My TMobile Sidekick LX finally bit the dust so I got a new Epic 4G yesterday and switched from TMobile to Sprint after 8 years with TMobile. It was an easy decision because Sprint offers deaf-friendly data-only plans and a larger selection of phones.
First impressions of the Epic: love it! My only “complaints” are, the visual alerts aren’t as prominent, and the battery doesn’t last very long (and yes, I have Advanced Task Killer.) A friend mentioned external battery packs, so I’ll look into that.
Questions:
1. Are there apps out there that create better visual alerts? On the SK the trackball would glow blue if you had an unread message (it glows green the rest of the time.) I wonder if there’s an app out there that can cause the screen to glow on and off for unread messages.
2. I really like that I can do the Quick Launch keyboard shortcuts – is there a way to quick jump to Applications without having to go to the Home screen first? BTW, you can’t set Applications as a Quick Launch item.
3. Is there a way to wirelessly connect the phone to my laptop in order to transfer files to it, or does it have to be connected physically via USB?
Accessibility:
The YouTube player doesn’t display captions on YouTube videos that are captioned on the Web. Google says Youtube captions are available on Froyo, which the Epic doesn’t have yet (still on 2.1.) I also have Sprint TV on the phone, and I haven’t found any captioned episodes yet.
• Search and Download Subtitles Right From Your Android Phone with mVideoPlayer. – good resource
The Epic is TTY compatible though, and the slide-out keyboard is very good. Typing is easy and I don’t make mistakes.
As mentioned above, the visual alerts aren’t prominent enough, and I think the vibration even at full power setting isn’t strong enough – I had my phone in my purse last night and didn’t feel it vibrating. Not a huge deal, I can live with checking it more often.
I haven’t tried out the video chat option yet but deafies say it’s fast enough that they can sign to each other without lag.
Dream App/Wishlist:
1. Something that could receive signals from a doorbell, smoke alarm, baby monitor, etc and cause a visual alert/vibration on the Android device.
2. Captionfish app
3. More deaf-tech apps like iSubtitles and Figaro (couldn’t find link)
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Iphone Rocks!
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