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Comment by philips | Hacker News Reader

Relatedly I find it amazing that Planet Computers has found a niche and developed multiple cell phones with tiny qwerty keyboards.

https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/astro-slide-5g-transforme...

https://store.planetcom.co.uk/

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I just "finished" my first Gemini after using the hell out of it for two years straight until it finally gave up on me - it had missing keycaps, the obligatory cracked screen, dents & scratches for the last few months of its life, but still would not give up on me - until it finally went out few weeks ago.

I tried to do without a keyboard for two days, but I just can't do it, and got myself a new unit from Planet.

I guess I'm an old-skool kind of user, my primary app is termux + openssh for doing my mail and irc remotely, but the keyboard is good enough to do the occasional sysadmin and coding work - and that's not something you'd typically do on a blackberry.

I highly recommend this device. It has its flaws, but it's unike any other device available at this time.

How usable do you find the keyboard with a terminal? I had not heard about these before today but I am curious now.

Both the Gemini and the Cosmo look almost perfect as a portable terminal - the only thing I can see missing is usb-c power delivery for docking.

It takes a day or two to get used to the small form factor, my left hand types with 4 fingers, right usually one or two. I was never a 10-finger-type of touchtyper anyway. Because of the limited key count somey characters are in strange places with a fn-combo, but these you just learn over time.

I find the keyboard good enough to take my phone out and write a proper business email, caps, punctuation, lingo and all. I find the keyboard good enough to reply to threads like this while waiting for the kids in the park. I find it good enough to fix a small bug in software, do basic git bookkeeping. I use it for IRC all day long.

I do not find the keyboard good enough to sit down and write proper documentation, or do real coding sessions.

After two years I would expect issues like you have mentioned. It does not sound too good in my humble opinion. I guess you were doing more than just occasional work? :)

I have noticed they put MediaTek CPUs into their devices. Personally, I had bad experience with MT chips in various devices and they are putting me off to try out any of Planet PDAs. What is the Gemini performance in your opinion?

Well, it lived in my jeans' pocket without any protection for two years. The nature of a mechanical device like this (hinge, keys) you can expect to be more fragile than your average slab-of-metal-and-glass phone. I am not easy on my devices, i dont treat them nice, so i am not at all disappointed with lasting it for two years.

One note: the keyboard hates sand. It really does. Do not. ever. take your gemini to the beach.

Initially I was not happy about the MediaTek chipset, but in the end I figure I don't really care - the performance is still good enough for me to get a new gemini after two years, but I'm not the average multimedia consumer I guess.

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