This has been rumored for a while now, but this seems to be more concrete:
http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2015...android-phone-the-priv-will-launch-this-year/
BTW, this place has been completely dead for a few weeks now, and the last nightly is dated Sept 6. I tried several months back to start building my own ROM images, but before I got all the way there, someone else stepped up. Before you vanish completely, I might like to try this again, especially if someone can help me get started. I remember one file in particular that I don't know if I did correctly, perhaps it was "local.manifest", or something like that. If I can get running, with a bit of assistance, I can start putting up nightlies, if not nightly, at least at some interval.
I dunno, I kinda don't like the way the keyboard is. The keys seems too small. I'd like a keyboard in landscape mode.
Also, being by blackberry means rooting won't be as easy.
I couldn't agree more with you tpmjb about wanting a landscape keyboard phone, but i think this a big move for blackberry and warrants our support if we ever want to see another qwerty android device ever. The priv is getting allot of press and i think allot of people are excited about it. I also believe that the capacitative thingy for s6 was made because they heard about it ahead of time.
chuckiev79 said:
I couldn't agree more with you tpmjb about wanting a landscape keyboard phone, but i think this a big move for blackberry and warrants our support if we ever want to see another qwerty android device ever. The priv is getting allot of press and i think allot of people are excited about it. I also believe that the capacitative thingy for s6 was made because they heard about it ahead of time.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I changed my mind, I'm buying the Blackberry Priv. I figure it will be rooted before too long, and I'll probably get used to the keyboard. Also, this phone has severe problems with GPS, which I use to get around everywhere.
At $700, very few people will be purchasing a Priv. There will be no development community for the device.
There are plenty of people that want a keyboard, but that desire will not make hundreds of additional dollars magically materialize.
Furthermore, a $700 device should have 4GB and an 810 under the hood. The Priv forces compromise with 3 gigs and an 808.
QWERTY is dead.
No designated number row.... the main reason I chose the Relay over the Glide... well, that and lack of bluetooth phone calls in jb4.1+
I've been following the blackberry for a while and the rumors of them going android, really hoping somebody comes out with a horizontal slider.
Rumors say it has dual boot os. Android and bbos10
orange808 said:
At $700, very few people will be purchasing a Priv. There will be no development community for the device.
There are plenty of people that want a keyboard, but that desire will not make hundreds of additional dollars magically materialize.
Furthermore, a $700 device should have 4GB and an 810 under the hood. The Priv forces compromise with 3 gigs and an 808.
QWERTY is dead.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If you buy a Samsung Galaxy S6, you can take advantage of certain economies of massive scale. If you choose a Priv, the economies of scale aren't the same. And so you won't get the same value for money.
Still, the price of the Priv will fall over time.
Plus, I suspect that, six months or a year after its release, it'll be possible to buy a used or refurbished Priv for far less than $700. Then you can use your Priv with a deep-discount carrier — a carrier which doesn't offer handset subsidies, but which offers ultra-cheap plans.
Alternatively, if you're with a carrier which offers handset subsidies, you may be able to sign a long-term contract and buy a heavily-discounted Priv. You can then pay your carrier back over time.
Looks cool but its t9 not qwerty
http://m.gsmarena.com/samsung_w2016_highend_clamshell_gets_official_in_china-news-15129.php
orange808 said:
At $700, very few people will be purchasing a Priv. There will be no development community for the device.
There are plenty of people that want a keyboard, but that desire will not make hundreds of additional dollars magically materialize.
Furthermore, a $700 device should have 4GB and an 810 under the hood. The Priv forces compromise with 3 gigs and an 808.
QWERTY is dead.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Actually SD808 is atleast as good as SD810 or even better. SD810 is thorttling too much and it is not stable in every day use. Take a look at here: Thermal Throttling – Which SOC’s are the Worst Offenders.
Qwerty sliders are dying but you have to be creative. I modded my own qwerty slider from Xiaomi Mi4C and iPhone 6 bluetooth keyboard case: Qwerty Keyboard Slider [DIY]
phred14 said:
This has been rumored for a while now, but this seems to be more concrete:
http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2015...android-phone-the-priv-will-launch-this-year/
BTW, this place has been completely dead for a few weeks now, and the last nightly is dated Sept 6. I tried several months back to start building my own ROM images, but before I got all the way there, someone else stepped up. Before you vanish completely, I might like to try this again, especially if someone can help me get started. I remember one file in particular that I don't know if I did correctly, perhaps it was "local.manifest", or something like that. If I can get running, with a bit of assistance, I can start putting up nightlies, if not nightly, at least at some interval.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I don't know why they even came out with Priv cause there was already Q5 & Q10...and on top of that most big shot Companies think people (Or everyone is a Text-Crazed Teenager) only use phones for texting and emails... ... ...those are pretty much the same and most simplistic things people will do with a phone besides Facebook... BLACKBERRY, MOTOROLA, SAMSUNG...I use my Relay at one point to replace my Computer (Dell D800 which start to run at 600MHz and 1GB RAM)...Stop with this Marketing Target business.
We the customer aren't Programmers or Teenagers, we don't need an iPhone or Phones that match with what we wear (Motorola)...we need Convenience...hence why you -blackberry- lost the market cause you keep pushing out small screen -but bigger than Nokia- phones that didn't really improve much (NO NUMROW, worst is the Sony Xperia sk17 (Mini Pro, 3") and sk16 (Pro, 3.7"), both have the exact same keyboard...3.7" and they didn't put Numrow or Okay Button). Had they had the size of a S3 or a 4" screen-phone-size with the Keyboard or not make the mistake like Symbian -Nokia E6, Touch with Buttons on Screen design for DPAD- they couldn't lose there market, but Priv is show us how Blackberry needs to let go or improve its model, not make more nostalgia (I don't know if that is right) while thinking its the big screen that everyone loves (If iPod had a Stylus instead of Touch, people would look at that like its a Color Palm Pilot...as where touch is better based how you control it).
Me when I saw Passport and Priv, I laughed my butt off, only Trenders will buy. I was even thinking Blackberry was going to actually come out with a Landscape Slider at one point and make a video with the Song "I want to know that, want to know that, will you Love me Again" playing...but snap Blackberry, Storm (My Twin Sister first Bought it, I wasn't even into Phones until 2012...born 1992 and got a Relay in 2015...made in 2012) was fail for me cause of putting 1 clicker in the Center of phone instead of 9-13 or 16-20 (Top/Mid/Bottom+Left/Center/Right to Between Center/Corner=4 or to Quarter of Size or to Fifth of Size or even put more at the bottom for the keyboard)...you guys should have built a fake plastic prototype of that feature (1 Hard Clicker to 13 Mid-Soft Clickers unless the 1 made it seem hard) cause had it not failed it would have been like iPhone 6 pressure screen...
Blackberry thinks that only 1 Phone is the Best, but Truly they Grew when you went from Pearl to Bold, etc and bold to Q5/10 (Had they made Torch like that), but Priv or Private -as I call it if it becomes Landscape Slider then Lieutenant and Colonel- is why Blackberry shouldn't design Hardware Form.
They are 100% correct about software cause I can Play PSP and Edit Word Docs on my Android and Hackers figured out a way to play all PS1 on PSP, but Sony's Devs couldn't (Embarrassing).
The only reason I have a PC is literally cause I'm doing online schooling and the website needs Internet Explorer or Google Chrome or else the interaction might slip up on a Mobile Device...other than that the only reason I bought a Vostro 14 is because it can play PS3 equivalent games (Skyrim, Saints Row, etc)...so I don't need a PC or the Lastest Android (GingerBread was my World and now JellyBean, in fact an LG Ahola has a keyboard with Prediction, where as my Relay doesn't...Relay is 4.1.2 and LG Ahola is 2.1 with 600Mhz CPU & 256MB RAM...it really depends on how you design it...even Motorola Defy Pro had it too...also Relay doesn't have a OKAY Button so if I highlight/select text (Shift+Left/Right) with Keyboard and touch to use Copy/Cut, the selected text disappears)
And funny thing today -Octo-core is 2xQuad-core CPU with 4 low & 4 high power- same thing I said ever since I got my first Phone -A Nokia 5000-6000series- I need something for note taking and I'm pretty sure that doesn't require a very fast Computer or computer at all (Cause now Tech is getting better)...if anyone is smart they stop with Big Screens and go to built-in Project-on-to-screen-like-a-flashlight or Project-to-a-screen-via-cable...cause I once saw a Phone design as Processor that goes into a Tablet...
