservoir or some hole, so I liked to use the Diamond keyboard SIP, to write some small notes. So, my experience is I use keyboard about 30% of my time.
Looking the HD and the Pro specifications, I suppose they don't defer more than in design and small details.
If you need to work as "at home", I suggest you to get the device with built-in keyboard.

Thanks for the replys guys.
As I do a fair amount of blogging and web browsing I have been thinking that the Pro might be best suited for me, but on the other hand I do use remote desktop a lot (From work to my home PC) so being able to use remote desktop "On-the-go" would be rather handy especially on the large screen of the HD.
Another question I have is how often do you Pro and Diamond users make use of the D-pad? It doesn't seem like it would have very much use on a touch screen WM device.

D-Pad? Hardly ever.

HTC Touch Pro2 (and others with no D-PAD)

I was wondering if there was a keyboard with just the D-PAD (lower row) This would be great for programs that use D-pad (or games) Sometimes I have to open keyboard to use a directional key, close it again so I can read the content on my screen, to have to reopen the keyboard to use the d-pad once again...

Why can't you just scroll with your finger? Also I know there are some programs that allow you to use the zoombar as a scrollbar instead, can't seem to find a link right now though.

Some programs require you use UP/DOWN/LEFT/RIGHT and that's what I need it for. Scrolling with finger just won't do it on some programs.

You should be able to scroll left and right with touch no problem, not with the zoom bar though.
either way...if neither of those options work there is a discussion here with some links to different options for scrolling:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=446015

Once again, I Am Not Trying To Scroll....! I am trying to use UP/DOWN/LEFT/RIGHT keys of D-PAD.

m4f1050 said:
Once again, I Am Not Trying To Scroll....! I am trying to use UP/DOWN/LEFT/RIGHT keys of D-PAD.
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the thread title is "virtual d-pad", just because we are not using the same vernacular doesn't mean the information i'm giving isn't helpful. you can read it or you can be a stubborn fool and be in the same position you are right now. next time, do you own damn searches on google (site:forum.xda-developers.com ........) i'm done with you.

I would have told you if it did help, don't feel bad just because you didn't answer what I was looking for. If you know of any virtual d-pad with just the up/down/left/right then let me know. Thanks.

m4f1050 said:
I would have told you if it did help, don't feel bad just because you didn't answer what I was looking for. If you know of any virtual d-pad with just the up/down/left/right then let me know. Thanks.
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There are programs in there where you can use the g-sensor to act as a d-pad. They are in development to work with games (and it may already work with some).
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=429569
in the description:
What is this ?
This is a little application that will simulate key presses (on the D-pad) or scroll while you tilt your device. It will soon be usable in many games (e.g. racing games where it isn't really great to use the D-Pad). It is actually usable with a lot of desktop-softwares, like Manila, etc...
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IF you would have read that whole thread, you would have found a link to a discussion on extracting the toshiba virtual d-pad:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=533157&page=2
Although I'm not sure if it will work for the tp2, maybe we can get WM devs on it.
and lastly:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=658673

Now *THATS* interesting, the g-sensor one... Might be even bettern than what I was looking for. Thanks for the info.

[Q] Delete Key

Hi, I have a T-mobile 810 (very similar to the 820) and was wondering if the 820 has a "Delete" key on the keyboard? Here is something I posted at T-mobile's forum and haven't received an answer yet:
Hi, one of the things that really bugged me about my Lumina 710 was the keyboard didn't have a "Delete" key or arrow buttons to go forward or backward. You had to try to get the cursor right where you needed it and use the backspace button and that was really frustrating at times. It looks like they didn't do anything new for the 810's keyboard and I just can't understand why they didn't. I had a Samsung Galaxy Note II for a 14 day trial and it was tremendous, but the Voice dialing over bluetooth was a deal breaker and I returned it. I hope that this lack of a delete key doesn't make me return the 810 because I have since found out that the voice dialing over bluetooth can be corrected in the Note II. Does anyone know if the keyboard can be modified or corrected on the 810? Thanks.

Ken B said:
Hi, I have a T-mobile 810 (very similar to the 820) and was wondering if the 820 has a "Delete" key on the keyboard? Here is something I posted at T-mobile's forum and haven't received an answer yet:
Hi, one of the things that really bugged me about my Lumina 710 was the keyboard didn't have a "Delete" key or arrow buttons to go forward or backward. You had to try to get the cursor right where you needed it and use the backspace button and that was really frustrating at times. It looks like they didn't do anything new for the 810's keyboard and I just can't understand why they didn't. I had a Samsung Galaxy Note II for a 14 day trial and it was tremendous, but the Voice dialing over bluetooth was a deal breaker and I returned it. I hope that this lack of a delete key doesn't make me return the 810 because I have since found out that the voice dialing over bluetooth can be corrected in the Note II. Does anyone know if the keyboard can be modified or corrected on the 810? Thanks.
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Good suggestion, but you need to give your feedback to Microsoft. This really has nothing to do with Nokia or T-mobile. This is a design choice in the Windows Phone OS to only provide the backspace key based on available screen space constraints. Not having DEL or the inverted "T" cursor keys seriously annoys about 2% of users (some of whom are regulars on this forum) but most folks just don't care.
Since only 2% of users care, there isn't enough return on investment to add a truly customizable keyboard to the platform that would allow, for example, swapping out the emoticon key for a backspace key. Get 10,000 signatures with an Internet petition thingy and then maybe somebody will pay attention.

danchar4 said:
Good suggestion, but you need to give your feedback to Microsoft. This really has nothing to do with Nokia or T-mobile. This is a design choice in the Windows Phone OS to only provide the backspace key based on available screen space constraints. Not having DEL or the inverted "T" cursor keys seriously annoys about 2% of users (some of whom are regulars on this forum) but most folks just don't care.
Since only 2% of users care, there isn't enough return on investment to add a truly customizable keyboard to the platform that would allow, for example, swapping out the emoticon key for a backspace key. Get 10,000 signatures with an Internet petition thingy and then maybe somebody will pay attention.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks danchard4, that's a shame that more people are not upset about this. You don't know how much time I have spent trying to get that stinking cursor exactly where I wanted it and then backspace to delete mistyped words. Oh well, I'll just have to live with it I guess. Thanks again for answering.