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Pro1 X: A Linux smartphone with slideout keyboard

fxtec.com

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Re: Pro1 X: A Linux smartphone with slideout keyboard

#241

Post by Snitch-Thursday »

LilBytes wrote: post #231
xearl wrote: post #227

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That page you linked to is for the Pro-1. The OP is about the newer Pro-1x.

Well, was the Pro-1 ever delivered!?

Yes. I have one. Mine was ordered in Feb 2019 for shipping in August 2019. Come February 2020 it finally came in.

Biggest favorite is that I love they keyboard. I run the LineageOS 17.1 simply because I've been too lazy to flash LineageOS 18 unofficial. tdm the primary developer did a great job making the keyboard act well, and other developers made it behave via an app in Stock Android.

Second biggest favorite is that it has the trifecta of features I require from any phone: unlockable bootloader, microsd card, headphone jack. I prefer a removable battery but alas those are as thin as hen's teeth.

My biggest beef with this phone is that it has spotty voice reception. I have to stand in a particular spot in my house to not have my UDP packets drop off. Data reception is fine and when I do calls over signal or duo (wifi) it works a treat.

My second biggest beef would be the lack of snap-on case options like the old Nokias. I'm trying to figure out if someone does a 3d printed case or what, but with this curved screen, I'm nervous that each day could be this phone's last with just one fall.

Re: Pro1 X: A Linux smartphone with slideout keyboard

#242

Post by Snitch-Thursday »

wazoox wrote: post #124
seanhunter wrote: post #110

There's no free lunch, and it's easy to overlook the compromises involved in the devices that used to have physical keyboards. By modern standards, blackberrys had a woefully small screen and phones with slideout keyboards were very fat. This device doesn't look fat which suggests to me that the compromise might be either battery life or low processor power. That said, although this is definitely not for me, it's gen…

It is really fat: about 14mm, nearly twice as thick as most current phones.

I own one. Mine feels no thicker than the Samsung Galaxy in a case. As long as it perceptually feels more or less like a box of playing cards, I'm not worried about thickness.

Re: Pro1 X: A Linux smartphone with slideout keyboard

#243

Post by swiley »

dbeley wrote: post #233

It doesn't give you as much control as a Pinephone or a Purism smartphone, as it relies on a ton of proprietary blob that will never reach Linux mainline.

This easy to tell, if it has a Qualcomm SoC in it chances are you won't be able to run a reasonable OS on it.

Re: Pro1 X: A Linux smartphone with slideout keyboard

#244

Post by stinos »

chaorace wrote: post #164
andreygrehov wrote: post #139

I see positive comments about the keyboard, but is it really a good UX to type on such a small keyboard? I mean, when you use your laptop, pretty much all of your fingers are involved in the process of typing, whereas if the same keyboard is part of a mobile phone, you only use your thumbs, which is the opposite of how qwerty keyboards supposed to be used. It feels like the idea of a full-blown keyboard on a mobile p…

I think the main advantage is blind typing. No amount of muscle memory can trump the tactile feedback of raised keys and home-row notches. When you're forced to rely on sight, you make more errors and are limited to using just one finger at a time ( because your eyes can only focus on one spot at once ). With that being said, I can blind type on my smartphone, just not with a QWERTY IME. I instead use a 4x4 grid-layo…

and are limited to using just one finger at a time (because your eyes can only focus on one spot at once).

That isn't entirely accurate. It's not because you focus at point x, that another finger cannot be moving at x + y cm and perform the correct action there. I never learned to type blindly. Or at least not in the way this is normally done. However I do have enough muscle memory by now that I can look down at the keyboard, put a couple of fingers in what roughly looks like the right spot and then start typing away with multiple fingers, from time to time laying focus in the center of the keyboard only.

Re: Pro1 X: A Linux smartphone with slideout keyboard

#245

Post by Snitch-Thursday »

aerique wrote: post #217
seanhunter wrote: post #110

There's no free lunch, and it's easy to overlook the compromises involved in the devices that used to have physical keyboards. By modern standards, blackberrys had a woefully small screen and phones with slideout keyboards were very fat. This device doesn't look fat which suggests to me that the compromise might be either battery life or low processor power. That said, although this is definitely not for me, it's gen…

I've used its predecessor the Pro1 with Sailfish OS for 4 weeks. (While having fond memories of using my Nokia Communicator in the past for SSHing into servers to fix things.) For me, the compromises were not worth it. The phone is too clunky and heavy and virtual keyboards are good enough these days.