There are so many things and ways of doing any thing, but Blackberry choose Portrait Slider...over Landscape and no alternative...when they've been using Landscape the Whole time (I know this contradicts before, but not increasing the Screen Size is what was Blackberry's Downfall)...In fact I just realize when has Portrait been used in an electronic besides Reading Text Material (Like on actual Paper) cause Televisions and Computers don't have Portrait Screens, I would use Word Doc and Landscape Shaped Window even if page is Portrait and the thing I see most people use big scr.een phones for is Videos...in Landscape...I read my Comics in Landscape (Cause Portrait is small).
Portrait is for the Quick and Easy or Simple Stuff (1-Hand)...Landscape is for 2 Handers and yet people who design for Portrait still put the things you need to Touch at the Top of the Screen...I only need Time at Top if I need to see it at the Lock Screen not when I am using the Phone.
Sorry for variety of errors of Grammar, Punctuation, Spelling, Sentence Structure, dotting my i's and crossing my t's (Joking on the last part). I didn't proofread much.
Best Keyboard was Motorola Droid 3 and LG C710 Aloha, but sadly there Hardware wasn't good.
Flash-A-Holic said:
Actually SD808 is atleast as good as SD810 or even better. SD810 is thorttling too much and it is not stable in every day use. Take a look at here: Thermal Throttling – Which SOC’s are the Worst Offenders.
Qwerty sliders are dying but you have to be creative. I modded my own qwerty slider from Xiaomi Mi4C and iPhone 6 bluetooth keyboard case: Qwerty Keyboard Slider [DIY]
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I hate those keys, though. That's the same bluetooth case available on every modern phone. They change the brands a million times on Amazon, but it's the same case. Price varies wildly too.
Keys are wayyyyyy too close together. It's somehow faster to type each letter on a touch screen.
TPMJB said:
I hate those keys, though. That's the same bluetooth case available on every modern phone. They change the brands a million times on Amazon, but it's the same case. Price varies wildly too.
Keys are wayyyyyy too close together. It's somehow faster to type each letter on a touch screen.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It is not that bad. There is shaped buttons for better touch in my keyboard. I have seen different keyboard which are worse.
Flash-A-Holic said:
It is not that bad. There is shaped buttons for better touch in my keyboard. I have seen different keyboard which are worse.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Oh weird, where'd you get a 5 row case? I thought it was the ****ty 4 row case that's on Amazon, from the thumbnail on your video. I might just check it out
Edit: Wow, it looks exactly like my relay keyboard! I'm definitely interested! Every Amazon link I see is that awful 4 row keyboard.
...but not for $72 eee gad
http://www.ubergizmo.com/2016/12/blackberry-dtek70-mercury-leaked/
It looks like BB is about to release another QWERTY phone. But the times of slider keyboards are gone.
Guys... prepare your butts, the holy grail:
https://www.computerbase.de/2017-01/graalphone-4-in-1-notebook-smartphone-tablet-3d-kamera/
The GraalPhone!!! Next year in Europe and USA!!
Had my hopes up then...but look at the size of it! It's massive
Related
WOW BREAKING NEWS
Touch Pro 2 News From engadget.com (http://www.engadget.com/2009/02/16/htc-touch-pro2-is-awesome-in-ways-the-touch-pro-never-could-be/)
So, how do you make HTC's Touch Pro -- already near the top of the WInMo heap -- an even beefier device? For starters, you can throw out that nasty VGA screen of yesteryear and up it with a 3.6-inch 800 x 400 replacement. Next, add a dedicated touch-sensitive zoom slider that works overtime to take maximum advantage of said screen, then throw in a few key carryovers: 512MB of ROM, 288MB of RAM, microSD expansion, and a 3.2 megapixel cam. Meet the Touch Pro2, the official follow-up to HTC's popular series of QWERTY sliders that introduces so-called "Straight Talk" technology for "seamlessly" transitioning conversations between email, single-line calls, and party calls. It'll also automatically switch to the crazy high-performance, full-duplex speakerphone simply by flipping the phone over, so it's clear that this bad boy was meant for business. It'll launch early in the second quarter in parts of Asia and Europe with other "major global markets" following in early Summer.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
DETAILED INFORMATION HERE: http://www.htc.com/www/press.aspx?id=83956
I just wish it had tv-out or I'd get it (or the diamond2) I guess I'm the one who uses that feature a lot on my omnia.
Edit: My bad... It DOES have tv-out))
awesome..
now i know why peoples selling their phones
Support HTC
The TouchPro 2 seems more like the Tytn II replacement to me,
I LIKE.
The touch pro is more business oriented. . . so it probably wont have alot of media features were hoping it has .
A dump promise
Hopefully, someone will soon get their hands on these units to dump the ROMs and port them to Touch Diamond and Touch Diamond Pro.
1-very nice but the lack of d-pad and other buttons is annoying as hell.
2-lets hope the fix the very very poor performance of the diamond this time http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UZHYimU-VHM&feature=related
3-also software,themes,apps development forums will be too segmented. diamond ,diamont2,tpro,tpro2, blackstone,x1 are all very similar phones(internally). is there a clean and logical way to combine them.
4-whats the code names of these two devices
very nice. Shame they wont work for more than about 3 minutes before something falls off/a random onboard chip of some random nature starts to malfunction.
HTC, design phones then get someone decent to manufacture them.... you cant manufature for toffe.
"...something falls off". Please explain. I've had the Diamond for 2/3 of a year now and nothing has "fallen off"....
In my opinion, the build quality of HTC products is impeccable.
Monty Burns said:
very nice. Shame they wont work for more than about 3 minutes before something falls off/a random onboard chip of some random nature starts to malfunction.
HTC, design phones then get someone decent to manufacture them.... you cant manufature for toffe.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
My experience of HTC hardware is far from good. BlueAngel (dead speaker), two TyTN's, one TyTN II and now a TD - all and i mean ALL of them have had at least one warranty repair or replacement. Actually , thats a lie: TD was sent back for a full refund under UK consumer law as "Not Fit For Purpose" as at the time there was no way to play music without the famous skipping/pause issue.
Just fire up google and use terms like "HTC" "hardware" "fault" "Issue" and so on .... you'll soon see what a timebomb of a device you have.
My Toshiba G900 and now Omnia have restored my faith in Smartphones and there reliability.
thats odd....my TyTNII(Kaiser, from USA) has been nothing short of amazing, and it has taken its share of nasty falls!
anyone know what carrier in the U.S will be providing the TP2??
im praying its AT&T, Its almost time for an upgrade, and I think im in love
Perhaps you got some Gremlins
My HTC phones all work like they did on their first day. I didnt have any hardware Problems and the software problems where solved by this nice Community.
Ok, i hve to admit that HTC really doesnt care that much software-wise... I bet they wont release proper drivers for these devices either...
Thats no problem for me though, as i wont buy another arm or qualcom based Smartphone anyway. Im up for atom-powered voice capable MIDs now.
Hmmm. Quite fancy the Pro 2. Shame it doesn't have a slightly beefier processor though. I'm sure these will be replaced by Snapdragon or Tegra devices shortly after I buy one!
i opened a similar thread but it's closed cause i was to slow
now my question again
what's that "zoom bar" supposed to do
but if HTC devices are built so horribly, why use them over and over?
operative1 said:
i opened a similar thread but it's closed cause i was to slow
now my question again
what's that "zoom bar" supposed to do
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
my guess its just the touchwheel from diamond and tpro. not that usuful if you ask me since they could have added more usfel buttons with dpad or remove it for the sake of bigger screen or just remove it to make the phone smaller.
