The biggest problem with the Redfly is..

[reckless]

So here's the deal. I travel for a living. When I ordered my Redfly I figured it would be a great way to keep my Touch Diamond charged. Thats all I really wanted. I thought the keyboard and screen were just cool gimicks. After all I already have Mobiler.

But as I was relaxing one evening in a hotel room in Portland linked to my home computer in San Diego via my new free LOGMEIN account playing cards online with my buddies, doing massive spreadsheets, plowing through my e-mail...all of course using only my Redfly.... then it hit me.

I hate using my phone without the Redfly. I'm so spoiled by this thing that I will let a call go to voice mail and call back after I get my Redfly turned on. Even now I'm writing this lengthy post using my Redfly, something I'd never attempt with just my phone interface.

I want to thank everyone on the Redfly team for ruining me for stand alone phones. I hate you guys.

Seriously though... if you dont have a Redfly, you have no idea what you're missing. Just get one and you too will be ruined. Thanks for a wonderful product. Keep up the good work.

 

[cplush#WP]

me too!!! i dont respnd to texts or emails until i connect to redfly. i almost never go online with just my phone. I only have a q9c and the RAM is pretty low but dispite this 90% of the time i use my phone its connected to the fly...i look at my dad and his blackberry and laugh as he's typing with his thumbs or squinting at a webpage...when paired with live mesh, myphone, live search, office mobile, this is a killer device. im actually getting a desktop next instead of a laptop!!!

 

[mknollman]

I am with you guys - if I am sitting still for more than 5 minutes and using my phone my RF is coming out. In the car, I use it constantly as a better interface to play MP3s and see my GPS screen. I know that the complaint of some about winmo is that it is a PC OS slapped into a phone, but the RF makes it shine. I find myself getting spoiled another way tho - I now hate the weight and heat of my laptop. It stays in the bag or on its stand for days at a time now.

I must say that for real "surfing" and not just hitting my favorite forums, etc - the browsing is not quite there yet, but some of that is screen size and that I can accept for the form factor.

I love my RSS reader (SPB Insight) and also Microsoft Reader for ebooks on this thing and I will never buy a Kindle because of it (yes I am one of the 7 people that still uses MS Reader and it works flawlessly on the RF - I have a HUGE book collection).

By the way, yes this somewhat long-winded reply was typed on my RF. Wouldn't even consider more than 3 lines on the Touch Pro itself.

I do still use and love my phones qwerty for the little SMS that I do and quick online searches, but other than that - Redfly all the way.

 

[jwebb56]

mknollman - How do you have the Redfly mounted in your car? I'm assuming it is mounted and not free standing

 

[sp991]

I have to join the redfly love fest. I agree that it is great. If I have to type more than two sentences it comes out. Now with google maps and my gps enabled blackjack 2, the tomtom stays in my wifes car. Incidently, I just put the RF on the center console in front of the shifter. It sits under the radio and in front of the temperature controls.

 

[Aware]

Yes MS Reader is fantastic ;-) I have 2 Gb of books ...

But it's not been updates for years, so I use MobiPocket on my WonMobile and S60 phones. It's relatively easy to convert MS Reader books when you have the right tool ... Google is your friend

Why would anyone want to pay all that cash for a Kindle that only does one thing and won't fit in a pocket? ;-)

 

[c1oudrs]

Yes. I love my Redfly too. Like many I'm a bookreader. I can't help but confess to a bit of device envy over the netbooks and new kindle though. I wouldn't have bought a high end Redfly before owning a Redfly. Now I wish I could buy a higher end Redfly. (Or at least I could turn down my screen a notch or set it at permanent dim at night as the screen is too bright to read in the dark.) The trouble is you have to use a Redfly to really appreciate it. And then you want more. I may have to break down and go the Redfly computer program route with a netbook in conjuction with my old Redfly.

 

[mknollman]

@ the car mount question above -

Before the Redfly I used a full usize laptop in my truck for gps, movies, and music. I have a "mobile desk" that is mounted to the floor and i just use velcro to hold the Fly in place. I do not think this will help you all much but is works for me extremely well. If anyone is interested I'll up a picture.

 

[Bill R]

I do love my Redfly, but find it not without it's faults. It's main fault is that it makes me want WinMob to do more than it does and better than it does.

