The SMS stopwatch challenge: Touch vs hardware keypad

[tenticle56]

So I finally got to try a Polaris in person today. Overall, I was very impressed, however I did find the Touch interface a little clunky for typing SMS. Perhaps this is just because I have never used it before.

I didn't have a chance to time myself with a stopwatch when using the Polaris, but I am curious to see if anyone who has experience using the Touch interface could post some comparative times typing the same SMS on a regular keypad compared to the Touch.

When I came home today, I timed myself typing a standard 160 character SMS on couple of different phones -
Nokia 6300: 65 seconds
Samsung S800: 69 seconds
HTC Touch Cruise: ??

Note that the times themselves don't really matter, I'm just interested in the comparison between a hardware keypad and the Touch from someone with experience using both.

Any feedback you guys could offer would be greatly appreciated - thanks in advance! :-)

[texarcana]

I think its kinda useless to compare this from other people.
Everyone types on a different way (not everyone is speedy on SMS, it depends how much SMS'ing you do on a daily basis)

But the more you practice on a touch keypad (or alternatives), the better and faster you get at it.

[tenticle56]

Of course, you are right - everyone types at different speeds. That's why the actual times themselves don't matter to me - what interests me is the relative difference between typing on a hardware keypad and a Touch keypad.

If a fast typist takes 60 seconds on a hardware keypad and 69 on a Touch keypad, while a slow typist takes 600 seconds on a hardware keypad and 690 on a Touch keypad, then I will know the difference is approximately 15%. In either case, the times aren't relevant, just the difference between them.

I understand that the numbers will always vary from person to person. We have so many great users on these forums and getting a range of feedback seems like one of the best ways to take advantage of their expert experience.

Thanks again!