It's a shame it doesn't come with a trackball like the htc g1\hero.

I consider that to be a feature (dpad over trackball). My biggest gripe about the G1: the trackball. Would MUCH rather have a dpad.

The 'clicking trackball' found in blackberry bold and G1 can be used to move in one direction one 'click' at a time and yet it can also be scrolled at variable speed.. I've found it great for scrolling pages and selecting text.

I'd imagine dpads would be great for games though.

edit: found another pic with better view of the dpad.

technically nothing, except there is less of a issue getting a subsidiced phone in norway (1 year lock, unlock coade at end of year).

i just hope another company launch a android phone with keyboard here (htc and samsung seems to only go for OSK).

To me, a trackball is redundant to a touch screen (when combined with inertial scrolling gestures), with or without stylus vs finger.

Fast scrolling with a trackball vs fast scrolling with the flick of a finger/stylus
Click and Drag with a trackball vs press and drag with a finger/stylus

Finger and trackball are both fast and imprecise (almost every phone trackball I've used/seen is over-sensitive and doesn't offer a sensitivity control, so a slight slip of the finger throws you WAY off).

A stylus can make up for that, but having to get out a stylus is, IMO, awkward and cumbersome. I only want to use the precision of a stylus for fine point drawing, and maybe text selection. I don't want to use it for precision movement from widget to widget (which, in my opinion, neither a finger nor a phone trackball is suited for).

A dpad handles everything those 3 input methods doesn't:

• Precision -- When you move from widget to widget, you always do it ONE step at a time, you don't have to worry about accidentally slipping and jumping 3 widgets over (like with a trackball), or being unable to choose among 2 or 3 small text links or buttons that are close together (like with a finger). Whether it's precision of movement, or precision of clicking, the dpad wins over both the finger and the trackball.
• Convenience -- Unlike a stylus, you don't have to pull it out of its well, keep it on a lanyard, worry about setting it down and forgetting/losing it, etc. Depending on where it's placed on the device, it's always available, and you never risk losing it.

To me, the best combination is (all of these in one device):

1) Finger optimized GUI with inertial gestures for scrolling and such (flick your finger, send the scrolling list flying; have a slider thumb that appears only during scrolling so you can grab it and move it to the right place on the list (Android does this)).

2) A Dpad that is easy to use both when the device is closed and open.

3) The option/ability to use a stylus if you need to do fine point drawing, manipulation, or something similar. Preferably it could use the plastic tip of a pen cap, or something similarly common and easy to obtain (so that you don't have to worry about replacing one that comes with the device). I also like the Nokia Express Music "guitar pick" styli. But, again, it should be optional, and something you only really need for specialized applications. The primary pointer should be your finger(s).


So, as you can see, a trackball doesn't even enter into it for me. It's not necessary for speed, precision, convenience, anything (and, I still argue that it's not even _useful_ for precision). I find them clumsy and imprecise. Even after a year of using the one on my G1.

It might be acceptable to have an optical mouse in the middle of the dpad, like one of the latest Nokia phones (E73?). I haven't used an optical mouse on a phone yet, but it was a little bit awkward on the Raeon Everun Digital Note. It'd be ok, as long as you can turn it off and just use it like a regular Dpad IF YOU WANT. (that might give you the best of both a Dpad and a trackball)

@john: Ok. Just curious, can you tell me which trackball implementation have you tried and how long have you spent with said trackball to get yourself acquainted with how it works?

On my Bold and G1, the OS+trackball has been tweaked to offer the precision required that I've never had any problem with getting the cursor to move in the direction intended or the number of single clicks required out of it.

And as for the conveniene issue (as you've mentioned), I think that can be put aside, as there's no stylus anymore in new devices nowadays

After comparing the use of trackball and d-pad on handhelds, i've found them to be very similar actually:
- Conversion of the free 360' direction of the trackball to 4 primary d-pad direction is never a problem. Never got them wrong, once.
- The movements are usually either a staccato string of single clicks (very similarly duplicated on trackballs) or when you need it repeated for a short duration (moving the cursor\pointer for a few rows or columns (of icon or letters) at a time you either hold the d-pad down to let the key-press repeat work on its own or scroll the trackball having a bit of control on the speed of its repetition. For 90% of common document manipulation and interface interaction, they're really sufficient.

The main difference (to me) is for playing games when you need to hold the d-pad button down for long periods of time and that cannot be easily replicated on a trackball.

I've spent 15 minutes with the digital mouse on the raon, I don't think it is really useable.

I've spent almost a year on the G1, and I'm not aware of any method to adjust its sensitivity. It's always just as broadly/coarsely over-sensitive no matter what. A slight tremor in the thumb and it will dump to the next item when you try to click. A slip of the thumb at the wrong moment can move you multiple widgets along (this is especially annoying with Google Reader, for example, but also in the web browser, or even in Gmail -- but to see what I mean for Google Reader, try to click on the "keep unread" checkbox for a large range of messages, where the messages have lots of links (a combined list of engadet and slashdot articles ought to do the trick) ... it's one of those things that's so obtuse that, in my experience, only has a 40-60% chance of success averaged out over multiple attempts on multiple articles -- try doing it with your finger, too).

I have used a BB Curve many times, but not as consistently and continuously as the G1 (my G1 has been my only pocketable device, carried with me almost constantly, since last October).

Getting the trackball to roll in the intended direction isn't a problem. Getting it to only roll as far as I want, and be sure it doesn't roll at all when I click, those are the problems. And those are what keep it from meeting my requirement for precision.

"No more stylus" _included_. That doesn't mean it can't be useful to have one. There are, for example, accessory styli you can get for the iPhone. I would similarly expect/want one for the N900. And I wish I could find a stylus that would work with the G1 (I'd probably only RARELY use it, but there are cases where I definitely wish I had one to use).

iirc, the G1 uses a capacitive screen, so the iphone stylus should in theory work with the G1 as well...

@john: I'm not sure where the difference lies between your device and mine.. but I've tried your use case and I could click 'keep unread' checkbox 10 out of 10 tries without any problem at all. Though I do think the navigation and ui of android's browser is a few steps behind iphone's as there's a weird (unintended?) cursor repositioning\screen jump after every checkbox click.

Yes, stylus can be useful. But I'm not sure about fat styli over capacitive screens.

@tso: yes, you're right.

That's pretty much what I'm talking about ... except that for me, it frequently happens _before_ or _during_ the click, not just after. And not just with checkboxes, it also happens with URLs.

Further, I see it apps other than just the android browser. The dedicated/native Gmail app does it to me, sometimes, as well.