> For me, the compromises were not worth it. The phone is too clunky and heavy and virtual keyboards are good enough these days.

There are compromises like I said in previous posts. Frankly I love the physical keyboard not for long form text, but for my terminal operations or just plain old character-by-character cut/copy/paste edits in text. If there were a virtual Ctrl key on my on screen keyboard so I could do Ctrl + V, then maybe I would swap to something else too, but for now this fxtec takes the mobile cake for anything more than a 7 word swype reply to a text.

Re: Pro1 X: A Linux smartphone with slideout keyboard

#246

Post by regularfry »

thesuitonym wrote: post #188
seanhunter wrote: post #110

There's no free lunch, and it's easy to overlook the compromises involved in the devices that used to have physical keyboards. By modern standards, blackberrys had a woefully small screen and phones with slideout keyboards were very fat. This device doesn't look fat which suggests to me that the compromise might be either battery life or low processor power. That said, although this is definitely not for me, it's gen…

It's kind of crazy to me that people are concerned about the thickness of phones, yet nobody bats an eye when they keep getting bigger and bigger in the other dimensions. I guess screen size trumps all other concerns.

It's to do with pockets, at a guess. There's no penalty for expanding in the height and width dimensions up to the limits of a back pocket, which is comparatively huge.

If you expand in the depth direction, the pocket can't expand far before it starts to feel uncomfortable, particularly if you sit on it.

Re: Pro1 X: A Linux smartphone with slideout keyboard

#247

Post by Snitch-Thursday »

uranium wrote: post #223
rainingmonkey wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everyone who remembers how much better phones with slide-out keyboards were. Commenters here seem to be focusing on the available OSes, but most flagship phones from a few years ago without a locked bootloader will run Lineage or Uubuntu Touch. FXtec's offering here is just that the bootloader won't be uncooperative. The real killer feature is the keyboard. Those questioning the utility of a slide-out keyboard on a p…

This. I haven't seen a good phone with a 5-row keyboard since my first android phone, a G-1. Having that fifth row means that all the punctuation goes where you expect it to be, and you don't have to learn another key layout. I've been making do with swiping text since about 4 phones ago, but it makes typing on a phone painful and about 10x slower. So far I've had to correct about 3 words per sentence. I can't wait t…

G1, G2, Droid, Droid 2, Droid 4, Photon Q, Dell Venue Pro (windows phone), Priv, Pro1.

The road for keyboard phones is long and winding.

The portrait sliders like Dell Venue Pro and BB Priv are the best IMHO. With glossy silver metal sides to protect the screen, mmmm.

Re: Pro1 X: A Linux smartphone with slideout keyboard

#248

Post by brazzy »

andreygrehov wrote: post #139

I see positive comments about the keyboard, but is it really a good UX to type on such a small keyboard? I mean, when you use your laptop, pretty much all of your fingers are involved in the process of typing, whereas if the same keyboard is part of a mobile phone, you only use your thumbs, which is the opposite of how qwerty keyboards supposed to be used. It feels like the idea of a full-blown keyboard on a mobile p…

It's worlds better than using a touchscreen keyboard, at any rate. I find those absolutely horrible to use and will buy phones with a phsyical keyboard as long as they are available.

Re: Pro1 X: A Linux smartphone with slideout keyboard

#249

Post by k_ »

Sodman wrote: post #170

I still consider my old Nokia E70[0] my favorite phone of all time, so I am definitely in the target demographic for this, as I'm 100% sold on the usefulness of a physical keyboard on a phone... However the CPU just doesn't match the "pro" branding, or the price range. I'd personally rather throw an extra $200-300 on top to get a flagship CPU and then it would be close to a perfect phone for me! As it currently is, t…

Seems like we're looking for similar things. I am currently waiting for delivery of my Astro Slide [0]

[0]: https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/astro-slide-5g-transforme... which has android / linux dual boot. Not sure if performance are what you are looking for.

Re: Pro1 X: A Linux smartphone with slideout keyboard

#250

Post by tartuffe78 »

regularfry wrote: post #246
thesuitonym wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's kind of crazy to me that people are concerned about the thickness of phones, yet nobody bats an eye when they keep getting bigger and bigger in the other dimensions. I guess screen size trumps all other concerns.

It's to do with pockets, at a guess. There's no penalty for expanding in the height and width dimensions up to the limits of a back pocket, which is comparatively huge. If you expand in the depth direction, the pocket can't expand far before it starts to feel uncomfortable, particularly if you sit on it.

People sit on their phones?
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