TouchPal vs HTC Touch 20-button keyboard

Zoide · #1 (**permalink**) 01-03-2008, 02:32 PM

What are people's opinions on the Cootek TouchPal vs. the HTC Touch 20-button keyboard?

IMO the TouchPal has all sorts of clever tricks and extra features, but the buttons are just a little bit too small for my taste. I find that I make a lot of mistakes and I often get frustrated.

The Touch keyboard, on the other hand, has much bigger buttons that I can press easily with my thumbs, and since each key has a maximum of 2 letters, I can usually type out things with a single key press per letter (even without predictive input). One of its big disadvantages is that it takes up half the whole screen, but otherwise it's pretty good all-around.

Thoughts?

2manyphones · #2 (**permalink**) 01-03-2008, 04:49 PM

I have tried every input method and found this to be the best. Here is the link to my custom skins and the program site:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=349647

Zoide · #3 (**permalink**) 01-03-2008, 05:21 PM

BTW, here is a link to an image comparing most of the input methods we're discussing:

http://forum.xda-developers.com/atta...6&d=1198986082

The one furthest to the right is the Cootek TouchPal. To the left of it is the HTC Touch 20-button keyboard, and to the left of that one is the PCM Keyboard.

The two furthest to the left are not really worth it, IMO.

Zoide · #4 (**permalink**) 01-04-2008, 02:26 AM

Strange... I've realized that I'm getting better at using TouchPal than the HTC 20-button keyboard... At the same time it turns out I was trying to use TouchPal without predictive text and obviously failing miserably. But if you use predictive text, it's actually quite good! Especially if you make the keys bigger by dragging up on the Help/Options key.

That said, my right thumb is hurting like hell now from all the keybpad testing, so by now my results might not be very reliable...

98classic · #5 (**permalink**) 01-04-2008, 02:59 AM

the pcmkeyboard or whatever is pretty good, i use it for one handed typing on my mogul while closed and i must say you can type out pretty fast, just turn off the auto correct feature.

savy1 · #6 (**permalink**) 01-04-2008, 03:03 AM

here is my take....

i have used all 3 that we are talking about here...

htc 20 button (touch)
Horrible. just horrible.. It's just not for the mogul, I couldn't bang out a paragraph with ease like I wanted to. It just gave me to many problems. I also could not just hit a letter and add contacts to the to: field.

PCM keyboard.
A little better. I could tap away , and get some lines going. The only odd thing is that it took me a while to type out a paragraph, and at times I found myself still using the stylus. I also had a hard time getting used to where the button was to get to the number pad.. again a negative.

Touchpal:
I install this, and at first I would sware it was the oddest thing ever. It takes time to get used to. Ok so I start using it, and when you enter words it doesn't recognize it asks to add them to the database. Now next time you type the word it comes up .. for instance you can type in fo , and u will get (fo,for,food,foot,form). I just did that and it's what came up.. so if you wanted to type food. u could type fo and tap food... so three taps and your on to the next word. Once you get good at this program, and you will... Your gonna bang out paragraphs with out thinking about it...

MrOuija36 · #7 (**permalink**) 01-04-2008, 11:53 AM

after you own touchpal for about a week and you get all your words in it and everything its great... i type really fast and really accurate with it.. had it for a month or 2 now.. and bought the pro license..

and yeah in version 2.0 you can make the buttons bigger or smaller

and i have a touch so i have to have a vKeyboard that makes it easy to type.. if you check my text inbox its nearing 1100 now so yeah typing is pretty much second nature by now lol

Zoide · #8 (**permalink**) 01-04-2008, 03:58 PM

Does anyone have a spare license for TouchPal? I'll Paypal you half the $10.98 that it costs now

rainbow70 · #9 (**permalink**) 01-10-2008, 10:05 PM

TouchPal V2 is much better than V1...

All the issues you mentioned above are gone. It's resizable, so that you can have it bigger, or smaller. It also support multiple languages like PCM keyboard does.

Actually, if you enable error correction, you don't need to worry about your big finger! It works perfect!

**xweaponx** · #10 (**permalink**) 01-10-2008, 11:01 PM

I have had just about every touch pad keyboard out there as well and once I stepped into TouchPal, I bought the Pro version and never looked back. I thought it was definitely worth the $11.

And it looks good.