Copy from Raphael Thread
My thoughts:
1. First thing I thought was: I wonder if there will be some way to buy this from AT&T without breaking my contract? I mean, what do they do for people who got a 2-year contract with the original iPhone, and then a year later they want the new iPhone?
2. Longer battery life and a bigger screen are very welcome.
3. I hope that keyboard is a mock-up. Also, I can't imagine using a non-Fuze keyboard, let alone one of those 3-row keyboards most phones have, but it's just way too convenient to have all those punctuation marks available top row.
4. I wonder when this phone will reach stateside.
5. I wonder why the phone's specs aren't improved?
6. I wonder why it's not all-black. It better just be a mockup.
7. Almost Touch HD-sized screen, and the TYTTN II tilt *drools*
But really, it took an entire year for the Touch Pro to come out in the states, so who is really banking on this thing coming out by Summer? And what will AT&T do when I'm willing to give them 300 more dollars for the Touch Pro II, and I still have a contract?
Sure, it's not the improvement we'd all have made. Not more RAM, not a better processor, or drivers... but it's still an improvement over the Touch Pro (unless that isn't a mockup keyboard, in which case I may cry over the colour scheme and the fact that there are LESS KEYS on that phone than the existing Touch Pro) and I'll take it. Plus, the front-facing D-Pad is a pain to use anyway that I just open it up and use my Keyboard D-Pad.
Good point...
drama2747 said:
but if HTC devices are built so horribly, why use them over and over?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
When will we see some dedicated forums for these devices...? moderators...?
HANDS ON VIDEOS
I'm fallin' in love... no kiddin
good to see the phone in action...all though i was tempted to mute the sound lol
Just wondering why you chose Fuze/Touch-pro over Iphone.
For me 3 major reasons in order of importance:
Size: I just cannot accept the size of an Iphone. I believe in a small device with great capabilities that will nicely fit in my pocket.
Bluetooth Stereo: Bluetooth A2DP support was NOT native to Iphone at that time. Did not want to add and an UGLY connector to get bluetooth music streaming either
Not an Iphone fan boy: Never carried an Ipod nor had a Mac. Its too overrated and is more of a fashion statement. I just cant see the cool factor in Apple products.
Whats your reason?
#1: this forum
#2: can't type texts without a hardware keyboard when i'm drunk
#3: tp is my 3rd htc phone
price would also be a factor
iphones without a tariff is a lot more expensive then a touch pro without a tariff
Welll, in random order
#: xda-devs support
#: custom roms
#: HTC user since 2005
#: size and h/w keyboard
and most of all
#: never was a fan of (maybe powerful but) overrated trendy devices over powerful business ones, end of story.
iPhone may be a "powerful" device, which can provide a similar experience to WM (or even better, that's a subjective matter). However the fact that the device itself is locked, and does not allow you to experience it fully (and I mean things which are supposed to be standard in smartphones, like multitasking) without jailbreaking it, tells me one thing and one thing only: that Apple does not respect it's customers.
For me it was a matter of carrier, and the 5-way navigator, because aside from those factors my Touch Pro is almost the same as an iPhone anyways with all the skins and mods
1. iPhone is 44% higher than my Touch Pro discounted Sprint monthly Everything Plan.
2. iPhone doesn't have a physical keyboard vs. huge Touch Pro keys.
3. iPhone has zero customability. "There's an app for that" means nothing to me. Energy 6.5 with Sense2.5 ROM means a whole lot more.
Sadly I feel the opposite way. I'm thinking of selling my Fuze just because support for it sucks lets face it. Theres no where near the amount of developers for windows mobile as there is for the iphone. I find myself using my ipod touch way more than my fuze and the only thing I cant do on my ipod is make calls. Sure theres no hardware keyboard and its nice to have one but I could live without. One thing that kills me the most is the screen, its almost unbearable using my phone after I use my ipod but thats to be expected since they're different tech. But over all I find myself not liking my phone more and more everyday and I dont think its going to change. I think Im going to submit to apple with the next refresh of the iphone simply because Apple is the juggernaut of smart phones at this time. Until they find a way to standardize android its not going to shine, I truly think fragmentation is going to kill it and if it doesn't kill it, it will always be that other OS. And WP7 is a mess. For one I dont have a Facebook or any other social networking crap, nor do I have an xbox so all that integration is useless to me. Not to mention that the UI looks terrible. But thats my look on things and unfortunately the way things keep going I dont think its going to change.
VibrantRedGT said:
3. iPhone has zero customability. "There's an app for that" means nothing to me. Energy 6.5 with Sense2.5 ROM means a whole lot more.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
^^^^THIS^^^^
nagle3092 said:
Sadly I feel the opposite way. I'm thinking of selling my Fuze just because support for it sucks lets face it. Theres no where near the amount of developers for windows mobile as there is for the iphone. I find myself using my ipod touch way more than my fuze and the only thing I cant do on my ipod is make calls. Sure theres no hardware keyboard and its nice to have one but I could live without. One thing that kills me the most is the screen, its almost unbearable using my phone after I use my ipod but thats to be expected since they're different tech. But over all I find myself not liking my phone more and more everyday and I dont think its going to change. I think Im going to submit to apple with the next refresh of the iphone simply because Apple is the juggernaut of smart phones at this time. Until they find a way to standardize android its not going to shine, I truly think fragmentation is going to kill it and if it doesn't kill it, it will always be that other OS. And WP7 is a mess. For one I dont have a Facebook or any other social networking crap, nor do I have an xbox so all that integration is useless to me. Not to mention that the UI looks terrible. But thats my look on things and unfortunately the way things keep going I dont think its going to change.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm sorry.....but April fools was on the 1st.
For myself it's all of what this guy says (from 3:40-4:00) in this iphone review "The Gadget Show" on youtube. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bumP10hUaVs, and more.
When I think of iphone...I can't help of think of the Will Smith movie iRobot. I have thoughts of Apple trying to brain wash me into thinking that it's the only phone I need and I don't need to think for myself because "there's an app for that". It want's me to drop my guard and completely trust that it can run my life with only finger swipes across the screen yet.....it will not let me have a close relationship with by shutting me out of it's inner workings (battery replacement, removable storage). It try's to keep me hanging by a thread just strong enough to stay attached for a new version with "innovative" abilities like "copy and paste". It's true colors are hard to see through it's colorful ads and apps.
1: size
2: its need to always be on the net
3: can't sync calendar, contacts w/out using iTunes, which I cannot stand
4: can't multitask apps
I have both a fuze and an iPhone 3G (from my son when he moved to 3Gs.) Both phones are jail broken, so I decided to use the iPhone with an international SIM while traveling. I was really (&**&(*^( t'd off when I noticed that it always connects, thus incurring international data roaming charges. There's no way to make it not "call home" for one reason or another (checking if there's something new in app store, etc.) unless you tweak connectivity, block almost every app, or install some "firewall" to block all traffic. That just sucks if you travel a lot. ATT warned me, but I didn't think it was that bad.
International roaming data charges are nothing to mess with. I've never used an iphone, but I've heard that many of the apps are web-based widgets. One of the problems with not having things like a native file explorer is that if you download an app, you can't look in program files to see what the hell you just downloaded. You'd know if it was just a web app on winmo pretty easily, but I'm sure it's hard to keep track of everything loaded on an iphone.
I went from an iphone 3G to a Fuze to a 3GS to a Tilt2 back to a Fuze with a Bold 9000 in there at some point as well.
