[jleec]

Reviewers and forum posters consistently say there's a learning curve in adapting to the Storm keyboard, but I haven't read how successful that adaptation ultimately has been for them.

I've spent time with the Storm in Verizon stores on three occasions and have timed myself with "The quick brown fox..." Five times without errors now takes me about 150 seconds vs. 85-90 on my 7250; I can get this down to about 115 seconds with multiple, uncorrected errors, but typing errors are not the point. I assume I would get better with more practice, but I don't know if I could get it to 90 seconds.

I'd be interested in knowing how close to their former typing speed with hard key Blackberries Storm users have succeeded in coming.

[SeattleGrace]

Wow. Can't say I've timed myself with typing on a phone...but my previous phone was a LG EnV 2 and I was pretty quick on that. It took me a day to get used to using the touchscreen.

[quattro.pilot]

i suck with suretype...I've never used it before so I'm dreadfully slow. If the protrait-based "keyboard" was set up more like a conventional phone dial pad then I'd be much quicker.

On the landscape-QWERTY touch screen I am pretty quick, and only just physically held & played with a Storm a few hours ago. I was pretty comfortable simply navigating myself around the keypad but did make some errors. I think those spelling mistakes would be eliminated after experience with use and as well knowing the various BB typing shortcuts.

[Jesson]

if timing yourself typing is very important to you then i probably would stay away from a touchscreen phone

[jleec]

Timing per se isn't important; quick, accurate typing is. Unfortunately, I'm slowly coming to this conclusion.

[anon(971517)]

It just took me 18 seconds on my storm...you must be a very slow typist...

[jleec]

"The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog." five times without errors took you 18 seconds? That's amazing!

[anon(971517)]

whoops, for some reason i thought it said twice...if you continue that out though, 9 secs a time, add a few seconds for tiring and i'm looking at about a 55 secs.

[chuckh0308]

I consider myself pretty slow on the Storm and it takes me about 130 seconds to type that sentence 5 times. I have rather fat fingers though and I don't type on it all that much really. But, when I first go it that probably would have been double or triple that...I was BAD! I think if you're at 150 just by playing with it in the store you're doing pretty good. The best advice I can give anyone is to not cross sides with your fingers. The qwerty keyboard is specifically set up so your right thumb works the right side and your left thumb works the left side. That's where most of my trouble was when I first got it. It does NOT work when you cheat!

[usty]

It didn't take me that long. I just typed it once and copied and pasted 4x.

[SeattleGrace]

It didn't take me that long. I just typed it once and copied and pasted 4x.

Lol genius!

[tennisets]

75 seconds here. 60 if I don't go back to correct mistakes I make. Typing on the storm just takes practice. I've never owned another blackberry but from trying them out in stores I have more trouble typing on the small physical keyboards than I do on the Storm. With practice I'm sure that would change. I think the key with the storm is to have a good rhythm and make sure you let the button come back up before trying to press the next letter.

[pitbullguy]

I have to say, I was VERY resistant to moving to the Storm from my World Edition for the same reason. I was very quick on my WE and didn't like when I tested other touch-screen phones.

I hated the SureType when I first got the Storm and was convinced that I would only use the landscape keyboard. However, there was some good advice on this forum to just "trust" suretype and keep trying it without looking at what is being typed on the screen.

Well, I kept doing that and now I honestly cannot imagine what I did without SureType before. I just did your test and I typed, "The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog" five times with only one error in 65 seconds.

Much faster than I ever did on my WE keyboard. I am really a fan of SureType...I would not have said that before I got the Storm or even for the first week I started using the SureType.

Hope that helps.

[MJ_23]

I thought that I would type slow on the storm. But surprisingly I'm pretty fast now and I've only had it for a week now.

[beagleberry]

The past few days I have been consciously trying to type faster and more accurately. I have come to two conclusions:

1) It helps to raise your fingers completely off the keyboard after you are done typing a letter before moving to the next one. If you try to glide to the next one you are going to make more mistakes.
1) Trust the auto correction; mistakes are going to happen. Sometimes I just don't worry about making mistakes and just try to type fast. 99% of the time the auto correct makes the right correction with the exception of proper names.

After having a physical QWERTY on a phone for a few years it is difficult to go to the storm but I'll give it a few more months, maybe I'll get better at it.

[jleec]

I had read the warning about not crossing over and have been careful not to do that.

I've also read good things about SureType, though standing in a Verizon store doesn't lend itself to becoming proficient with it so I haven't tried it yet.

