What's your favourite HW keyboard phone?

[readyfx 0]

If i had to put a list of my top keyboard phones it would be in this order.

Am expecting the new F(x)tec phone to go straight to the top of that list :)

 

1. Nokia E7

2. Blackberry Priv

3. Nokia E9

[EskeRahn 5,399]

I hope so too, but would put phones such as the Sony Ericsson Xperia (Neo) pro on the list too.

I loved my Nokia N97 mini too - except the display that was horrible in sunlight.

:)

[TeZtdevice 262]

Motorola Photon Q and Motorola Droid 4

 

[asti 0]

I only had one - a Samsung Omnia and I liked it. I would prefer a slider mechanism and it is very important for me to get a German QWERTZ layout with easy accessible umlauts (Ä,ä, ö, Ö, ü, Ü ß). Sharp Zaurus SL-C 1000 had a good function to edit the keyboard functionality e.g. to add sticky keys and such things.

[aprilming 0]

nokia n950

[thomas_d 0]

Nokia E7

It's just the best combination of full screen and wide keyboard.

With danish keyboard naturally...

[dicer 36]

For me its the Droid4. Still using it to this day so you can see how eagerly I'm waiting for a new keyboard phone to arrive ;)

[thomas_d 0]

Speaking of Nokia, could we by any chance have the equivalent of Nokia Sleeping Screen on the F(x)? I miss being able to check the time at a glance, and it does have an OLED after all.

[zernag 0]

My list of best Keyboard phone would be :

1 - Nokia E7 (<3)

2 - Blackberry Classic (Q20, the that I actually use)

3 - Samsung S5611

4 - Blackberry priv

 

Just one question : Will your smartphone keyboard be in AZERTY ?

 

Because I'm French and this would perfectly replace my Classic ! :-D

[sur5r 0]

1. HTC Dezire Z (HTC Vision)

2. Nokia 9500

[static_typer 0]

Motorola Photon Q (XT897) / Droid 4 (XT894)

Pros:

Five row keyboard with good layout and tactile response.

Unlockable bootloader (XT897).

Partial compatibility for choice of Linux based OS (XT894).

 

Cons:

Keyboard is noisy (popping sound on key-press).

Ribbon/flex cable breaks.

 

 

Nokia E7 / N950

Pros:

Excellent build quality, materials and durability.

Silent keyboard.

 

Cons:

Keyboard lacks buttons. The tab, shift, esc keys are missing from the left, meaning the alphanumeric keys are not centered in the hand for typing.

Symbian (E7).

Unreleased (N950).

 

Fxtec (what we know so far):

Pros:

Similar hinge design from former Nokia employees, so should be durable. Metal construction.

Five row keyboard.

Unlockable bootloader.

Proposed compatibility with multiple Linux based OS's.

3.5mm Audio jack (no longer a standard in 2019).

 

Cons:

Obscure choice of key positions. The numeric keys are misaligned with the alphabet keys by one position to the right. For example, above the 'Q' key are 2 and 3. On any standard keyboard, it should be 1 and 2.

 

Solution: Is there really a need for both a backspace and a delete key? If the delete key is changed to backspace, the numeric keys can all be shifted right one position and the ~ key moved up one position. This leaves a blank key to the left of 'Q' that could be used for a different symbol.

[EskeRahn 5,399]

Reply to static_typer, February 18, 2019 at 11:08 am

 

Obscure choice of key positions. The numeric keys are misaligned with the alphabet keys by one position to the right. For example, above the ‘Q’ key are 2 and 3. On any standard keyboard, it should be 1 and 2.

 

I too find that rather odd. I do understand the WHY to centre the letters to ease two-thumbs usage, but to me the price of the misalignment is not a good balance. Another way could be to move the plus to a secondary position on the minus key. Though an important symbol, the plus is used far less than the dash and the digits for ordinary users texting/mailing/browsing/....

[aprilming 0]

I want to know if I can buy this phone in China, and the approximate price.

[9500 3]

Nokia 9500

Nokia 9300i

N900

Blackberry 9900

Blackberry Passport

Blackberry Priv

[osamagirl69 0]

Droid 4, since that is what I am currently using. Really anything is fine as long as it is a 5 row keyboard--I can't stand the 4 row on the priv. I personally would like to see a dedicated @ as well as something that can be mapped as a ctrl. There is not much use for alt/ctrl under android but it is useful for ssh'ing into linux, or for the proposed native linux running on the phone.

