[dwaynewilliams#WN]

One of the reasons I like my BB is that is has the best (IMO) physical qwerty keyboard of any smartphone. However, touchscreens have become the rage and I have noticed that there are less and less qwerty keyboard devices released. Could the physical keyboard be phased out? Should I hop on the touchscreen bandwagon?

[Radius]

I think at this point just running to a touchscreen because you are worried they may be phased out in 5 or more years is just a little premature.

[giantstepp]

I doubt that they will, at least anytime soon. I think that it'll always a huge market for the physical qwerty. Plenty of new devices outside of BB are featuring them now because of the demand. I personally prefer them myself. Ive played with touch screens and I just dont like them.

[dwaynewilliams#WN]

I think at this point just running to a touchscreen because you are worried they may be phased out in 5 or more years is just a little premature.

If that is going to be the trend, then I better become accustomed to the technology.

[mark-d]

I hope they are not phased out. Never tried a BB storm but the touchscreen qwerty on my Sony Ericsson wasn't very good and the touchscreen on the iPhone I found near impossible to type on.

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[mjb2535]

Honestly they proaly will even HP is making touchscreen computers. The world wants smaller and thinner and they heyboard adds size.

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[Radius]

If that is going to be the trend, then I better become accustomed to the technology.

I have to wonder how long it would take you to get accustomed to it? I picked up a Storm for the first time a few months ago and was typing pretty fast right out of the gates. It's not a huge difference, just one has physical feedback and the other doesn't.

[thinkamp]

Lets just hope there will always be a physical keyboard option for us people that do love the physical keys.

Touchscreens just arent for me.

[JoeyMoose]

Lets just hope there will always be a physical keyboard option for us people that do love the physical keys.

Touchscreens just arent for me.

Ditto..........

[Jancy10]

I doubt physical keyboards will ever disappear since many people (including myself) prefer QWERTY keyboards over Virtual Keyboards

[tallazzPilipino]

i would like to see the BBs in its current form, but with a trackpad rather, and a touchscreen. that would be a neat little BB.

[Ami.]

The physical keyboard will never be fully phased out. Touchscreens aren't perfect, and people (old and young) aren't either. They are nice to have, but not a necessity, and when I had my Samsung Behold, I found I was F-ing things up more often than if I hit an actual key.

Physical keyboards could just be made to have keys with less resources (read: computer keys made thinner, but still functional and "clunky" if you may; phone keys made in the same flat fashion but still functional), and some manufacturers already take that into consideration.

I don't know a doctor or a lawyer who's going to dink around with touching something -just the right way- yet :P

[papped]

One of the reasons I like my BB is that is has the best (IMO) physical qwerty keyboard of any smartphone. However, touchscreens have become the rage and I have noticed that there are less and less qwerty keyboard devices released. Could the physical keyboard be phased out? Should I hop on the touchscreen bandwagon?

There aren't really less and less qwerty devices released. Look at all the sliders, LG variants, etc.

Samsung for example isn't just releasing the Omnia 2, they have a qwerty slider omnia pro also. I wouldn't mistake an increase in the amount of touchscreen phones made as a dying off of qwerty phones.

[Username00089]

You gotta be kidding me with this thread...

[Caddyman]

eventually we will just think what we want to type and the phone will read our minds....

[avt123]

Physical keyboards will last for a very long time. Yes there are a lot of touchcreens being released, and they are extremely popular, but there is a market for both types of devices.

Some people are unable to use touchscreens for whatever reason (patience, lack of coordination, skill, etc..), companies will provide them with the physical QWERTY they need.

[kkwan77]

I doubt that they will, at least anytime soon. I think that it'll always a huge market for the physical qwerty. Plenty of new devices outside of BB are featuring them now because of the demand. I personally prefer them myself. Ive played with touch screens and I just dont like them.

I always had the problem with missing out on that tactile feel on the specific key which would result in fat fingering the wrong letter.

Due to this I can see why they use the auto-correct feature to try and compensate for this.

[steveo1259]

The reason for most touchscreen phones is that teenagers like them simply because there new and stylish and companies have picked up on that

The qwerty phone is more for buisness orienated consumers although im not saying that normal people couldnt have one

[papped]

Some things that aren't really going to change either:
-Virtual keyboards take up screen real estate (a lot of it). Having your keyboard popup on your screen space is not ideal for every app.
-Generally speaking pure touchscreens require much larger screens and are more expensive to make than other hybrids or smaller screened phones.
-A lot of gaming simply sucks with no hw keys and is not fixable with crappy touchscreen "workarounds". The iphone is a good testament to that.
-There will never be a time when everybody prefers one input method.

I'm sure I'm still missing a bunch of stuff...

[epeter1]

You gotta be kidding me with this thread...

I agree. We're all gonna die eventually, but should those that are worried about it just do it now and get it over with so they're used to it by the time death actually comes around?

C'mon people...

[cyanide845]

Comparing the time it takes me to type on my iPod touch to my bb curve, I prefer physical keyboards by far.

[muse126]

Ever try drunk texting on an iPhone?

[dragonsamus]

I doubt the physical keyboard could actually ever be phased out. The demand for one will always be there. The iphone will not take over the world. I'm just kidding.

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[Timelessblur]

I do not think physical QWERT keyboards are going away. It I is not the devices are going get any smaller since we already are increasing the size phone.
We are making phones bigger so they are more useful. We can only make screens so smal before you can no long read stuff on them. Keyboards it be touch or physical are as small as they can be and still ne usable to humands hands.
Look at how many of the smart phones aqnd **** phone made for texting are about the same size as the bb curve 8900. The curcve 8900 seems to be the small end of the scale and the bold/ pre seem to be the large end

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[Arson627]

Other manufacturers might do so. But if RIM has any kind of smarts they will stick to what made them the corporate standard; the qwerty keyboard.

Enough said.

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