After a solid month, I give up. I need to vent.

[Hook 3,020]

One of my advantages, I suspect, is that, other than work assigned Blackberries, this is the first physical keyboard phone I have ever used, so I am just training my motor skills to this keyboard.  All other keyboard phones tempted me, but they were too small, making them very difficult to use when I tried them in stores.  I only reluctantly used my BBs with their hopelessly cramped keyboards, and usually only to say "k, email later."  I most often just phoned people if I wanted to reply. So I really find this phone the first phone really made for my hands.  With the Pro 1 I will snap out the keyboard even for short messages. I have no problem with opening the keyboard.

Which is really what @VaZso was saying, I guess.

My only real problem with the keyboard is what they did with the "/" and "?" and having Fn act as Shift.  But there are good workarounds like FinQwerty and Fx Qwerty, so I'm fine.

I definitely would have preferred a flat and beveled screen, but I have adjusted with the help of Edge Null. 

As for the software rough edges, I expected those. I do truly hope they get fixed, but even that has taken a hit from the Covid-19 virus.

I certainly hope F(x) Tec is able to produce a smaller model for those who want one, but I am very happy with the Pro 1. Very happy.

 

[EskeRahn 5,460]

1 hour ago, Polaris said:

For me, and I admit this is a radical idea which isn't for everyone, it allows the best of both worlds between the QWERTY and the QWERTZ layouts.

I think this sounds rather close to what is offered by FinQWERTY for those not tech savy enough to fiddle with the mapping themselves. If they select this, that is intended for the qwertZ hardware, but could be used for the letter shifted qwertY too.

(obviously more is changed than was is marked with pink as "changed" if used on the qwertY))

[Polaris 423]

5 hours ago, EskeRahn said:

I think this sounds rather close to what is offered by FinQWERTY for those not tech savy enough to fiddle with the mapping themselves. If they select this, that is intended for the qwertZ hardware, but could be used for the letter shifted qwertY too.

Actually radically different.  Using the FinQWERTY mapping for the qwertZ on a qwertY device remaps every key in the middle three rows (as well as others).  The version I came up with leaves all of the keys to the right of (the printed) RFV diagonal alone; thus, function matches the key printing.  This has two wonderful effects.  First, it unshifts the left half of the keyboard, and by doing so, creates symmetry (meaning the standard J key and the newly remapped F key are exactly the same distance from their respective right and left edges (this is a huge plus for me as I can now pickup the phone, and begin typing without having to look at the keyboard, or my thumbs, for positioning).  My thumbs automatically land right on top of F and J, and I can blind touch type everything else from there.  Second, it means that the printing on the majority of the keys, and even the entire right half of the keyboard, is accurate.  Some of the symbols are the only keys I need to look at to type them; thus, it's nice to have the printing be accurate on as many as possible.  My remapping means the loss of three keys, but they are symbols I don't use often with a phone, and LOS can bring up a symbol keyboard (why this wasn't implemented in the stock ROM is beyond me) for these symbols so it's not like they are lost (or need to be remapped -but can be such as what I did with the / and \ on the same [ key).

[arichter.games 1]

Screen:
This phone is slick. day 2 it slipped out of my hand while sitting, fell 2 feet to the floor and cracked the digitizer. seems to work fine but now it has a rattle every time the vibrate triggers. and a crack.

Keyboard:
- I cant type ? or /  (shift types uppercase. F, Alt, Sym, Arrow, all do nothing) ..... are you @#$%ing serious?! the primary reason I purchased this phone and I cant use it to type a question or a URL?! Could have done an almost identical layout to a standard keyboard. and didn't. 
- Misses key presses. a lot. 
- Touching a misspelled word doesn't bring up suggestions.
- backlight frequently turns off and does not turn on again unless you re-open it.

Edge touches: I have to spend 50% of my time undoing whatever random action just happened. 
When the board is open, it's way too easy to rest your thumb against the bottom of the screen, causing edge touches.

Flip mechanism: clever. too clever. I've almost flung it out of my hand dozens of times because my fingers cant get purchase on the smooth screen surface. 

Call quality: constant drops. have to stand in special places in my house to use the phone. I've never had issues like this with any previous phones. 
cheek check constantly fails and opens random things as i'm talking.

Had to disable the two-tap power to open the camera because I would frequently take it out of my pocket and the camera would be running. very very very bad when you work in a place that doesn't allow pictures. Hesitant to gripe too much about this one because Samsung also fails hard at this. 

[Polaris 423]

1 hour ago, arichter.games said:

.
.
Flip mechanism: clever. too clever. I've almost flung it out of my hand dozens of times because my fingers cant get purchase on the smooth screen surface. 

Call quality: constant drops. have to stand in special places in my house to use the phone. I've never had issues like this with any previous phones. 
cheek check constantly fails and opens random things as i'm talking.

I don't have any problems with opening it, or it potentially flying out of my hand, or hands, but I most certainly have issues with the constant call dropping.  I too have to stand in certain areas of my house, and while, I readily admit that I'm in a weak cell signal area, I too haven't had it anywhere near this bad with previous phones.