[Kzin 28]

I had a HTC Touch Pro 2 for a while, it had a tilt screen, I liked the Keyboard on that. and the Droid 3 had a nice action and was super rugged, but Have a Droid 4 ATM, But the best keyboard I had was not on a phone it was a Psion 5MX. Put that Keyboard on a phone and I'm there!

[EskeRahn 5,399]

Good news osamagirl69 If you look at the images in the newsletters

https://www.fxtec.com/otherhardwarespecs/

https://www.fxtec.com/the-smartphone-you-thought-you-couldnt-have-keyboard/

You can clearly see TWO Ctrl buttons on the five rows keyboard. :-)

(And the @ on the 2 key the 'standard' way)

[CornholioGSM 268]

what is my favorite qwerty phone...hmmm thats hard question. My first was nokia 9110, then 9210, htc wox, htc xda atmos, htc s740, milestone, xperia mini pro, droid2global, droid 3 and then of course Photon Q...all of these phones was good...but maybe best was droid 3 for its design , 5 row keyboard and for metal frame around display.

[Craig 1,435]

Motorola Photon Q.

 

To my knowledge, it's the highest spec landscape slider there is...

 

I like the keyboard, Always been happy with it being conformable and usable. I like that Motorola allows unlocking bootloader. I like the ability to run cynaogenmod and lineageos, especially on such an old phone. I'm fairly happy with the size. I liked the hdmi port, I hooked it up to hotel TVs to watch video when traveling.

 

I'm not happy Moto never even released Kitkat even tho they'd promised it previously. I'm not happy that it required hardware mod to use sim card (to use outside us sprint), and I'm not happy how slow it seems today compared to modern phones. I also don't like micro-usb as much as usb-c, which of course is not a fault of a phone that came out more than 5 years ago.

 

 

[Ktharsia 10]

These are the phones I've used so far, but I don't have a favorite:

Nokia 9300i

HTC Touch Pro2

Motorola Droid 4

[npatel1050 132]

Favorite is the Desire Z or G2. Lovely design and solid keyboard.

However best phone specs wise would have to be Photon Q or blackberry priv

[oTToToTenTanz 0]

@CornholioGSM wow, nice to see some old-school guys here in this forum. I followed your photon q mod back in 2012 and that was such an awesome phone... I just needed to change it for another phone when I needed to swap sim cards once in a while. Have been looking for another qwerty phone since but there has never been more than some leaks some early pictures of the Droid 5. Anyway, you seem interested in the upcoming qwerty phone?

[Rud 123]

Nokia E7-00;

Nokia E6-00;

BlackBerry Priv.

[Ken 0]

My qwerty phone list (in order I have used it):

 

ETen Gloofish M800

Pro: one of the very first smartphone with full horizontal keyboard. Good response of the keys. Like the sliding mechanism. Good price (280€).

Con: very bad OS (windows mobile 6.1). Bad hardware. Lot of problems. No finger friendly. No space between the keyboard keys. Huge bezel and small screen.

 

HTC Desire Z

Pro: Android. Very good assembly. Still now in function. Good hardware for 2010 phone. Standard headphone jack.

Con: the key's response is not so good (very soft without "click"). After years of use some keys need to be pressed very hard to function. I didn't like the sliding mechanism. Hardware too old for today (isn't a con, it's the hardware life). Price a little bit high (475€). Very difficult to unlock but is possibile to do.

 

Motorola Photon Q

Pro: very good keyboard. Simply to unlock. The last QWERTY phone at the moment. Decent hardware. Good keybord response. Price low (used with hw mod: 100-120€)

Con: slider connection cable that broke after intense use. Bad assembly. Keybord click too noisy. Need to be modify in the hardware if you need to use with your own SIM. This cause a lot of hardware problems like screen bugs/blackout, battery drain ecc. Need to change 3 times... After the last problem I choose to switch to a non QWERTY phone :-(

 

Hope this can help... Waiting form your new device! :-)

[Slion 1,200]

Nokia E7

Nokia E90

Sony Ericsson vivaz pro

 

So looking forward to own one of yours. Go fxtec, go!

One thing though, will it run Symbian OS? I'll get my coat... :)