I can't do without the physical keypad. I email on the go a lot with my phone, and I just can't get used to virtual keyboards. Just can't do it. I'm also a sports nut, so browser navigating ability needs to be on point, meaning I need a touch screen. Now, I'll admit the iPhone's capacative touch screen beats the hell out of the pressure sensitive ones, although they'll get a lot better with some of the tweaks and ROMs available. There's no lag when you use the iphone's screen (although the newest ROMs for the Fuze have done a great job closing that gap, but it's still very much present). I miss that and the myriad of apps.
I really do hate Apple, what they did with the priority bandwidth with AT&T, and the fact they can't and absolutely won't support flash, along with that internal battery and no storage card. They could easily provide these features, but they don't simply because they don't HAVE to in order to sell the product. But, the iphone does what it does incredibly well. I'll concede to that.
I went back to the Fuze from my Tilt2 because I was pretty pissed that the hardware wasn't really upgraded much between those models. That was an unpleasant surprise. Also, the Fuze is SOLID. It's a beast, the tracks don't have tight tolerances, and the case is thick with robust corners. Plus, the Android development for the Fuze seemed to be further along than for the Tilt2. Also, when typing on the hardware keyboard for the Raphael, your thumbs do all the moving, and your hands don't. The Rhodium's bigger layout is nicer in that you hit the wrong key much less; however, you're moving your hands a lot too. I didn't like that. ROMs are also getting ridiculously good for WinMo devices.
Let's be honest; what the iPhone does, it does incredibly well, and if I didn't have needs (HW keypad) that it didn't meet, I would still have it, even though the Apple logo itself makes me want to kill a hippie every time I see it.
1. I'm used to Windows Mobile, having used it on a PDA for several years
2. Getting a refurbished Fuze through AT&T with an Employee Purchase and a 2 year contract brought the price of the Fuze down to a rather attractive $0.
Fate was kind to me. I'm glad to have stumbled upon the Fuze.
Mainly the Hardware Keyboard, but all-in-all, I simply love HTC devices.
Oh, and the Hardware Specs were actually pretty good for the Fuze, not the best, but for a device with a hardware keyboard, not bad.
I originally bought my Fuze because of the hardware keyboard. 6 months later, I bought an iPhone 3GS. I liked the Fuze for the most part, I just couldn't take WM anymore. With the stock firmware, my battery would not last a day. Timlol's stock like firmware made the battery life bearable and the device much more usable. But in the end, it was the limitations of WM that made me switch. It is nice having a browser that works, a mail client that can display messages and not move to the next message when you accidently move your finger sideways, a well stocked app store and a touchscreen that actually responds properly to touch.
I still have my Fuze and will use it to play around with the current Android project, but for day to day use as a phone and data device, the iPhone is it.
On your poll it was a hard toss-up between "Hate Apple products" and the "Other options (cooked ROMs, Android etc)".
My biggest factor was that it was more open to open source and cracked (aka free) software, and more moddifications that could be done to the firmware. The reason this could be done is because its not an Apple product.
I recently upgraded from the iPhone 5s to the Galaxy Note 3.
This phone is a revelation and I want to try and give some indication why.
I have been using iPhones for many years with a detor to Android every few months (itchy feet!).
Whilst Android is clearly the more technically advanced platform, I always end up dumping the Android phone a few weeks later and returning to the iPhone.
Why ? mainly for two reasons. 10 years ago we used to say that a phone is mainly for phone calls. Internet was a limited and frustrating experience. Today I realise that I only use my phone 5% for calls, the rest is email, general messaging and browsing. The keyboard and user experience therefore become very important.
Apple software engineers really "get" user experience. I don't know how they do it but the keyboard on the iPhone is psychic. My typing is terrible but it manages to mostly get the right keys and if not, do the correct word substitution. It must estimate if you hit between two keys then pick the best letter in the context of the word you were typing or something like that. And then the word lookup is terrific and terribly accurate
Now Android keyboards gave me much worse typing. Not only that, but the word substitution was not automatic (no way of setting it). I could never get used to clicking on the correct word substitution after practically every word. This whole keyboard thing made me feel like chucking every Android phone in the bin after a few weeks (aka to ebay).
Recently, epiphany! I discovered whilst testing an Android phone, that savvy users actually never used the default keyboard (duh!). I found that SwiftKey app was pretty popular, installed it and bing!, now I had 95% of the apple keyboard experience.
That's the thing about Apple, you see it works great out of the box. Android you need to fiddle with it, and for many users they just don't have time or want to do this.
Step in the Note 3.
Ok, now the keyboard is great. I don't know whether it's the latest version of Android or a Samsung developed keyboard but many of the issues have been solved out of the box. One other thing though, due to the size of the screen they have taken the liberty of adding a fifth row of keys, the numeric ones. Genius! You know how frustrating it is when you are typing in passwords or email addresses with a mixture of letters and numbers, always having to flick between numeric and letter keyboards. Now problem solved. For the first time it seems an Android keyboard is better then the Apple one!
The other thing that frustrated me was the speed. Despite having better specs, Android phones have always had the occasional stutter. This can occur anytime, when scrolling, opening an app, etc.
The Note 3 seems 99.9% free of this. Again not sure if this is software development or brute force.
So whilst we are on the subject of brute force let's talk specs. The Note 3 has 3gb of memory, a quad core snap dragon 800 cpu running at approx. 2.3Ghz and a Adreno 300 GPU (yes, thats right, a graphics co-processor). The screen is a full HD 1920x1280 and is an AMOLED with Gorilla glass 3. AMOLED was invented by Samsung and its simply the highest contrast phone screen you can get. IPS screens, as used by the iPhone, have slightly more accurate colours and a slightly brighter maximum brightness, but the contrast on an AMOLED is quite striking. As well as 32gb of internal storage it has a microSD card. I put in a 64gb one so now I have 96gb of storage. Note that with Android you can install apps on the external card if you want, which is very useful.
This spec approaches many full computers!
Completing the specs it has a truly monster 3200MAh battery and a removable stylus built into the body. A stylus you say, back to the Pocket PC ? not quite, this is a whole new technology. For taking notes (aka the phone name) or drawing, its really very good. It also has a switch on it for a pop up menu and other fun.
Lets talk about the elephant in the room, the size. Samsung have been crafty here, the screen size is 5.7", only 0.7" bigger then the S4 but of course a world different from the iPhone 5. Samsung do have phones with bigger screens (e.g. the Mega) but in this bracket have clearly restrained themselves, e.g. compared to say the HTC One Max , Sony Xperia Z Ultra, etc.
This has paid off. The screen is larger and much more comfortable to use then a smaller screen, but due to the extreme thinness, lightweight and minimised bezel of the device, does not feel gigantic in the hand.
Its a personal taste thing and you have to push yourself to even try a device of this size. But the danger you run is that there is no going back. Even 5" screens look pokey, let alone the iPhone 5.
It fits fine in a jean pocket and you get use to it faster then you would think.
The main reason for me trying this in the first place was to attempt to replace both my iPhone 5s and iPad mini, which I take to work every day, with one device. Also cutting the need for two contracts. On a side note I have 4G contracts from EE and vodafone. Again its something you don't think you need, but once you have you can't go back to 3G. The EE network is more mature and has better coverage, I assume Vodafone will come up to the same coverage in time.
Lastly lets talk accessories. Samsung just get this much better then anyone else. There are all sorts of things, from charging backs (so that you can use wireless charging) to docks and headphones. However the key breakthrough is the S-View wallet type cover. This has a window in to allow the phone to show status reports of phone calls and texts as they come in, without having to open the cover. The phone is "cover aware" and formats a small square window to fit this window. It also switches on when you open the flip cover and switches off when you close the flip cover. This is just sheer genius. It sounds simple but it raises the functionality to a whole new level. The final piece of genius is that the cover replaces the back of the phone, so it doesn't add much to the bulk (although it does clverely add a less then 1mm overhand to protect the sides).
Samsung has always made excellent phones, but its no use denying that its basic design has been influenced heavily by the iPhone 3, which it has kept to slavishly.
