Does heavy use of the PDA buttons cause damage?

[MikeStanley]

I have just bought CrazyKart and have played it quite a big these last few days, trying somehow to progress onto a new track.

A thought passed through my head - is all this heavy use of the buttons damaging them?

Does anyone have experience to suggest it is.

How about a poll.

[Thinkingmandavid]

A couple of years ago when I was using an IBM 3c, one of my buttons on the right broke and it was from heavy game usage. of course it was not a great game but that is the reason why it broke. I did get IBM to replace it so it was not a problem.
We get into really playing those games so they take a lot of pressure, and it is hard to regulate that when you are in the middle of a cool game, such as Anthelion :)

[PetiteFlower]

You could break the buttons if you use a lot of force, try to be gentle :)

[jmkeuning]

this is why we need a GAME PAD for these PDAs!!! Anyone wanna go into business?

[maximus]

This is exactly why I think that PPCs with built in physical keyboard should be avoided at all cost.

[senfeng]

Ya know... other than the d-pad, I just don't avoid using the buttons. I use my PDA with one hand holding it and the other either pressing the DPad or touching the screen with my stylus. I find those buttons so ergonamically unfriendly that I avoid them at all cost.

If it were up to me, I'd put them on the side(s) of the PDA (I know... people already have problems with accidentally pushing the record button, but hey...) or make them easier to push like normal game controllers that take are made to take a H3CK of a beating. For goodness sakes! Can someone PLEASE make buttons that are at least raised enough to be useful!!! Is there any focus testing going on with these things? I love my PPC, but I really could do without the buttons unless they made them more friendly and durable. Nintendo's been doing it for years. The Gameboy SP's pretty durable.

Just my rant

[Vulcan]

I read a lot of E Books with mine and I was concerned that the continual pushing of the right DPad would cause a problem....So far all is good.

[Stephen Beesley]

My Jornada has now lasted about 18 months of pretty heavy use including the buttons and so far no trouble.

That said, I have deliberately steered clear of a number of games which seemed to make very heavy demands on the d-pad. Siberian Strike, for example is a game that I quickly uninstalled because I was worried the dpad would not be able to stand up to the strain.

[pocketpcfox]

I read a lot of E Books with mine and I was concerned that the continual pushing of the right DPad would cause a problem....So far all is good.


I agree. Sometimes I find my 2210 Dpad skipping a page or two of an ebook, feeling a little loose. So I mapped the buttons to page up and down, and alternate between the two.

[Vulcan]

That's a good idea....

[M@]

I wrote some software a while back which used the 4 buttons to enter in text into the pda.. Eventually I abandoned the idea (it took 3 button presses for one letter and so took ages to type ANYTHING, and dell buttons are not the most easiest to press o.O) but during my few weeks of testing using both the hardware buttons, the twizzly thing on the side and directional what-you-call-it suffered no problems... in fact they still work perfectly now......

[MikeStanley]

Thanks all,

It's looking quite conclusive so far that those little buttons are reasonably resilient.

Play away !!!! 8)