Took me forever to figure out what was going on with the keyboard. Someone at BGR finally did it for me.
The keyboard is the back of the phone. Thats why the camera is on the keyboard (see the 5.0 megapixel part under the yellow part?).
I think its awesome and can't wait to see it in better shots. That makes soooo much sense to me I can't believe Moto was the first one to come up with it. I'm really interested in seeing if the buttons retain any function while closed. Seems like it would be a great way for phones to keep their minimal fronts while still giving people another way to navigate. Of course there would have to be some kind of "palm check" so you're not pushing them while using the phone in other ways but if they could figure something out it would be quite cool.
The buttons would be pretty much useless when closed because you wouldn't be able to look at both faces at the same time, so I don't see how they would provide another way to navigate unless the phone is opened. If the phone is opened, it essentially function the same as a slider device.
I don't really see any positives to this that type of design, but I see two negatives. Unfolding the phone seems like it would take more effort than a simple one-handed slide, and as you already mentioned, accidentally hitting keys while using the closed phone becomes way too easy.
@tande This looks like a great way to make a phone easy to snap in half. I don't think I'd trade a completely flat physical keyboard for a redesign like this, although I am open to new things. I've been wishing for an android device on AT&T for a while, but I guess I should've been more specific. I want an android device with a good keyboard.
On second thought.. I could definitely get used to a front-facing keyboard being on a more mainstream phone. Video chatting on a mobile device would be exciting.
@losttime I doubt that motorola are silly enough to allow the buttons to function when the phone is closed. I'd put a fair bet on that they will be de-activated during it.
I think they are attempting to reduce the depth of the phone by removing the need for a slider mechanism, although its hard to tell from the the blurfest.
While its tablet world topping pixel density, Tegra 2 silicon, and fresh to death OS certainly sound awesome, we had to get our grubby mitts on one to see if it's as good as its spec sheet would have us believe.
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Took me forever to figure out what was going on with the keyboard. Someone at BGR finally did it for me.
The keyboard is the back of the phone. Thats why the camera is on the keyboard (see the 5.0 megapixel part under the yellow part?).
I think its awesome and can't wait to see it in better shots. That makes soooo much sense to me I can't believe Moto was the first one to come up with it. I'm really interested in seeing if the buttons retain any function while closed. Seems like it would be a great way for phones to keep their minimal fronts while still giving people another way to navigate. Of course there would have to be some kind of "palm check" so you're not pushing them while using the phone in other ways but if they could figure something out it would be quite cool.
@tande I don't see that catching on.
The buttons would be pretty much useless when closed because you wouldn't be able to look at both faces at the same time, so I don't see how they would provide another way to navigate unless the phone is opened. If the phone is opened, it essentially function the same as a slider device.
I don't really see any positives to this that type of design, but I see two negatives. Unfolding the phone seems like it would take more effort than a simple one-handed slide, and as you already mentioned, accidentally hitting keys while using the closed phone becomes way too easy.
@tande This looks like a great way to make a phone easy to snap in half. I don't think I'd trade a completely flat physical keyboard for a redesign like this, although I am open to new things. I've been wishing for an android device on AT&T for a while, but I guess I should've been more specific. I want an android device with a good keyboard.
On second thought.. I could definitely get used to a front-facing keyboard being on a more mainstream phone. Video chatting on a mobile device would be exciting.
@losttime I doubt that motorola are silly enough to allow the buttons to function when the phone is closed. I'd put a fair bet on that they will be de-activated during it.
I think they are attempting to reduce the depth of the phone by removing the need for a slider mechanism, although its hard to tell from the the blurfest.