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Lumia Icon, best Windows Phone ever, receives tepid reviews

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Android compatibility: yes please (Score: 1)

by zafiro17@pipedot.org on 2014-03-19 13:10 (#P6)

I don't care what Windows did to OS/2. (Well, yes I do). But here and now, there's potentially hope for app compatibility. I've got a few Samsung Android phones, including the Note 3, which is their flagship (and it's a pretty great phone). But I'm looking seriously at the new Blackberry Q10 with keyboard. Why? I like the hardware, and Blackberry does things that no Samsung Android does today. I can assign shortcuts/hotkeys to the physical keyboard, and launch a call to my wife in a single keypress. On my phablet I've got to unlock the screen, navigate over to the phone icon, hit favorites, and select her from the list (voice control works when I have a wifi connection, but I don't always have one).

Point is just: I wouldn't be considering BB alone because their software ecosystem isn't as good. But getting a Q10 Blackberry hardware with Android app compatability is potentially a sweet spot for a consumer like me! (ironic, since most tech analysts look at Blackberry and tell them to stop making handsets, as their value is increasingly only in their patent portfolio - how stupid).

Re: Android compatibility: yes please (Score: 1)

by vanderhoth@pipedot.org on 2014-03-19 14:07 (#P9)

I have a Note II, I was able to create a shortcut to my wife on my home screen so it's just unlock phone, click shortcut, click call. Not trying to talk you out of BB or anything, BB makes some great phones, just wanted to give you the heads up in case you didn't realize you could create a shortcut to a contact.

I'm a big fan of the stylus for my Note II. Writing text messages by hand beats typing on tiny keyboards for me any day, but if I didn't have the stylus definitely a physical keyboard is better than a touch screen keyboard.

Re: Android compatibility: yes please (Score: 2, Insightful)

by zafiro17@pipedot.org on 2014-03-19 15:36 (#PE)

Hey, I'm glad to know that! Thanks. (Still want me a real keyboard though - I wish those early Androids with physical keyboards were still around but alas, the market has spoken).

Re: Android compatibility: yes please (Score: 2, Insightful)

by vanderhoth@pipedot.org on 2014-03-19 16:59 (#PJ)

Yeah, I had the HTC Desire Z with the flip-out keyboard and thought it was the greatest thing. Then when I was thinking of getting my next phone, 3 years after that, there were no more physical keyboards for Android phones, only touch screen. I was worried until I stumbled on the Note II with the stylus. It can be a bit quirky because I have pretty messy handwriting, but 90% of the time it works great and it's light years better than typing on a touch, which is still an option on the Note II. I hope there's something with a stylus available in two years when I'll be looking for my next phone.

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Time Reason Points Voter
2014-03-19 22:15 Insightful +1 computermachine@pipedot.org

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