[divstar 164]

I cracked the screen 2 weeks after I got it - and got it replaced a bit over a month later. It slipped because I was careless (had nothing to do with opening the keyboard).

[SteffenWi 139]

@roland I love how 'stiff' the keys are. And after just a couple minutes typing on it I can almost type blind. Always interesting to see how different our silly human brains work 😉

[david 929]

5 hours ago, arichter.games said:

Keyboard:
- I cant type ? or /  (shift types uppercase. F, Alt, Sym, Arrow, all do nothing) ..... are you @#$%ing serious?! the primary reason I purchased this phone and I cant use it to type a question or a URL?! Could have done an almost identical layout to a standard keyboard. and didn't. 
- Misses key presses. a lot. 
- Touching a misspelled word doesn't bring up suggestions.
- backlight frequently turns off and does not turn on again unless you re-open it.

Missing keypresses might be due to a bug, where you can't press the next key before the last key is released.  That should be fixed in one of the new firmware updates.

For the / and ? problem, clear your keyboard language selection so that it reads "Default".  Then the button next to the left control key will get you / and ?

The other 2 are known issues.  Hopefully they will be fixed in a newer firmware.

[roland 13]

@VaZso
My hands are relatively big so that's not an issue. Perhaps I have a Monday morning keyboard, who knows.. But it really takes an effort to type which I didn't have at all with my old HTC Wizard. And despite its simple sliding mechanism it never opened in my pocket because there was a slight resistance to overcome in the very beginning.

@EskeRahn

I read the thread. I don't find it difficult to open the keyboard. It just requires more effort compared to what I was used to with my old HTC Wizard. It's small but this and the stiff keys just keep me from using it. And especially for a device that's used for ever so many messages a day it should take minimal effort to open and close and that's simply not the case. The fact we need to learn certain techniques to partly overcome this says a lot I think. This is not criticism per se. I'm merely describing how I experience the device.

@Polaris

That's exactly what I think about those old devices compared to the Pro1. It was totally effortless to start typing on those. Again I have my hopes up for a Pro2. 🙂

[EskeRahn 5,460]

2 hours ago, roland said:

The fact we need to learn certain techniques to partly overcome this says a lot I think.

That could be an argument that bicycles should have three (or more wheels) as two-wheeled are hard to operate in the beginning. 😜

[Craig 1,435]

1 hour ago, EskeRahn said:

That could be an argument that bicycles should have three (or more wheels) as two-wheeled are hard to operate in the beginning. 😜

Most humans do start with a tricycle before bicycle for that very reason, sometimes for years.  And then some even switch up to four wheels for a while before going to 2....

Edited February 25, 2020 by Craig

[VaZso 1,998]

3 hours ago, roland said:

And despite its simple sliding mechanism it never opened in my pocket because there was a slight resistance to overcome in the very beginning.

Not only that - it should also lifted up so if you don't really have space in your pocket (more thickness) then it can not be opened...

[EskeRahn 5,460]

2 hours ago, Craig said:

Most humans do start with a tricycle before bicycle for that very reason, sometimes for years.  And then some even switch up to four wheels for a while before going to 2....

And some switch back from two to three when they get old... 😂

Would it be pushing it (excuse the pun) seeing a plain keyboard slider as a handicap friendly version of a real keyboard device like the Pro1?  😇😇

[Craig 1,435]

 

6 minutes ago, EskeRahn said:

And some switch back from two to three when they get old... 😂

Before I looked at your picture, I was imagining you meant something more like this.

Edited February 25, 2020 by Craig

[david 929]

7 minutes ago, Craig said:

 

Before I looked at your picture, I was imagining you meant something more like this.

They make these near where I live:

[everlast4308 30]

Logged in hoping to catch @fxyo1 before it's too late:

Please dig it out of the trash!!!

There are LOTS of useful components, I would personally pay you cash for it. I'm sure others here or on Ebay would too. Like hundreds of dollars.

- Battery
- Keyboard
- Shell
- Main Board / CPU / RAM
- Buttons / Sensors
- etc

It's just that these phones are so rare. Having one for parts is still super valuable!!

I hope I caught you in time... otherwise what a waste 😭

[david 929]

23 hours ago, arichter.games said:

- backlight frequently turns off and does not turn on again unless you re-open it.

 

@elvissteinjr's solution in this post solved this particular problem for me, nicely.

The keyboard backlight turns off every time the scree turns off, so if you set your screen to not turn off as often, then you'll face the keyboard backlight issue less often too.  However, with the above solution, every time the screen comes back on, it will turn the keyboard on too, so the screen off timer duration won't matter anymore, other than having to unlock the phone (if you have it password/fingerprint/pattern) locked.

If you are like me, and have never used Tasker, to import the profile files from his post, you need to tap on the word "PROFILES" in the tabs across the top of the Tasker home screen.  That will give you a drop down menu, were you can pick "Import Profile".  You can then pick whether to browse the internal or external storage (icons in the lower right) and find where you put the files from his post (typically in the Internal storage, in the Downloads folder). 

