[frankzaman]

I for one am sick of hearing the media bash RIM. This device is revolutionary. One example, is the buttons. There was some serious thought put into their placement despite the critical reviews of the power button. I have had my playbook for 2 days and I have never "needed" to use the power button once. But there are so many other on/off options that it is almost comical (my favorite is the bezel to bezel swipe to turn it on again). I have used it a few times to put the playbook to sleep and don't have a problem with it (mine is raised slightly). It's also great for turning off the display while you're playing music.

The real genius of the buttons is that you can use them in almost any orientation. When you are using the playbook in one hand, the buttons are right where your fingers are (or thumb if you turn it around), and it doesn't matter if your right or left handed, just turn it around. Once you've got some music playing you can hold it in portrait mode and control the volume, pause/play, skip forward/back by holding on a bit longer, its ingenious. After a couple tries it gets really easy to know how long to hold the button to skip forward or back and you can quickly cycle through songs until you get to one that you like.

In landscape mode with the buttons facing down it's easy to control with your thumbs. With the buttons upward I find my index fingers work great.

The advantages of the buttons for presentations is obvious, even if you are not in presentation mode you do not have to disturb the display to adjust the music.

Great job RIM! There is obviously more to be added, but what the playbook does it does remarkably well.

[trunks20022]

hey how do you put it to sleep with a swipe i always have to hit the power button

[lesarmitage]

hey how do you put it to sleep with a swipe i always have to hit the power button

You can tap the battery icon too of course and take the option - sleep

[Marcel38]

And we have the legendary power off icon on the homescreen.

[xjrichb]

I'm certainly glad there are options out there, because the power button really does suck!

I deal with it because it is what it is...I just wish it has some "feel" to it instead of wondering if I pushed down hard enough while I wait for a light to turn on.

[Matt J]

I'm certainly glad there are options out there, because the power button really does suck!

I never used the "power button" to power on or power off the PB. The "power button" is more a hard reset button that allows someone to reset the PB if it become unresponsive by holding it down for a while. It is designed PERFECTLY for this job, as you can't just accidentally reset it.

RIM designed the "power button" perfectly.

[kbz1960]

Yep I like that I can't hit it by accident.

[eds817]

Yep I like that I can't hit it by accident.

Some of the Android tablets I looked at have the power button on the back and it's very easy to hit by mistake.

I've used the power button on the PB a few times over the past 3+ months. Most of the time when I want to put it to sleep or shut it down I tap the battery icon and make my choice.

[lawguyman]

I have not used the power button since RIM added the virtual buttons to the battery icon. So, I will probably only use it once or twice a year.

[pkcable]

The power button COULD have been better, BUT I still love my PB!

[zerofive05]

The power-button is designed perfectly in my opinion. Never had any problems pressing or "finding" it.

[dayoungdc]

so sorry for the stupid question.... if you turn the pb off using the power button, the dedicated icon, etc can you turn it on again with a swipe/gesture? Or is that just possible when it is sleeping? Are people actually turning thdir device off or just putting it in standby?

[jthep]

I use the power button to turn the device on and to put it in sleep mode. I use the vertical swipe to wake it from sleep mode. I use the power button icon to power off. I luv the way it works and still have to wonder about the lame reviews actually complaining about the power button.

These same "critics" are grasping the Playbook with one hand with their fingers directly above the power button and then complain that you have to press and hear a click for it to work? The way they hold it and many users for that matter would accidentally hit the button if it didn't have extra give to it. Smart and logical design, IMHO. But these "critics" don't have to be smart or at all logical...

[sk8er_tor]

so sorry for the stupid question.... if you turn the pb off using the power button, the dedicated icon, etc can you turn it on again with a swipe/gesture? Or is that just possible when it is sleeping? Are people actually turning thdir device off or just putting it in standby?

If it's turned OFF, you must use the power button to turn it back on.

[bembol]

I agree the Media Buttons are amazing and useful especially when I'm working out and it's in my pocket but it's the Power Button is useless.

There are several ways to Turn Off, Reset or put her on Stand By so I don't know why RIM even did this. Every review I read FOCUSED on how poorly it was designed and RIM could've avoided all this, they could've just used the Play/Pause button to turn her back ON by holding it for 5 seconds.

[JDukeOSBB]

I usually tap the battery meter and use those options to put mine to sleep or power off....

Posted from my CrackBerry at wapforums.crackberry.com

[melander]

The power-button is designed perfectly in my opinion. Never had any problems pressing or "finding" it.

On early batches of Playbooks (like mine) the power button does not stick up and maybe is even recessed .5mm. As the OP said, his is raised slightly. I'd like to be able use it to enable quick sleep mode rather than swipe/tap/tap on the battery icon. A lot of people say there is no problem on theirs but they may have later models. I wonder if I should take it back and hope to get a later model... nah, I'm too attached to this one.

The reason for want of a quick sleep mode was when I was using the pouch case, I didn't want random things happening to my session while using my fingers to slide the PB inside. I now have a flip over case so random screen touches are less of a concern. I just let the screen timeout now.


As for the other hardware buttons, I agree. They are very handy to be able to play, pause, forward and reverse without having to find where in the application these swipe/tap combinations are.

[frankzaman]

Update - For anyone that is interested, the Otterbox Defender case makes the buttons even easier to push; they really stick out and are rubbery so you can find them quickly. I normally use the power button to turn the display off to save power when I'm listening to music or done using it but want it on standby. I've also mounted the playbook to my kid's Chariot stroller and use all of the buttons constantly for volume, mute, playing and pausing music as I'm always bumping into friends. The buttons are nice too because if I've got the screen off I don't need fire up the screen to adjust the music. Combined with podcasts, amazing itunes sync, streaming radio (like slacker), the wicked speakers, the buttons have have created a killer app out of my playbook called a 'radio'. Sure if you want it really loud you can use external speakers but for most parts of my house, the patio, the basement its loud enough.

[markv_my]

i will usually press the power button to keep my pb in standby mode instead of tapping the power icon

[digdah]

I forgot the power button existed after the OS updated to include standby as an option.

[joshua_sx1]

what power button?...