ThinkOutside Stowaway BT Keyboard: Great hardware, poor software, useless support

[martin_ayton]

After seeing all you guys write about it, I just bought myself a Think Outside Stowaway Bluetooth keyboard. As a piece of equipment, it is fantastic: really well designed hardware which looks as though it will last.

The software (drivers) however are something else: Despite all ThinkOutside's promises, the thing will not hold a secure pairing when the BT connection is broken (which happens after 3 minutes of keyboard inactivity). That means I have to constantly re-pair the kbd to my PPC (an HTC Blue Angel) which is really irritating.

However, the really, really annoying thing is that ThinkOutside could not care less :evil: . Support requests go unanswered. TO don't appear even to read their own support forums. I am not alone in finding this: there are plently of others in the ThinkOutside support forums who desperately want to like this piece of kit if only they could get a little help to make it work, but who are being completely ignored by the company who happily took their money.

Caveat emptor :cry:

[Cheap PDA Wannabe]

I registered just to reply to your rant. First of all if it doesn't work well for you, that does not mean that it also does not work for others, so please do not use generalizations saying that the drivers and service is terrible just based on your opinion.

I myself bought Bluetooth Stowaway keyboard a year ago and I am very please with it in all ways. Not only the drivers worked with no problem, but I also did not experience any problems described by Martin_ayton. I've used my keyboard in school, and typed hundreds of pages with it.

I am very sorry for your poor experience with the same product and I hope that you will find ways to resolve your problems.

[yankeejeep]

If you go into the Advanced option for the keyboard driver, you should be able to turn off power efficient mode. The automatic turn-off comes from this option. With that turned off, the keyboard will not power off until you close it and that should keep secure pairing alive. Although I have to say that I have not had this issue and find the software very reliable on a PPC running WM2003SE. So reliable that I picked up the companion BT Travel Mouse and live most of the time now without lugging my notebook along.

[martin_ayton]

I registered just to reply to your rant. Cool :) Good to have you on board.
First of all if it doesn't work well for you, that does not mean that it also does not work for others, so please do not use generalizations saying that the drivers and service is terrible just based on your opinion. Hey, it's a rant, right? This is my opinion and you have a right to express yours (and I'm glad you did). Overall - hopefully - readers will get a balanced view. Anyway, go take a look at the TO support forums and you will find that I am far from alone in my experience.

Actually, you may be right: the drivers may not be quite as poor as I thought. On the advice of another user in the TO forums, I downgraded from v4.2 to v4.0 and now the kbd holds its pairing and I am a happy bunny.

The real issue here is the support (or complete lack of it) from TO. People find bugs, and different machines have compatibility issues. The mark of a good company is that they care about their customers and work hard to resolve problems. TO score 0/10 for that.

If readers come away from this thinking "look, it sounds like a good product and I'm willing to take the risk on non-existent support" then that's OK - at least they are fore-warned.

[southgrid]

:devilboy:

Hey :-) I have the oldest version installed guys! version 3.11 that comes with the cd.....heheh so far it works for me. only occasionally I have to pair it Securely all over again. I should may be upgrade to 4.0 huh. ....:-)

[jhennig]

So are the 4.0 drivers the best? Which ones should I use?

[maikii]

I have also had this problem, of often having to re-pair, to get it to work. I have not yet tried to contact TO support about it.

I'm not sure I'd agree also with the statement that the hardware is great. I find the lack of a number row disappointing, in what is supposed to be a "full-sized" keyboard. (I don't mind the lack of a number row in a micro thumb keyboard, but in what is supposed to be full--sized, that is a serious fault to me.) I don't understand why they omitted the number row. It really doesn't save a lot on size, this KB is not much smaller than similar foldable keyboards that have number rows.

[jhennig]

Woohoo! I got my keyboard today and boy is it speedy in comparison to the on screen tap keyboard. I am very pleased with it although as was mentioned, it would be nice if it truely was a full keyboard.

In TrueVGA the typing can be a wee bit staining on my eyes, but as I am only 17, I feel lucky enough to be able to see the letters from 2 feet away. Now for that summer reading work that I have been putting off...

[PocketPC Addict]

I too have some pairing issues with it since the last Axim X50 rom update. For some reason, the keyboard can stay paired for weeks then one day, it will stop and I'll have to set it up each time I want to use it.