To the left of the display, there are Menu and Jump buttons and a directional keypad that doubles as the phone's speaker. Meanwhile, on the right, you have a Cancel button, Talk and End keys, an OK button, and the trackball navigator. On top of the unit, there are two function buttons that perform different tasks depending on which application you are using, as well as a mini USB port and a 3. The volume rocker and the power button are located on the bottom.
As we've noted in our other Sidekick reviews, we found these controls a bit hard to use since they're pretty tiny in size and set flush with the phone's surface.
The camera lens is located on the back of the phone minus a flash or self-portrait mirror and finally, there's a microSD expansion slot, but you have to remove the back cover to access it. With the exception of the Sidekick Slide , the T-Mobile Sidekick has a swivel-screen design where if you nudge the upper-right corner or the lower-left corner of the screen, the display will rotate a full degrees and expose the full QWERTY keyboard.
The keyboard itself is similar to the one found on the Sidekick LX. There's plenty of spacing between the keys, and we were able to easily compose messages. We did find that the top row of number buttons were pretty close to the edge of the bottom of the screen, so there were occasions our thumbs bumped against it.
The good news, however, is you can now dial numbers without having to use the keyboard. There's an onscreen dialpad that you can access using the track ball actually a bit time-consuming, so it might be easier to just use the keyboard and you can also scroll through your address book and select and call contacts. For more add-ons, please check our cell phone accessories, ringtones, and help page.
Features The T-Mobile Sidekick doesn't bring any unannounced, new features to the handheld, but it does ship with all the enhancements that came with the Sidekick LX software update--most notably, video recording and playback and stereo Bluetooth support.
As a phone, the Sidekick offers quad-band world roaming, speed dial, call forwarding, three-way calling, a call log, a vibrate mode, a speakerphone, and text and multimedia messaging. The Sidekick's address book holds up to 2, contacts, with room in each entry for five numbers, an e-mail address, an IM account, a Web URL, a street address, and notes.
For caller-ID purposes, you can pair an entry with a photo, a group ID, or one of 18 ringtones. The Sidekick does support MyFaves to give you unlimited calling to five contacts, regardless of carrier. The Sidekick has integrated Bluetooth 2. Other uses for Bluetooth include hands-free car kits, wireless transfer of photos, videos, and music, and connecting to other Bluetooth peripherals, such as a printer.
We should note that the Sidekick's Web browser now has a mini view, which provides you with an overview of an entire Web site so you can more easily find what you are looking for without having to scroll through the entire page. Like previous models, the Sidekick comes with its own T-Mobile e-mail account with a push solution so you'll have real-time message delivery. In addition to the T-mail account, we configured our review up to access our Yahoo account and had no problem with the setup.
It simply required entering our login and password, and we were up and running within minutes. Of course, you've also got the choice to instant message with friends. In Oct. Celebrities who backed the phone soon turned against it. The following year, with consumers throwing their cash toward the iPhone and Samsung Galaxy smartphones, Microsoft attempted to tap into the youth market the same way the Sidekick had a decade earlier.
It released the Kin, a miniature Sidekick-inspired smartphone with a sliding keyboard that was tailored for teens who liked Facebook and Twitter. Two months after its release, it was discontinued. Just ask Blackberry. Devices that sold themselves on large keyboards soon gave way to phones with touchscreens and as many buttons as you have fingers on one hand.
So, Danger turned off its servers, and older Sidekicks that relied on their data centers were rendered useless. Things seemed to have come full circle, but not in a good way—this was the end of the line. The Sidekick succeeded because it showed consumers how cool technology could be, that they could personalize a chunk of plastic and chips to make it their own, and ushered in an era of mobile computing for the masses.
Say what you will about how fast its rising star burnt out, but the Sidekick is an important element in the link between cell phone and smartphone, technology and style. What Danger and T-Mobile were able to do whether it was intentional or not was tap into something that Dr. Dre and Jimmy Iovine later did with their Beats headphones and what Apple is attempting to do with the Apple Watch today by making a device that's essential to one's personality and status, something stylish for the coming generation of consumers.
So many of us wanted an iPhone before we knew we wanted one because we saw the future of connectivity in the Sidekick. In an era where new pieces of technology become obsolete by their first birthday, the Sidekick is, well, very much obsolete, but it has kept a lasting coolness about it that devices today lack. In the evolution of the mobile phone, the Sidekick has an important place both in marketing and technology in helping jumpstart the modern smartphone craze that would go into full effect at the end of the s.
While we grew, the technology grew with us. The Sidekick is very much a representation of the time and place in which it was popular. It was also the first BlackBerry device to have a camera and music player capabilities. Without a doubt the most revolutionary phone of the early s, the Apple iPhone was unlike any of its predecessors.
From a visual design perspective, it was a rectangular, minimalist gem, featuring a sleek metal-and-glass body, a singular button, and an extremely thin profile. From a technological design perspective, the touchscreen made waves. As soon as Apple launched iPhone and iOS, its operating system, other manufacturers rushed to conjure up their own versions of the smartphone.
Motorola RAZR. Robert Lepre said the Sidekicks' physical design makes users vulnerable. Most people hold the phone with two hands out in front of their body, using their thumbs to text or instant message on the full keyboard. The problem has become so pronounced that the Boston Police Department teamed with students from the Boston Arts Academy to create a poster — the winning one is emblazoned with the words "Hold on to Your Kick" — reminding young people to keep their phones close and avoid openly texting.
For Tatiana Mesa, the Sidekick's popularity — among her classmates and thieves — eventually turned her off. The year-old student at the Boston Arts Academy recently switched to a BlackBerry Curve — after her Sidekick was taken while she was in class. IE 11 is not supported. For an optimal experience visit our site on another browser. Politics Covid U.
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