In all seriousness, it has expanded what I use my phone for.

 

[jwebb56]

I am very optimistic on the Redfly's future. It's a great concept that will only get better as our phones get more powerful. Bill R is spot on though, WM has to improve, especially in its Office Mobile apps.

But back to my most pressing near term Redfly wish -- the ability to use it in my car to display the phone's GPS maps. I have iGuidance 2009 running great on my Epix and it is serviceable in the car. But the display is small and it's hard to see the street names. The program renders fine on the Redfly so if I could find a suitable car mount, I'd be set.

Anyone out there have any leads or ideas? And for the Redfly employees that monitor this forum, if you released an 8" touchscreen version (no physical keyboard, just a virtual option) with a car mount accessory, you'd have a killer piece of hardware IMO.

 

[laurieny]

We demo'd a prototype of that very solution at CES in January. ;-)

-Laurie

Director of Engineering
Celio Corp | REDFLY

 

[c1oudrs]

Yes. I'd buy one of those (8 inch touchscreen) if the bezel was kept small so that the device wasn't any larger than the c8. It might make a nice bookreader. Better still if you could keep it relatively thin, under $500-$600 thinnish and connectible so that you could buy one and then buy another down the road and put the two together. Or put it with a redfly with a keyboard as your uses dictated. That way you could get the repeat customer base to buy more. I know. I know. We'll be lucky to get an 8 inch touchscreen at all. And grateful. I've been looking at the mimo monitors and an oqo2. . . (device envy again).

 

[jwebb56]

Laurie - So where do we find more info on that prototype and when (approximate) will it become real?

 

[laurieny]

I don't expect we will have too much more information available in the near term, but the best thing to do is check back here or our on website.

-Laurie

Director of Engineering
Celio Corp | REDFLY

 

[wodin]

An 8" touchscreen version (no physical keyboard, just a virtual option) with a car mount accessory, you'd have a killer piece of hardware IMO.

We demo'd a prototype of that very solution at CES in January. ;-)

-Laurie

Director of Engineering
Celio Corp | REDFLY

I want one!

I wonder if an 8" touchscreen monitor and a Dock would work. The monitor I saw on line for $200 had drivers for Windows, Mac, and Linux; so I'm thinking it won't work on WinMo.

 

[Aware]

We demo'd a prototype of that very solution at CES in January. ;-)

-Laurie

Celio Corp | REDFLY

Why didn't we hear you trumpeting that demo from on high? Or was I deaf that week?

 

[ckj]

We barely got the auto touchscreen demo working before CES so we didn't make a big deal about it. We did get a lot of interest from people attending CES from the auto industry who saw it so hopefully that will speed-up production time lines and partnership talks. I'm going to shoot some more video of various new concepts/prototypes in the next week or so and will post a vid when ready. Just remember, it's only a prototype now, so it could be a while before an actual product is announced.

 

[wodin]

We did get a lot of interest from people attending CES from the auto industry who saw it so hopefully that will speed-up production time lines and partnership talks.

I can see where there could be a market for a high end hands free kit with REDFLY like features.

That means take Celio's touch screen BlueTooth car kit, add hands free through the radio features, and market it against Parrot's hands free kits.

With all of these states making anti cell phone laws, hands free is only going to get bigger, and NOBODY?s got one that can be used for GPS, or web browsing, or email, or reading ebooks ?

 

[zad225]

I can see where there could be a market for a high end hands free kit with REDFLY like features.

That means take Celio's touch screen BlueTooth car kit, add hands free through the radio features, and market it against Parrot's hands free kits.

With all of these states making anti cell phone laws, hands free is only going to get bigger, and NOBODY?s got one that can be used for GPS, or web browsing, or email, or reading ebooks ?

I wonder if all of those features will be able to work just through a bluetooth connection. As of now, you can't even connect the Redfly through bluetooth if you have a bluetooth headset paired with it.

 

[BengtBeier]

I wonder if all of those features will be able to work just through a bluetooth connection. As of now, you can't even connect the Redfly through bluetooth if you have a bluetooth headset paired with it.

From my understanding, that's because WinMo can only handle one bluetooth device at once. If the car set identified itself as one device, it should work (it might possibly need it's own drivers for sound, though).