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OT- cell phone advice needed

9100

Diamond
Joined
Nov 1, 2004
Location
Webster Groves, MO
I have an old Samsung Galaxy Relay 4G phone which I chose because it has a slide down full querty keyboard. The advice I keep getting from T mobile tech support is that it is obsolete and should be replaced. Then they try to sell me an all touch screen model. I hate typing on touch screens.

The question is in two parts. Is there a service that will operate properly with this phone? I have it doing reasonably well. After hours with their worthless tech support, I finally figured out how to make it work as a tethered internet device after my service quit cold, but there are still a few functions malfunctioning.

Second, there is a keyboard cover for the new Samsung phones that has mechanical keys over the touch keys. Does anyone know anything about them?

Bill
 
Perhaps a Blackberry phone for you? It at least has keys.

There is something to be said for the predictive word feature of smart phone keyboards that save you the trouble of typing in the entire word. A large aspect smartphone has a decent sized keyboard which is not as bad to type on as the wee little ones on old generation tiny phones.
 
that phone would be difficult at best compared to a modern phone. regardless , you can add an OTG(usb)
or bluetooth querty keyboard cover/case to many samsung galaxy and i-phones .

with otg, you can plug any
usb keyboard you like (desktop,folding,rollup) to any cell that supports OnTheGo usb connection , or use any
bluetooth aux keyboard .

Amazon.com: SlimType smartcover with keyboard (Black): Cell Phones & Accessories

Amazon.com : Phone Keyboard Case Cell Phone Keyboard Phone Wireless Keyboard Case Cover Mobile Keyboard Bluetooth Phone Keyboard (for iPhone 8-SB) : Office Products

Amazon.com: Efanr Universal Wired Keyboard Flip Holster Case Cover For Samsung Galaxy Note 5 4 2 S7 S6 S4 S3 HTC M9 M8 One plus One and other 4.2''-6.5''Micro USB Andriod Mobile Cell Phones With OTG (Blue): Cell Phones & Accessories
 
that phone would be difficult at best compared to a modern phone. regardless , you can add an OTG(usb)
or bluetooth querty keyboard cover/case to many samsung galaxy and i-phones .

with otg, you can plug any
usb keyboard you like (desktop,folding,rollup) to any cell that supports OnTheGo usb connection , or use any
bluetooth aux keyboard .

Amazon.com: SlimType smartcover with keyboard (Black): Cell Phones & Accessories

Amazon.com : Phone Keyboard Case Cell Phone Keyboard Phone Wireless Keyboard Case Cover Mobile Keyboard Bluetooth Phone Keyboard (for iPhone 8-SB) : Office Products

Amazon.com: Efanr Universal Wired Keyboard Flip Holster Case Cover For Samsung Galaxy Note 5 4 2 S7 S6 S4 S3 HTC M9 M8 One plus One and other 4.2''-6.5''Micro USB Andriod Mobile Cell Phones With OTG (Blue): Cell Phones & Accessories

While I 100% agree, I also would advise the OP to be sure that the phone he buys supports full USB OTG (USB On The Go). Some that supposedly have USB OTG only support certain devices/features.
 
Some cell-enabled tablets are available with usable phone capabilities. The on-screen keyboard on these is large enough to actually use. And, paired with a bluetooth or USB keyboard, they also make a half decent laptop replacement.

FWIW, since retiring I'm happy to be hard to get (except when traveling out of town) on a cell phone. It's usually off. Given the latest news I suppose I can claim it's to avoid cancer (recently in the news). Anyhow -- email is my preferred old-fogey means of communication and I "get" your notion of wanting a real keyboard.

You may also want to assure yourself that whatever miserable security patches are being made these days, are still being made for your old Samsung.
 
Some cell-enabled tablets are available with usable phone capabilities. The on-screen keyboard on these is large enough to actually use. And, paired with a bluetooth or USB keyboard, they also make a half decent laptop replacement.

