As promised here is some further feedback on using this £69 bargain phone with android. I got it unlocked pay as You Go from virgin. Mobile Accessibility is a one off cost of £53 which I can, understand it now install on any phone which I register with the Android market . At a RNIB and BCAB event I went to on Android the rep from mobile Accessibility said that, whilst they could not commit in perpetuity, they wanted to pursue a policy of free upgrades, as well as free updates . I guess we have to thank competition from Voiceover for this policy. I will feed back briefly on 3 points . 1. Setting up access 2. description of keys on phone. 3. Pitfall to avoid with Android Market.
Generally Progress with this phone has been slow, mainly because I have been busy academic writing but also because I have struggled a little with the touch screen keyboard interface. I think my next investment will be a Bluetooth keypad of some description and would be very interested to hear any recommendations. 1. Setting up accessibility. I got somebody sighted to download Mobile Accessibility from the Android market for me. If you take this route you must remember that installing Mobile Accessibility alone is not enough. The phone will appear to be talking but as soon as you leave M A the phone will stop talking. Mobile Accessibility is actually a set of self voicing apps but you also have to set it as the screen reader within Android settings. I had to get sighted help back to go to setting and then check accessibility and then also set mobile Accessibility as the screen reader for the phone. 2. Key descriptions. the phone has a touch screen with some very tactile buttons. Under this touch screen there is a centre round enter button surrounded by a 4 way cursor ring. To either side of the centre enter and cursor ring there are two button arrange with a proud rocker button, with a further recessed button below this. . Starting from the top left rocker button left, left press is the menu key. rocker button left, right press is the home key. Bottom left recessed button is dial /send key Then moving to the centre we have a 4 way cursor ring around centre enter key . rocker button right , left press is the back key. rocker button right, right press is the search key. Brings up Google search outside of Mobile Accessibility. Bottom right recessed key is End call button. On the side is the volume key Holding this in whilst in a edit field brings up the Mobile Accessibility on screen keyboard. This volume button is also used for the voice recognition text entry with Mobile Accessibility but I have not tried this yet. 3. Android market. I was looking forward to using the Android Market. I had heard podcasts where people extolled the convenience of searching for apps on your computer and having them pushed directly to your phone. I did this repeatedly with no apparent response from my phone. What was not made clear from the podcasts and descriptions I listened to is that this will only work if you are already logged into the Android Market on your phone. This sort of makes sense, but it does mean that, if you are using the computer to avoid having to use the onscreen keyboard, this will not work as a strategy as you will need to use the onscreen keyboard to log into your Google account at the very least. I may become more proficient with the on screen keyboard but I think I would recommend that anybody not used to this also get a Bluetooth keyboard. This would help whilst you are in the transition period of learning this skill, as you will be frustratingly not be able to access much of the functionality of the phone without it. For me personally, struggling to enter my login details onscreen held me up for many days. I know this is a comment about touch screen, rather than android but I thought I would mention it as I now wish I had got a Bluetooth keypad at the start, rather than waiting to see if I got on with the onscreen keyboard. Anyway thats enough for now. David Griffith ======================================= The Techno-Chat E-Mail forum is guaranteed malware, spyware, Trojan, virus and worm-free To modify your subscription options, please visit for forum's dedicated web pages located at http://mail.tft-bbs.co.uk/mailman/listinfo/techno-chat You can find an archive of all messages posted to the Techno-Chat group at either of the following websites: http://mail.tft-bbs.co.uk/pipermail/techno-chat/index.html Or: <http://www.mail-archive.com/techno-chat@techno-chat.net> you may also subscribe to this list via RSS. The feed is at: <http://www.mail-archive.com/techno-chat@techno-chat.net/maillist.xml> ---------------------------------------
