Can someone explain this suretype system to me?

[Guest gottifour]

First off is there a way to turn it off?

I'm having a hard time getting used to it. If I try to type a word it is rarely the word I want. Just about everytime I have to type a letter then push the center button on the directional pad and then repeat the process.

[Guest chaznet]

It's fully explained in the manual, take a look. Here's some basics:

xT9 is great, but you have to give it a week or so to fully understand and appreciate it. You can add words to the already extensive dictionary. It'll also memorize email addresses and internet URL's. Being able to type your telephone number, including area code, with 2 keystrokes is a good thing.

While you can temporarily switch to the alternate 'Multitap' method of hitting a key once or twice to type per-character; it always defaults to xt9 method. The T-Mobile Dash did this as well, however, in the WM6 ROM update it was changed and now remembers your last used setting as the default. Didn't make sense to use it with a full-QWERTY Dash, but it's great with the SureType keypad.

Also, you can configure xt9 by pressing and holding the asterisk key while in text-entry mode -- a menu will come up with an option for 'xt9 Settings'. From here you can configure the level of 'assistance' xt9 provides. You're able to turn on/off:

-Spell Correction

-Next Word Prediction

-Auto Append

-Auto Substitution

-Word Completion

-Multitap Word Completion

As you begin to use it, it learns phrases as you use them and begins to offer them, pressing the center OK button accepts them, or you can continue typing.

Once you get the hang of it, it's a great tool.

First off is there a way to turn it off?

I'm having a hard time getting used to it. If I try to type a word it is rarely the word I want. Just about everytime I have to type a letter then push the center button on the directional pad and then repeat the process.

[Guest gottifour]

Thanks for the reply...I'm slowly getting used to it ;)

[Guest palmsolo]

xT9 is great, but you have to give it a week or so to fully understand and appreciate it.

This is SO TRUE! I didn't like it at first because I was trying to use it like a standard keypad and couldn't get it figured out. I just kept going with it and now I am very fast with it and even wrote a recent article (90-95% of it) on the Shadow during my train commute. I personally really like the SureType implementation as it give me QWERTY functionality in a much smaller form factor.