FWIW, since retiring I'm happy to be hard to get (except when traveling out of town) on a cell phone. It's usually off. Given the latest news I suppose I can claim it's to avoid cancer (recently in the news). Anyhow -- email is my preferred old-fogey means of communication and I "get" your notion of wanting a real keyboard.

You may also want to assure yourself that whatever miserable security patches are being made these days, are still being made for your old Samsung.

Might be a few years younger than 9100 Bill in calendar years, but also on a dominant-carrier telco pension, so the only keyboard I want on a PHONE is the classical 16-button DTMF or workalike.

"Dumber" the handset is, the closer to POTS (Plain Old Telephone Service) the lower my risks of being F'd-with, and the more familar the use of it.

MIL-Spec ruggedized, water, dust, and shockproof are about all that still comes close. Clunky Kyocera in present service merely tolerated, but at least it can go over a week between battery charges, too, so..

Computing device? Composite-armoured OpenBSD, minimum 15" high-res screen, smallest tolerable keyboard the white ones from Apple or Kensington. Logitech thumball pointing device. No second-place winners, either, thanks.

Not one damned bit of this modern technology has yet made my hands or fingers shrink, nor my eyeballs slide closer together.

Nor miniatured any OTHER part of the human anatomy..

Damned grateful that Apple & competitors haven't gotten their hands on toilet-seat design or we'd need microscopic Norden bomb sights or "smart bomb" equipped nano-tech guided turds to even take a dump!

Why be uncomfortable - least of all in my cranky "golden years"?

:D
 
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I use to feel the same about typing on screens. I would only get a phone with keys. Then I migrated and it is big deal. Actually a lot better. Just make the move!.
 
I use to feel the same about typing on screens. I would only get a phone with keys. Then I migrated and it is big deal. Actually a lot better. Just make the move!.

Really? How good are you at one-handed thumb-keying - for example, a "911" call - in total darkness, whilst keeping your eyes eleswhere, other hand free, and not "lighting up" your own location with the high-speed-idiot device itself, nor making a sound?
 
Really? How good are you at one-handed thumb-keying - for example, a "911" call - in total darkness, whilst keeping your eyes eleswhere, other hand free, and not "lighting up" your own location with the high-speed-idiot device itself, nor making a sound?
Jfc man if you live your life such that this is a rational concern and not a paranoid fantasy then you should probably get off the internet before they find you.
 
Jfc man if you live your life such that this is a rational concern and not a paranoid fantasy then you should probably get off the internet before they find you.

Meahh.. ten years you have the master oversight of 26 alarm systems for a 150 million dollar jewelry and Gift firm's area stores? And the primary Day Job is to run the high-line gold, platinum, diamond, and precious stone manufacturing facility?

All in a day's work to stay in close touch with the police and tread cautiously.

Nothing "paranoid" about that, nor even any more stressful than a hundred other jobs.
Just has a few key priorities that differ is all.

There are MANY reasons a person might prefer a phone that need not be given full eyeballs-on, both-hands attention. "911" can actually be assigned a single button or accident-resistant, but still easy to key sequence.
 
Meahh.. ten years you have the master oversight of 26 alarm systems for a 150 million dollar jewelry and Gift firm's area stores? And the primary Day Job is to run the high-line gold, platinum, diamond, and precious stone manufacturing facility?

All in a day's work to stay in close touch with the police and tread cautiously.

Nothing "paranoid" about that, nor even any more stressful than a hundred other jobs.
Just has a few key priorities that differ is all.

There are MANY reasons a person might prefer a phone that need not be given full eyeballs-on, both-hands attention. "911" can actually be assigned a single button or accident-resistant, but still easy to key sequence.
If that's a real need you have maybe it's better served by a dedicated device. There are plenty of wearable panic buttons on the market.

For smartphone typing, The last couple of Android versions have traceable keyboard as standard iirc. Way easier than hitting the tiny letters once you adjust. Just get a big enough screen.