With the Note 3 Samsung has finally carved its own genuine innovation into the market and created something quite special which is going to permanently change the direction of phone development.
Put it this way, Apple will be responding to this either this or next year, and not the other way round.
Its not surprising that this is one of the world's best selling phones. A busy central London Vodafone shop told me recently that Samsung had long ago overtaken Apple with sales volume, especially the S4, but now the Note 3 is their best seller. No surprises there.
Hi everyone, my Relay 4g, thanks to all devs, rocks. I'm even thinking about buying a new one and keeping it in its box - in my experience, phones with hinges and moving parts such as this one do not last long.
We are part, I'm afraid, of a very small niche in the market - no one wants QWERTY phones, or atthe very least no one seems to want to supply them. Has anyone seen any rumor on new/upcoming Android qweerty phones?
Thanks!!
It's sad but no. I've researched a huge amount of materials but I wasn't able to find newer phone on the market than Relay since 2012.
Sent from my SGH-T699 using Tapatalk
http://www.gsmarena.com/lg_optimus_f3q-5998.php
Sent from my Nexus 4 using XDA Premium 4 mobile app
I saw it: nothing interesting except LTE, which is useless in my country, and display even weaker. But it's my IMHO nevertheless
Sent from my SGH-T699 using Tapatalk
demkantor said:
http://www.gsmarena.com/lg_optimus_f3q-5998.php
Sent from my Nexus 4 using XDA Premium 4 mobile app
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
haha specs of that are less than relay in terms of processor, chipset, and camera...thats such a suckerpunch
http://techcrunch.com/2014/05/16/the-app-store-is-proof-were-in-idiocracy/
This is why there aren't QWERTY devices. People don't do anything with their pocket computers..
orange808 said:
http://techcrunch.com/2014/05/16/the-app-store-is-proof-were-in-idiocracy/
This is why there aren't QWERTY devices. People don't do anything with their pocket computers..
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I think part of the problem is that QWERTY for many people is one of those things that you think you can live without... until you try it for some time.
Then you go back to a normal smartphone and you notice how much you don't say because it's a nuisance to type with an on-screen keyboard. You actively avoid having a meaningful conversation or replying to complex e-mails until you get to a pc (yes or meet in person, but lots of far away friends).
*sigh*
rad30n said:
I think part of the problem is that QWERTY for many people is one of those things that you think you can live without... until you try it for some time.
Then you go back to a normal smartphone and you notice how much you don't say because it's a nuisance to type with an on-screen keyboard. You actively avoid having a meaningful conversation or replying to complex e-mails until you get to a pc (yes or meet in person, but lots of far away friends).
*sigh*
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Absolutely! I can hardly explain the significance of hard keyboard to something but I cannot already live with usual phone myself
On-screen keyboard is a total s**t!
Therefore I've bought second Relay already)
rad30n said:
I think part of the problem is that QWERTY for many people is one of those things that you think you can live without... until you try it for some time.
Then you go back to a normal smartphone and you notice how much you don't say because it's a nuisance to type with an on-screen keyboard. You actively avoid having a meaningful conversation or replying to complex e-mails until you get to a pc (yes or meet in person, but lots of far away friends).
*sigh*
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
you've hit the nail on the head. my first smartphone was the original samsung blackjack (windoze mobile 5, later flashed to a custom 6.1 rom i think), and it was a blackberry style phone. when i tired of that, i got a samsung continuum, which was touch-only. not only was the device massively defective (had to return it so many times, vzw let me get a different model phone), not having a keyboard sucked for actually doing anything. so i got a droid 2 - slider qwerty. that one had its flight license revoked after a high speed impact with a wall, and was replaced with my current droid4. the d4 is slowly dying and its battery can't be (easily) replaced, and i want away from big red, so after much research, i decided that the relay is the best-specced qwerty slider on the market right now - especially sad since the just-released f3q or whatever actually has WORSE specs than the relay. so i bought a relay yesterday - found a local tmo store that had some open item stock and bought one for only $125. now i have to learn how to root, flash, and all that all over again - sammy stuff is WAY different from moto.
because i can actually use my phone for damn near everything (including RDP into the dell poweredge in my garage), i haven't even turned on my desktop pc in all of 2014. granted, i have a work laptop, but i don't have admin rights on it so i can't use it to work on my new relay. might have to commandeer the wife's laptop for that.
when i'm forced to use someone else's touch-only device (including my wife's sgs3 and tab2 7"), i quickly get frustrated by the on-screen keyboard. haptic feedback is no replacement for tactile buttons. that's why touchscreen sucks in a car, and why i hope the Tesla Model E (or whatever they're going to call it now) doesn't have 100% touch controls like the model S and model X. some touch is fine and appropriate in a car, but for some things, having a real knob or button is more efficient and safer. but i digress. calling these phones a "pocket computer" is 100% accurate. maybe someone will come up with a way to make those tack-on bluetooth keyboards not suck so much (like maybe they can clone the droid4's keyboard - it's nicer than the relay's, IMHO) or make it even bigger and make use of the space provided by these phablets out there now. i wouldn't mind carrying around a galaxy note if it had a good slider qwerty on board, and let me shrink the fonts to make better use of that big screen. alas, i just don't see that happening.
Gibson99 said:
you've hit the nail on the head. my first smartphone was the original samsung blackjack (windoze mobile 5, later flashed to a custom 6.1 rom i think), and it was a blackberry style phone. when i tired of that, i got a samsung continuum, which was touch-only. not only was the device massively defective (had to return it so many times, vzw let me get a different model phone), not having a keyboard sucked for actually doing anything. so i got a droid 2 - slider qwerty. that one had its flight license revoked after a high speed impact with a wall, and was replaced with my current droid4. the d4 is slowly dying and its battery can't be (easily) replaced, and i want away from big red, so after much research, i decided that the relay is the best-specced qwerty slider on the market right now - especially sad since the just-released f3q or whatever actually has WORSE specs than the relay. so i bought a relay yesterday - found a local tmo store that had some open item stock and bought one for only $125. now i have to learn how to root, flash, and all that all over again - sammy stuff is WAY different from moto.
because i can actually use my phone for damn near everything (including RDP into the dell poweredge in my garage), i haven't even turned on my desktop pc in all of 2014. granted, i have a work laptop, but i don't have admin rights on it so i can't use it to work on my new relay. might have to commandeer the wife's laptop for that.
when i'm forced to use someone else's touch-only device (including my wife's sgs3 and tab2 7"), i quickly get frustrated by the on-screen keyboard. haptic feedback is no replacement for tactile buttons. that's why touchscreen sucks in a car, and why i hope the Tesla Model E (or whatever they're going to call it now) doesn't have 100% touch controls like the model S and model X. some touch is fine and appropriate in a car, but for some things, having a real knob or button is more efficient and safer. but i digress. calling these phones a "pocket computer" is 100% accurate. maybe someone will come up with a way to make those tack-on bluetooth keyboards not suck so much (like maybe they can clone the droid4's keyboard - it's nicer than the relay's, IMHO) or make it even bigger and make use of the space provided by these phablets out there now. i wouldn't mind carrying around a galaxy note if it had a good slider qwerty on board, and let me shrink the fonts to make better use of that big screen. alas, i just don't see that happening.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
if you ever need help setting it up or unlocking it and all that ill be glad to help and guide you to the right threads
What's really sad is that every manufacturer has such a huge lineup (including stupid curved versions of phones that are more expensive and worse than the original uncurved version --- looking at you Samsung) and yet nobody can squeeze out a qwerty with a modern chipset.