I had to google around to find out where that import menu was hidden, hence the reason I'm mentioning it. :-)

[J_P 23]

18 hours ago, EskeRahn said:

That could be an argument that bicycles should have three (or more wheels) as two-wheeled are hard to operate in the beginning. 😜

Couldn't disagree more. I had the HTC Wizard, Hermes, TYTN, Xperia X1, Xperia Pro, Desire Z and Galaxy S Relay. All of the keyboards were very easy to open and there was no 'learning' required.

The Pro1 is a PITA to open due to poor design choices.

It's also annoying to type on.

[EskeRahn 5,460]

57 minutes ago, J_P said:

Couldn't disagree more. I had the HTC Wizard, Hermes, TYTN, Xperia X1, Xperia Pro, Desire Z and Galaxy S Relay. All of the keyboards were very easy to open and there was no 'learning' required.

The Pro1 is a PITA to open due to poor design choices.

It's also annoying to type on.

You are aware that none of the one you mention have a similar mechanism, right?

They deliberately chose this superior mechanism (previously used in several Nokia-models), despite that it unfortunately do have a learning curve.

You just haven't learned to master it yet.

Usually beginners also get angry at their bicycle until they master it, but once we do, we can not imagine how it was ever difficult.

You could compare the ones you list with tricycles that everyone can operate (almost) immediately, and the mechanism on the Pro1 with a bicycle.

[J_P 23]

7 minutes ago, EskeRahn said:

You are aware that none of the one you mention have a similar mechanism, right?

They deliberately chose this superior mechanism

Of course I'm aware of that.

The mechanism chosen is not superior. The superior one is the one that works really well with zero problems and doesn't cause loads of complaints from users.

Your bicycle metaphor is condescending. Please don't belittle people for having a different view.

 

The Desire Z did have a hinge mechanism by the way, it just wasn't a problem because it was well implemented.

Edited February 26, 2020 by J_P

[VaZso 1,998]

3 minutes ago, J_P said:

The mechanism chosen is not superior. The superior one is the one that works really well with zero problems and doesn't cause loads of complaints from users.

I think the superior one which works well in long-term use and doesn't activates randomly,

The TyTN could scratch itself by use, N900 could open in pocket, etc.
Nothing is perfect.
On the other side, similar mechanisms of Nokia were very durable - there are units which are still working well anyway.

[Doktor Oswaldo 904]

24 minutes ago, J_P said:

Of course I'm aware of that.

The mechanism chosen is not superior. The superior one is the one that works really well with zero problems and doesn't cause loads of complaints from users.

Your bicycle metaphor is condescending. Please don't belittle people for having a different view.

 

The Desire Z did have a hinge mechanism by the way, it just wasn't a problem because it was well implemented.

Eske is super chill with people with different opinions, but he does not like discussions based on personal opinion instead of data and science.
So he is just saying that the mechanism is rock solid once mastered. You could of course argue that it would be wiser to have one that instantly can be used but then the tricycle comparison is pretty on spot.
So there is no reason to feel belittled.
 

[EskeRahn 5,460]

6 minutes ago, J_P said:

Of course I'm aware of that.

The mechanism chosen is not superior. The superior one is the one that works really well with zero problems and doesn't cause loads of complaints from users.

Your bicycle metaphor is condescending. Please don't belittle people for having a different view.

 

The Desire Z did have a hinge mechanism by the way, it just wasn't a problem because it was well implemented.

The plain sliders have several issues you do not have with the superior mechanism, and it is related to the simplicity of the two-arms system.

1) The slides are almost impossible to keep clean, and you thus have to take a lot of care to avoid pocket debris and other dirt to get into the rails.
2) You have to press either almost exactly at the middle or use two thumbs evenly, unless the rails are totally clean and well lubricated
3) The display does not tilt, though some models offer an additional hinge to accomplish that.
4) as @VaZso pointed out the comlpexity means more error prone, and they could slide open in a pocket

I see no belittling here, I just try to explain that it is not unusual to find things one have not mastered yet hard to use. And the funny thing is that some grows into muscle memory so you don't actually consider doing it once learned. Just like walking. Took a long time for all of us, now we just do it.

I have had both types, and I had troubles opening my Nokia N97mini initially too, but yet found the mechanism far superior to my Xperia (neo) Pro.

[EskeRahn 5,460]

4 minutes ago, EskeRahn said:

2) You have to press either almost exactly at the middle or use two thumbs evenly, unless the rails are totally clean and well lubricated

...The BB Priv being an exception here, as the rails are so long compared to the distance between the rails.

[J_P 23]

42 minutes ago, EskeRahn said:

I see no belittling here

Look, I'm not offended, but reading through this thread for the first time today I felt bad for some of the posters - they're discussing the real issues and frustrations they're experiencing and they probably don't appreciate being compared to 4 year olds who have to ride a tricycle.
There's a distinct hint of "you'd love this phone if you were skillful and intelligent, but as you're a clumsy oaf you're having problems."