But Voice recognition is good enough to be useable now, with a modern android phone you don't even really need to type almost ever if you're willing to adjust your workflow a bit. This is the direction these devices are heading, not back to pressing individual buttons like its the 19th century. Have a look at one of the new Motorolas imo, well built for the money and minimal bloatware.
 
For Androids there are also aftermarket solutions like AnySoft keyboard. When you hit a key a display of the letter pops up above your finger or thumb so you can see if you hit a wrong key and correct it immediately. The stock keyboard, like many of the standard mfg provided apps are often inferior to apps that can be installed.
 
My better half likes those slide out keyboards also..

She's got a Droid 4. Actually I shouldn't say A, there are many, and there have
been many.. I think we are on #7, and there is another spare in the drawer.. Refurbs off
of e-bay. Usually about $40..

I don't know anything about the software version, but she was bummed when she couldn't
play that Pokemon thing because the software was too old.
 
I've had the newest BlackBerry KeyOne for a year I'd say. I love having a keyboard again, and the phone is an Android system.
 
If that's a real need you have maybe it's better served by a dedicated device. There are plenty of wearable panic buttons on the market.

For smartphone typing, The last couple of Android versions have traceable keyboard as standard iirc. Way easier than hitting the tiny letters once you adjust. Just get a big enough screen.

But Voice recognition is good enough to be useable now, with a modern android phone you don't even really need to type almost ever if you're willing to adjust your workflow a bit. This is the direction these devices are heading, not back to pressing individual buttons like its the 19th century. Have a look at one of the new Motorolas imo, well built for the money and minimal bloatware.

Roughly two human generations of y'all now have missed the entire point.

We are not luddites. Some among us beta and alpha tested the very technology you are NOW trying to "sell" back to its own pioneers!

Many of us are "computered up" to very high levels of AVAILABLE technology.

We are simply more selective as to when and how we use it. How many minutes or hours of a given day we permit it as reasonable rations for value returned.

The difference, y'see, is that we are not "reactive" to those market forces and fads.

We still wish to pick and choose just which type of "service" or portions of them, how much and how deeply we will ALLOW intrusion, distraction, interruption or annoyance to balance against any genuine gain for our convenience.

For a great many of those 'featured services", we do NOT see a genuine advantage to the way we wish to live our lives. They are not the same choices, one to another, either.

Ex: I dont have voicemail, no longer wear a pager, and won't ordinarily even read text messages. One arrives that is of interest? I hit a button and call back, live voice, right now.
ELSE delete.

No apologies.

After more than FIFTY YEARS of it in one form or several, Military and Civilian, I am NO LONGER on 24 X 7 X 300-plus "emergency callout".

If it matters, to YOU? Try calling me at another time of day. Or another day. Or next month. Or never.

I've got a life of my own, regardless. Gadgetry is meant to serve MY needs, in MY choice of shape, form, and function. Not the other way 'round.

Annnnnd.. sole and only Wife the sole and only exception, the entity at the OTHER END of that bandwidth? Does NOT have a blank check, issued in advance on any part of my life just because THEY have adopted a slice of technology as suits THEIR instant-gratification existence.

The "existence" of a raft of gadgetry does not compel adoption.

It only interests me for what I actually find useful. Or NOT. To ME!

The rest of the eye-candy and earbud distraction can go pound doped Silicon up its multi-core variable clock-speed virtualized arse.

Believe it or, not there are still people on the planet - even young ones - wise enough as to life's genuine priorities that they will NOT take an incoming call while enjoying good sex....or taking a dump. Or enjoying a cup of tea.

Really. Vanishing breed, it seems. But there are still the odd few holdouts..

:D

(NB: How TF would you virtualize Astroglide, orgasms, or ignorant toilet paper anyway?

Nah. I don't think I really want to know. Some of you lot will have more than one answer, and those damned no-key finger-swipe "handhelds" are like to be involved..)
 