The Relay is indeed a keeper! Hope this great community can go on collaborating and updating it for the next few years
I think i will buy another relay to keep in storage! The f3q does not look great:
http://www.t-mobile.com/cell-phones/lg-optimus-f3q.html
And not a lot of dev in the horizon:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2650840&page=4
Easiest way to get aosp is piggyback off a popular device, like we did for s3. I spoke to the LG guys at CM. Nobody is interested in the f3 (non qwerty) or the f3q. I'm personally waiting for project ara
Nardholio said:
Easiest way to get aosp is piggyback off a popular device, like we did for s3. I spoke to the LG guys at CM. Nobody is interested in the f3 (non qwerty) or the f3q. I'm personally waiting for project ara
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The LG Feck really doesn't seem like a new device, so I'm not surprised.
F3Q? No... absolutly not an option to "upgrade".
http://geekaphone.com/compare/Samsung-Galaxy-S-Relay-4G-vs-LG-Optimus-F3Q
The parameters are worse than relay. But F3Q is the ONLY qwerty android released 2014. Sad. Very sad.
NO!
sorgo said:
F3Q? No... absolutly not an option to "upgrade".
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Strongly agree. It's a piece of s**t
endangered species listed here
qwerty android phones:
http://www.meetgadget.com/gadget/#/gadget/category/Cell Phones/?f[3373][]=4764&f[7178][]=9439
gsm qwerty android phones:
http://www.meetgadget.com/gadget/#/...?f[3373][]=4764&f[7178][]=9439&f[3327][]=4772
side-sliders qwerty android phones:
http://www.meetgadget.com/gadget/#/...s/?f[3373][]=4764&f[3341]=4486&f[7178][]=9439
I am really considering buying another relay to have another one backup phone just for the day when the qwerty phones will be absolutely extinct in the future.
Guiyoforward said:
I think i will buy another relay to keep in storage! The f3q does not look great:
http://www.t-mobile.com/cell-phones/lg-optimus-f3q.html
And not a lot of dev in the horizon:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2650840&page=4
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Agreed. And Relays seem to remain available through ebay. The prices vary: I've seen some as cheap as $170 and as expensive as $250, but at least they are consistently available from various vendors. And I'm talking brand new still in the package with the plastic. But this may not last forever, though, so yeah, getting two might be in order.
RodimusConvoy said:
Agreed. And Relays seem to remain available through ebay. The prices vary: I've seen some as cheap as $170 and as expensive as $250, but at least they are consistently available from various vendors. And I'm talking brand new still in the package with the plastic. But this may not last forever, though, so yeah, getting two might be in order.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
yes, I bought mine (used device) in november for $125 (plus shipping and import charges, it was ~ €150). Now the lowest price for a device listed as NEW is $163. The only problems I had to replace the screen protector and now my display flex cable is starting to die. Maybe a good idea is to by one for spare parts too But I would recommend to buy a new one just to make sure that the keyboard mechanism isn't used too much.
I have the non-qwerty F3, and it would be seriously better with 8-16x the internal storage. It does have LTE (awesome if you're in an area where T-Mobile is serving it up), better RF performance (better dBm levels in 2G and 3G areas, at least), and amazing battery life, but the lack of internal storage is its Achilles heel. Naturally, they couldn't be bothered to upgrade that when they tacked on a keyboard, and there seems to be nothing on the horizon with regard to custom ROMs.
I dragged my Relay out of storage, popped my SIM into it (had to use an adapter since the F3 uses a Micro SIM), and fired it up again. Then, less than 24 hours after I take the CM plunge, CM development for the Relay grinds to a halt.
What a shame, since, other than a couple of rough edges (the AOSP calendar isn't as good as LG's calendar, and LG's calendar isn't as good as Samsung's, and also I can't sort contacts by last name) I like what I see with the M8 release.
What I am really starting to hate about the smartphone market is that every damn phone seems to have some sort of stupid $#!+ somewhere. Nexus 5? No removable battery, no external SD - the latest fashion! Recent Samsungs? Region locked, even if it's a "soft" lock and I'm unlikely to travel overseas anytime soon. Aren't they also locking the bootloaders on the S5 and Note 3? Don't even get me started on Apple's walled garden. Google seems to be steadily inching in that direction as well, as everything gets shoved into Google Play Services. The LG G3 looks promising (they brought back the external SD and the removable battery, yay!) but it's a flagship phone with a flagship price, and it's anybody's guess whether there will be any custom ROMs for it. Also, the buttons on the back make it useless with my windshield bracket.
Redirected from
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2551715&page=58#post57872212
(Sorry Moderators if I'm doing something wrong, but most of us were posting stuff on the DEV thread...)
I have to agree with @Dukenukemx that newer phones suck and that most don't even have physical keyboards.
This is probable because of the increase in screen size and the general interest in lighter, thinner phones. I actually really, really enjoy a heavy phone. It makes them feel solid, like those age-old Nokias. The myTouch especially is rather heavy, and I've dropped mine a lot mainly because I'm in college and I'm always in a rush but also because I'm clumsy as ****. Heavier phones are more solidly built, because of the thicker plastic required to support all the moving parts, in the myTouch's case, the G2, and the G1.
Gonna edit this later, I'm not done.
AndrMatr said:
Redirected from
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2551715&page=58#post57872212
(Sorry Moderators if I'm doing something wrong, but most of us were posting stuff on the DEV thread...)
I have to agree with @Dukenukemx that newer phones suck and that most don't even have physical keyboards.
This is probable because of the increase in screen size and the general interest in lighter, thinner phones. I actually really, really enjoy a heavy phone. It makes them feel solid, like those age-old Nokias. The myTouch especially is rather heavy, and I've dropped mine a lot mainly because I'm in college and I'm always in a rush but also because I'm clumsy as ****. Heavier phones are more solidly built, because of the thicker plastic required to support all the moving parts, in the myTouch's case, the G2, and the G1.
Gonna edit this later, I'm not done.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It's an interesting situation. Now I like the smaller phones because I don't want to have to be toting what is increasingly becoming a tablet in the front pocket. 4" screen is my limit, which rounds out to 122mm height, just small enough for a camera case.
I could have went iPhone with a Bluetooth keyboard but I don't like the Apple company model.
I won't repost the link I left in the other thread, but it talks about how Sprint did customer surveys which found people preferred hardware keyboards. They built two models, and close to no one bought them.
A big issue is that the lines are unrecognizable, and middle of the road in terms of specs. Since the specifications have pretty much stayed the same since then, "new" models are now bordering on low end phones. Ones that will never get updates, support, or any hope in general.
The suggestion in the end was that a qwerty line must be tied to a flagship device, or it won't survive. But after I had a couple beers with a network provider, their thoughts is that the market for qwerty is so niche that it would be too much risk for them.
A full sized device with a keyboard would not be practical. With the size they make them now, a few extra millimeters thickness for the keyboard makes it look bulky. A "Q" model would have to be tied to a device with a reduced size, like the S4 Mini, which is already a niche device.
Another issue, particularly with the doubleshot is with the hardware breakdown. Flex cable problems are all too common. With bar phones, it seems the only hardware problems they get are with the power button, and sometimes the volume rocker.
This may be my last foray in the hardware keyboard trend. I could (probably) get my cases made, which would be expensive and annoying, but it is what it is. Without a keyboard, and the ability to have a custom made case, I am willing to go to a phone size up to 5.5". So that would mean either a Nexus 5, Moto X 2013, or Moto G.
But it will be a while before I need to make that decision. My F3Q is still going strong (and strangely less miserable than the MT4GS, even though it wasn't a bad phone), although I miss the tactile response home buttons. ROM support would be nice, but I really like the LG interface right now (even though I replaced the launcher and icon pack).
My rant is over, for now.
Sent from my LG-D520 using XDA Free mobile app
@joel.maxuel, you have an interesting point when you said that a flagship device is needed for the keyboard to survive.
At the time, the myTouch was a flagship device. At the T-Moblie store I worked at every one of the guys I was working with had one. One had a red one, one had a white one, and I had LG Doubleplay (which is terrible phone, by the way) that I only got because it had two screens, which defeated the purpose of a battery.