It does sound as if some of you have found yourselves able to get close to what you were with a physical keyboard, which of course is the test since I may not be as good a typist as some of you. I'm sure I'll try again - I certainly want it to work if it can.

I also found my thumbs sore when I left the store, but I suspect that's just poor technique due to lack of experience on exactly how hard it's necessary to press.

[Lightninrod]

You have 30 days to see if you like it and the "sore thumbs" may have come partly from the demo Storm not having a properly set up click options and may not have had an optimized click adjustment(torx screws).

Many have said on other threads that they picked up a lot of speed after getting use to it.

[jleec]

The 30 day trial is something I have a question about that I haven't put to Verizon yet. Does anyone know if after the 30 days I decide to give the Storm back I can cancel the contract as well? I prefer Verizon, but at the moment my second choice on Blackberries would be the Bold on AT&T, and I'd prefer to be able to adopt that than Verizon's other Blackberry offerings.

[Jfredrix]

Took me about 108 seconds with going back to fix one word and with one mistake when done. I like the SureType and am getting better & better at it. I used to think that there was no way I would ever type as fast as I did on my Treo, but now I'm not sure so. And even if I'm close, I'm a happy camper. One thing that did change though is that I had planned on using the QWERTY keyboard, but that isn't working for me.

[Dasle]

Coming from a Chocolate, my typing is about the same, and I really don't do that much typing on it. I have come to love SureType though. Like others have said, I thought I'd use the QWERTY mostly, but the buttons are just two small for me to type accurately and SureType is almost always accurate for me. And I like the big buttons

[Rodsky11]

I tried this test twice. First time took 57 seconds with 5 errors. Second time took 51 seconds with one error. This in landscape mode and absolutely flying with no regard for error checking as I go.

When i bought the storm I thought I would never use the suretype board but I absolutely love using the suretype for one handed messaging. Any short length message I send is done with suretype and I save the landscape board for longer emails.

[Rodsky11]

The error correction on the Storm is quite good as well too, so long as you only make one error it generally gets the job done. Not quite iphone material, but then you should be making less errors on this keyboard then on the iphone.

I am not sure I am quite up to the speed I was at on my 8830, but its pretty damn close. Most people are stunned when they see me typing like a normal human on the Storm cause they've all heard it bashed for its typing.

[Mountain]

Around 10 seconds average... would guess it took about 30 seconds when I first got the phone.... however... I do type 60wpm on pc so may not be a fair comparison.... I think more is made of this keyboard than is really a problem. If you can type on a pc, you should be able to type on the Storm very well in a short time. Above was with Horiz Storm on qwerty keyboard. enjoy.

[BetaRay_Bill]

I have to say, I was VERY resistant to moving to the Storm from my World Edition for the same reason. I was very quick on my WE and didn't like when I tested other touch-screen phones.

I hated the SureType when I first got the Storm and was convinced that I would only use the landscape keyboard. However, there was some good advice on this forum to just "trust" suretype and keep trying it without looking at what is being typed on the screen.

Well, I kept doing that and now I honestly cannot imagine what I did without SureType before. I just did your test and I typed, "The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog" five times with only one error in 65 seconds.

Much faster than I ever did on my WE keyboard. I am really a fan of SureType...I would not have said that before I got the Storm or even for the first week I started using the SureType.

Hope that helps.

I've come to rely mostly on SureType as well and for some strange reason I feel guilty about it; like I should be using the full keyboard.

SureType is great. Only times I have real issues are with non-words and then it can be a pain going back, but adding them to the dictionary helps.

All said it did take me a bit to get used to the screen. When I first got the phone I would spend a few minutes a night just typing random stuff in a memo to get used to it.

[Optimusv2]

Reviewers and forum posters consistently say there's a learning curve in adapting to the Storm keyboard, but I haven't read how successful that adaptation ultimately has been for them.

I've spent time with the Storm in Verizon stores on three occasions and have timed myself with "The quick brown fox..." Five times without errors now takes me about 150 seconds vs. 85-90 on my 7250; I can get this down to about 115 seconds with multiple, uncorrected errors, but typing errors are not the point. I assume I would get better with more practice, but I don't know if I could get it to 90 seconds.

I'd be interested in knowing how close to their former typing speed with hard key Blackberries Storm users have succeeded in coming.

Well, I've never had a BlackBerry until my Storm, but I'm typing extremely fast on the Storm.

The best tip, and the one that has helped me the most, is I stopped being afraid of touching the screen. I type without fear of destroying the screen because it's what RIM designed the Storm for. If it can't handle me trying to type for real, then it shouldn't be on the market.

Once I took that approach, my typing has become extremely fast.