Dang... Thermite made sense.

I have and use a flip phone. I am not afraid of new tech, I have lived designing it in certain areas of the tech world.

Why I still have a flip phone is because the ^%$#@! smart phones are TOO BIG. I can't get them in my pocket if they are large enough to have usable "keys". I have a 7" tablet, which is great. I like it, but the keys even on that are pretty small, and they like to sense my finger and register the letter as the finger approaches almost to the key I REALLY wanted to hit.

My wife's tapered little female fingers work great on her Apple... not so much my fingers, and I do not have huge hands. I think the phones are designed for women, to fit in a purse, and so forth.

That tablet is too big for any pocket. The smart phones, which I would be very happy to use, are smaller, and even more of a nuisance as to keys, AND are STILL bigger than I want. If I stuck one in my pants pocket, I would fold it in half the first time I got down to look under something.... And things fall out of my shirt pocket...

They should make the darn things to fold in half so they could fit... they are thin enough, just too wide and tall..... and yes that folding can be done, never fear about that.
 
Dang... Thermite made sense.

I have and use a flip phone. I am not afraid of new tech, I have lived designing it in certain areas of the tech world.

Why I still have a flip phone is because the ^%$#@! smart phones are TOO BIG. I can't get them in my pocket if they are large enough to have usable "keys". I have a 7" tablet, which is great. I like it, but the keys even on that are pretty small, and they like to sense my finger and register the letter as the finger approaches almost to the key I REALLY wanted to hit.

My wife's tapered little female fingers work great on her Apple... not so much my fingers, and I do not have huge hands. I think the phones are designed for women, to fit in a purse, and so forth.

That tablet is too big for any pocket. The smart phones, which I would be very happy to use, are smaller, and even more of a nuisance as to keys, AND are STILL bigger than I want. If I stuck one in my pants pocket, I would fold it in half the first time I got down to look under something.... And things fall out of my shirt pocket...

They should make the darn things to fold in half so they could fit... they are thin enough, just too wide and tall..... and yes that folding can be done, never fear about that.

J? Every bit of that uber-miniaturized "wearable" technology has been "out there" for Donkey's Years. High-tech DoD contracts, classified 'airborne" MIL-SPEC tech and SWAT team police tactical goods no more than a year or three BEHIND - yes BEHIND - common wrist, earborne, spyglass, other body-parts or clothing-attached goods in the markets of Hong Kong's affluent instant-gratification society. For a time, some of the best - fingerprint recognition goods, IIRC - was even coming out of North Korea.

It's the more basic giving-over of lifestyle control I am not up for.

Simple "scarce-resource" thing. Not really all that much to do with "old age"

"Old age" just enables us to no longer give a damn as to whom might disagree..

:)
 
J? Every bit of that uber-miniaturized "wearable" technology has been "out there" for Donkey's Years. High-tech DoD contracts, classified 'airborne" MIL-SPEC tech and SWAT team police tactical goods no more than a year or three BEHIND - yes BEHIND - common wrist, earborne, spyglass, other body-parts or clothing-attached goods in the markets of Hong Kong's affluent instant-gratification society. For a time, some of the best - fingerprint recognition goods, IIRC - was even coming out of North Korea.

It's the more basic giving-over of lifestyle control I am not up for.

Simple "scarce-resource" thing. Not really all that much to do with "old age"

"Old age" just enables us to no longer give a damn as to whom might disagree..

:)

No clue what you are on about....

My issue is that when they are small enough, they are hard to use, and when they are bigger, they are not in my pocket, but somewhere else, and so are not useful to me because I do not have them on me.

The actual parts can be pretty small, the battery not so much, yet.

The technology? Whatever..... I already have a cell phone, I'm not too worried about that part, that ship has sailed as soon as you GET a cell phone. But I'd like the extras, if the blamed thing would fit a pocket that I can put it in, and still be usable.
 








 
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