While useful, the keyboards take up a little extra battery with the backlight. As far as the Doubleplay goes, the second screen combined with the keyboard just made the battery drain like someone who won the lottery throws away their money on houses, cars, etc. I never looked into Cyanogenmod for it, although that would be AWESOME with 4.x.x, having that extra screen for messaging and the top screen for whatever else so I can watch videos while I text.
Another device for the keyboard issue is the Kyocera Echo.
I don't know how many of you are familiar with the device, but it had two screens, which could be used in tandem with each other, you could pull an image onto both screens expanded so the image took up both screens. It was an extremely advanced version of the Doubleplay. The second screen was also the keyboard, which I didn't like because there was no physical feedback except the vibration of the phone. I liked the myTouch that when I was working for T-Mob I almost bought one, however I forgot about it as soon as I had access to the Sidekick 4G. What I liked about that phone was the lock screen, which displayed the time in words rather than the numbers. The trackpad was a joke, never worked properly, but it had a decent processor and a decent amount of RAM for 2.2 Froyo.
The keyboard was excellent, it had pretty good functionality. The buttons were really, really well spaced. There was no room for accidentally pressing a key and sending a text sending something really inappropriate instead of something harmless. Froyo is like Windows XP.
The downside of the Sidekick was that you almost always had to use both hands to press the soft keys, which I found to be almosed completely useless. Samsung did a terrible job of designing it. I have almost always had a keyboarded phone, and that's why I have switched carriers so much. T-Mob has always had the best Android phones, by far. Verizon's are also moderately decent, but T-Mob's were the best.
My favorite phone ever, was the G1. Forgive me, but I totally forgot about the spitting image of Google. Poorly designed, ugly, but very, very easy to use. I found out that it went all the way to ICS, and I threw mine out just about the time that ICS came out. The keyboard was the best addition to the phone that HTC could have added. The keyboard was snug, good for my (at the time) small fingers (I was 13). The trackball didn't light up, which was disappointing, that's what I liked about Blackberries (but blackberries themselves are a joke). When the myTouch 3G Slide came out, my friend got one and then he gave it to me. Even though it was slow as $#!+ the keyboard was the best thing (As I type this I realised that HTC had a thing for keyboards) about the phone.
My final point: Keyboards were a very, very important part of Android history. While keyboards had a fad, and like most things, they will make a come back. They might not be on major devices, but they will be on devices that will be supported enough for Cyanogenmod and the likes. I visited a AT&T store about a year ago and there were a couple of Android phones with keyboards. I look at foreign markets occasionally, and there are some companies that have keyboarded Android phones with decent specs (like a 2.2GHz quad core ARMv7 processor and an Adreno 430) but their hardware is cheaply made and the ratings that were translated by Google said that the hardware burned up fast. Battery life was almost zero.
Conclusion: wait a few years, or go live in China or Japan.
Edit
Oh, and by the way, I found this:
http://www.afterdawn.com/news/artic...ils_leaked_on_upcoming_mytouch_android_sequel
The phone looks like a combination between the myTouch 4G Slide and the 3G Slide, but there's no "chin" or whatever. The face is completely flat.
Personally, I think this one looks really cool. I have no idea why HTC didn't go with this design, I think it's really good, but instead they went with the original design of the current myTouch 3G Slide, which is what the 4G Slide is based off of.
What do you guys think?
Why non keyboard phones? It's not hard to imagine why companies don't make them. The demand for them has gone away. Why? Is touchscreen superior?
Look at the current trend of Android phones. They're getting bigger, but everyone hates them bigger, but everyone needs them bigger. Cause when you hold the phone on the side the keyboard consumes the screen. It's the most comfortable way to type, because holding it vertical gives you more visible screen, but less keyboard. So the solution is to make the screen bigger.
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But the reason everyone gets these keyboardless phones is because of iPhone. Everyone wants an iPhone clone. It's to look cool without the Apple tax. Manufacturers have no problems with this, as it makes manufacturing these phones cheaper. They encourage people to go for brick style phones, just like they encourage people to spend more on internal storage and cloud services. It's done by not including SD card slots and charge a lot for 32GB phones. Despite that a 32GB class 10 SD Card is only $17 on Amazon, and that's not even the cheap ones.
How hard is it to make a brick phone? Screen+SoC+battery = phone. When companies like HTC are falling apart when all they can do is continue to make more powerful iPhone clones. Like I care how much faster my phone can get when I don't have the software on it. Hey look 2+Ghz quad core with GPU9001 graphics with screen resolution beyond 1080p. So it's obviously for gaming, cause Facebook doesn't need this kind of power. It would be more comfortable to use a keyboard for gaming, especially games like ShovelKnight. Instead of HTC going after qwerty again they just keep trying to one up Samsung, LG, and Apple in shear power. Meanwhile best touchscreen games are AngryBirds, FruitNinja, and etc, which don't need that kind of power.
Well, in the beginning, it was more than a fad, it was a requirement. On screen keyboards were not part of the OS until Donut 1.6, where the G1 was released with Cupcake 1.5...
Sent from my LG-D520 using XDA Free mobile app
@Dukenukemx
You're right on the "More Power" idea. I totally agree.
Companies are repeatedly trying to 1-up each other with hardware.
While the G1 is struggling with 4.0.4, phones like the LG Phoenix are thriving even on Lollipop.
The Samsung Glalaxy Note III has an insane processor that can play Minecraft with no problem.
The Samsung Glalaxy Centura has an 800Mhz processor that can handle Minecraft with no problem. The only problem I have with my Phoenix is the processor architecture being ARMv6, and Minecraft is built on an ARMv7 platform. The Adreno 200 handles NFS Shift with no problem. If the Phoenix had ARMv7 I would have just bought a Bluetooth keyboard and played around with that. I'm happy with the Phoenix and if I can downgrade the CWM recovery back to 5.x.x.x I might also downgrade the OS to either 4.0.4 or 4.1.2.
And you're right with the whole memory problem. My Phoenix shipped with an unexpected 32GB Sandisk 32GB MicroSD card already wiped in the device! I bought the phone itself for $19.95 on amazon, and the card came with it! Apple bumps the price on a new iPhone up about $100-$200 per memory level. Other manufacturers are doing the same. It's not about the phone anymore. It's about the game. Manufacturers just slap the newest and biggest on their devices while devs are constantly tyring to keep up. The battery life is dismal. My Phoenix gets 2-3 days on a charge with a 1520MAh 3.7V battery. The Samsung Galaxy S5 has a 10.78 WH battery... Since when was battery life rated in the amount of watts used? The watt is a measurement of heat... That's disturbing. Even my myTouch gets warm while browsing the web, nevermind I fried my last one playing Minecraft. Given I had the processor overclocked by a whole 500MHz, that's mostly my fault. My Phoenix can barely handle a 148MHz overclock. The phones (myTouch and Phoenix) were released two months apart! Had Minecraft development started then, we would probably still see a lot of ARMv7 exclusive apps actually developed for ARMv6 as well. Developers tend to go to the brighter side of the latest and greatest, however people like me prefer to hang out on the deep end and dig through the dirt and bring old relics to light (like the Phoenix or the G1). Even the iPhone 3GS received an Android update! All you had to do was jailbreak it. iDroid development stopped right around the release of JB mainly because the 3GS's hardware couldn't keep up with Android and the developers had better things to do than tinker around with brand new iPhones. iOS is up to what, iOS 9? Android is only recently to 5.0!
I definitely prefer Android, though, because Android is open source and Apple is paranoid and has all of their stuff closed-source. I remember the announcement in Google News when the Android Market reached its one-billionth app download, and now most apps have over 100,000 and the number of Android apps is blowing up exponentially. I looked at Google's stock worth per share: 526 as of posting. About 8 or 9 months ago it was at over a thousand. Apple's stock? 110. Microsoft? Forget it. microsoft is becoming a game company now. Microsoft is becoming Blackberry: Everyone uses it but they either don't care about it or hate it. Windows 8 was a joke. I have extremely high expectations for Windows 10. I don't want to be disappointed so I'm using Ubuntu.
joel.maxuel said:
Well, in the beginning, it was more than a fad, it was a requirement. On screen keyboards were not part of the OS until Donut 1.6, where the G1 was released with Cupcake 1.5...
