Multi-touch technology

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So what do you think of this? I mean apple are telling us that there are obvious advantages but will it really make the iPhone a better phone?

The full QWERTY keyboard is something I have never really wished to have on a phone to be honest. In concept it is a great thing but in practice it's a bit of a pain. I can text people without looking at the keypad on my phone and I know that a lot of other people can. In apples tech demo you see two fingers being used on the pad but in reality I would probably only be using my thumb.

Again with the browsing features on the phone the technology can be used but is it really much faster than navigating with buttons? I can't see it being any faster than using the iPod wheel (even though I am not an iPod user) or even the buttons on the new Archos 5 series players.

How fragile is this thing going to be? The whole face is a touch-screen... won't it get scratched very easily and brake if dropped. We all know this is a problem with some iPods and people take less care of phones in general, I know mine goes flying a lot!

A bit off-topic, how about battery life? For Wifi, a touch screen, video, music and calls I can't see it having anything larger than 8 hours, and even that would be impressive. Normal phones can go without charge for several days.



Don't get me wrong... I am excited about this. They have put a lot of thought into it design and it has some nice features like all the sensors. Also it would be a perfect phone to sync to my mac and use some software like the clicker thing to control iTunes and powerpoint.

8GB seems a bit small too... 80GB on my Archos 504 ^_^ (ok i know its not a phone :p)


what do you think about this applications of multi-touch?
 
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According to the specs on the iPhone, the battery life is about 5hrs for talk/video/browsing and 16hrs for audio.
 
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Just saw that in the tech specs. Impressive, must have a newer battery than the current generation of iPods! Still, I would prefer some buttons :bomb:
 

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I must say a full QWERTY keyboard is the one thing I WOULD like to see implemented well on a phone. I use my phone (Nokia N80) a lot for MSN Messenger through the daytime (it's blocked on our work firewall, but I have lots of contacts from previous jobs that I don't want to lose contact with simply because my current employer is paranoid) and I have a Nokia BlueTooth keyboard to keep up with the conversations.

I looked at various options before going for a separate keyboard but couldn't get what I wanted (I could get a keyboard... but I couldn't get a decent keyboard, decent resolution screen and a camera all in 1 package at the time and I didn't want to use a stylus). So to me, it's great :)

Multi-touch is great, this whole idea of being able to put two fingers on a picture and then widen the gap to zoom the image is just 1 example of something you could never do with a single-touch sensor. Take a look at this YouTube video for an idea of what's possible with multi-touch that you couldn't do with older technology... Multi-touch LCD
 
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I think it was very smart to not put many physical buttons on the phone. I personally will not buy a smartphone that doesn't have a qwerty keyboard, as it's an absolute must for my uses.

The battery life was covered in the keynote speech.

8GB should be plenty sufficient, given that the iPhone has an SD memory expansion port in it.

As for multi-touch, I think it's brilliant. They truly came up with the most innovative way to control the device using just your fingers. The future possibilities for applications and gaming, are nearly unlimited, when combining the accelerometer and multi-touch screen.
 
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I must say a full QWERTY keyboard is the one thing I WOULD like to see implemented well on a phone. I use my phone (Nokia N80) a lot for MSN Messenger through the daytime (it's blocked on our work firewall, but I have lots of contacts from previous jobs that I don't want to lose contact with simply because my current employer is paranoid) and I have a Nokia BlueTooth keyboard to keep up with the conversations.

I looked at various options before going for a separate keyboard but couldn't get what I wanted (I could get a keyboard... but I couldn't get a decent keyboard, decent resolution screen and a camera all in 1 package at the time and I didn't want to use a stylus). So to me, it's great :)

Multi-touch is great, this whole idea of being able to put two fingers on a picture and then widen the gap to zoom the image is just 1 example of something you could never do with a single-touch sensor. Take a look at this YouTube video for an idea of what's possible with multi-touch that you couldn't do with older technology... Multi-touch LCD

That video was quite awesome. How did they manage to make that system if the patten is by apple?
 

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I guess cos this system far pre-dates Apple - that video was Feb '06. I think the idea isn't new but being able to implement in small-form cheap hardware was probably the clincher. Have a look here: Jeff Han home page, this is the guy who did that video...
 
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While that video is impressive, this is on a totally different scale. I think the big problem I am having with this is that it should be directed towards the general public and not just people in business.

When you are walking down the street it's going to be a pain to use... think of how you would be holding it... holding it with one hand and using your thumb. This is fine on all normal phones and MP3 players but the QWERTY keyboard using just my thumb?

And yeah the technology isn't new and most certainly not patented it just hasn't been implemented well enough to be a great consumer product. Apple would impress me if they pull it off. I have a long time to wait anyways... Q4 here in the UK
 

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