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It could be argued that it's a fad to not have a keyboard. Is removing SD cards also a fad too? Nobody wants Windows phones, but somehow they keep getting made. Part of it is market influence, and part of it is collaboration. I believe there's a lot of people who are still waiting for a next generation QWERTY phone, but nobody is making them? Something is not right here. We are being pushed into a direction that companies want. Who doesn't want a SD card in their phone? WHO?
The Motorola Droid 4 is the best QWERTY phone today. It has respectable specs for a phone today, but it was made 2 years ago. I would be using it now if it worked on T-Mobile. There are people waiting for the Droid 5, but that's likely never going to happen. But I also believe that companies like HTC, LG, Samsung, and even Apple are facing a growing menace. The Chinese ultra cheap market is growing and ready to explode into a problem for them. Willing to believe they have no problem with making QWERTY phones. I have no problem with Mediatek or Allwinner chips in my phone. Probably the worst thing going for the Chinese phones is lack of community rom support and support for T-Mobile.
AndrMatr said:
Even the iPhone 3GS received an Android update! All you had to do was jailbreak it. iDroid development stopped right around the release of JB mainly because the 3GS's hardware couldn't keep up with Android and the developers had better things to do than tinker around with brand new iPhones. iOS is up to what, iOS 9? Android is only recently to 5.0!
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I didn't know about the iDroid project, sounds like a cool initiative. Too bad they didn't keep it up (with the newer devices).
Your point that the iPhone couldn't keep up with JB tells me that either (a) Apple products are underspecced as well as being overpriced, or (b) the shift in OS requirements for Android were rather steep (in reality the big jump was from GB to ICS). With the options available, I figure it is mostly the former.
I don't understand the point of Android vs iOS versioning. Both release major versions once a year. Android just didn't mark those milestones with a full increment.
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---------- Post added at 01:37 AM ---------- Previous post was at 01:15 AM ----------
Dukenukemx said:
It could be argued that it's a fad to not have a keyboard. Is removing SD cards also a fad too?
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Click to collapse
I think that no longer having a keyboard is more of a trend, not a fad. A fad is a passing phase, likely/hopefully phablets for example. Since a hardware keyboard is no longer necessary, and too many people have voted with their wallets (never mind the fact my friend at Eastlink pointed out - you cannot customize a hardware keyboard) it is difficult that manufacturers will go back to that, including cheap chinese manufacturers to create latin-based phones for that matter.
The big companies have took too many notes from Apple - no SD card, non-removable battery, although they have pushed other nasties onto the market i.e. ever increasing screen sizes to hide the need for more chassis space for the specs.
Lack of SD card and removable battery is the worst for people like us. No SD card means we cannot back up userdata in recovery. No removable battery means we have nothing to pull if we bootloop and need to hard reset (AFAIK).
Their stance is that it saves space, and with 64GB onboard, why need expansion for a card that often cannot be more than 32GB anyway? I don't know the reasoning for the battery, but it means that the phone has to be replaced much sooner, and it cannot be shipped easily in many locations.
Its hard to tell what is a fad or a trend, but if enough people vote with their wallets, hindsight will determine the outcome.
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joel.maxuel said:
I didn't know about the iDroid project, sounds like a cool initiative. Too bad they didn't keep it up (with the newer devices).
Your point that the iPhone couldn't keep up with JB tells me that either (a) Apple products are underspecced as well as being overpriced, or (b) the shift in OS requirements for Android were rather steep (in reality the big jump was from GB to ICS). With the options available, I figure it is mostly the former.
I don't understand the point of Android vs iOS versioning. Both release major versions once a year. Android just didn't mark those milestones with a full increment.
I think that no longer having a keyboard is more of a trend, not a fad. A fad is a passing phase, likely/hopefully phablets for example. Since a hardware keyboard is no longer necessary, and too many people have voted with their wallets (never mind the fact my friend at Eastlink pointed out - you cannot customize a hardware keyboard) it is difficult that manufacturers will go back to that, including cheap chinese manufacturers to create latin-based phones for that matter.
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Click to collapse
As far as Apple devices being underspecced, I completely agree. The 4S had a 1Ghz dual core processor in 2011, where as we have the myTouch and the Samsung Galaxy S Whatever. While the iPhone 4S had really, really good battery life (that's the only good thing about Apple and Blackberry, everything else is total crap) it was a terrible phone, I ended up installing android on it with working 3G and wifi, plus texting and calling. A lot of apps were super incompatible with the iPhone's hardware. The Cortex-A9 was a sh*tty processor to begin with, and the PowerVR GPU was total BS as well. In contrast, my little, reliable Phoenix runs NFS Shift really well. I downloaded it for iOS when I wasn't using Android, and the iPhone could barely handle the graphics. I'll give Apple the cake for design. The iPhone 4S looked really cool. The ONLY part I actually enjoyed about iOS was Siri, and ther's a bunch of Android apps just for that. Given the'r not as good, they work much better in my experience.
On another note, how good would X86 and X64 desktop architecture work with Android? I heard newer versions of Android phones will be x64 compatible.
Aside from that, the Droid Turbo has better specs than my current PC, and once the Droid Turbo loses value because of the terrible battery life I might buy one and load up Bochs (a x86 desktop processor emulator and virtual machine for Android) and just boot Windows XP. I wonder how well that would work? It almost worked on a G2, it was just really slow.
Yet another topic, a lot of PC games that have launcher clients (Skyrim, Oblivion, COD, NFS) all use a standalone .exe that grabs the files and loads them into the RAM as needed. What if someone recompiles the launcher/client .exe for Android, and transfers the files to the SD card and installs the APK? Can that work? The Android apps like Ravensword also uses external data separate from the standalone APK app are practically the same, except the APK is the client instead of .exe. Could this mean we can get Skyrim for Android? I mean, we have the hardware. All we need is a bluetooth keyboard and mouse, or a compatible game controller. I take it you'd have to modify a few files for hardware reasons, but other than that it might work. A buddy of mine tried to get it to work with Oblivion, but he failed because it was too big of a task and took too much time.
Dukenukemx said:
The Motorola Droid 4 is the best QWERTY phone today. It has respectable specs for a phone today, but it was made 2 years ago. I would be using it now if it worked on T-Mobile.
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I was thinking about that. It has better specs than the MT4GS, existing the 8GB internal and the 1024MB of RAM. I might buy one for novelty purposes, use it as an android equivalent to and iPod Touch (which is what my MT4GS is doing, I have all media forwarded through bluetooth[calls, texts,internet]) but my problem is I already have two MT4GS's and I'm just gonna wear both of them out. By the time I break both of them HOPEFULLY there will be a decent QWERTY phone. T-Mobile seems like a good option, it's too bad alternate ROMs don't let us do a SIM unlock. My LG Phoenix, which I adore, is still loyal to me even though it doesn't have an SD card and is still sticking with me considering how much crap I've put it through.
It's also a shame that LG took over the Gx series, I really would have liked HTC to continue it. Just imagine another QWERTY phone! The HTC G3! I'm probably gonna whip out my pencil and draw it, I'll share it with you guys! Then I might send the design to HTC... Forget it. It's only a dream, but the concept is enjoyable. The HTC One should have a slide out variation, like the myTouch and the Evo 4G series'. Just browsing Amazon I see quite a few really, really crappy QWERTY phones in the style of Blackberrys. They disgust me.
Like it or not like it, I expect thanks for this. I apologise for the poor drawing skills, they are usually better and I was excited and rushed this a little.
Just in case the image doesn't show up, here:
https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B6Qo4xLF16dSOFlVRDM4ZUFwV0E/edit?usp=docslist_api