Spike for the iPhone 5/5s is a physical, tactile keyboard carefully integrated into protective case. It is the ideal solution for those who send and receive lots of daily emails and text messages or simply want to type on their iPhone error-free. Its keyboard doesn’t take up valuable screen real estate, because when no longer needed it easily rotates and stowed in the back of the case. What the critics say: PC World: Most people can type faster and more accurately with a tactile keyboard and Spike lets people do that” Todays iPhone “Spike is easily the most useable iPhone keyboard we have ever seen” Boston Globe “SoloMatrix has come up with a remarkable solution, their Spike keyboard is easily the most useable iPhone keyboard we have ever”
A**R
Clever and funcitonal, but not practical and frankly annoying
I was very excited about this product because of the clever design - making use of touch-responsive materials to lay over the existing touch keyboard and operate battery-free. Genius. However, clever design aside, its bulky, you can't use it in the dark, the swinging keyboard gets annoying and there are only certain scenarios where this keyboard can be remotely useful.The first gripe I had was its size. The lower half is bulky to accommodate for the keyboard - much thicker than my Speck CandyShell case. It also creates an uneven balance - so when laying the phone down on a flat surface, the phone falls angled away from you. Minor aesthetic nitpicking but annoying nonetheless.The flip-out keyboard was appealing to me at first, but its novelty quickly faded as I encountered all kinds of annoyances. The plastic nibs that hold the keyboard in the back of the case are very weak and don't grip the keyboard well enough, so i find that the keyboard comes loose and swings out when i take it out from my pocket. Not only do I find it swinging about all the time - THE KEYBOARD COMES OFF!!! Not even one hour after putting my phone in this case, I lost the keyboard in a best buy parking lot. Luckily, I saw it on the ground out of the corner of my eye and rescued it. A solution to this would be to create a housing on the back of the case to have the keyboard slide inside the back of the case - and then flip around to the front - rather than "snap" to the back of it. This would prevent a loose-swinging keyboard and make the design much more slick.Typing at night? This keyboard instantly becomes useless! It's not backlit (obviously) so typing in the dark is literally impossible - even if you're like me and have all the keys memorized, its impossible to type effectively using the button pushes to use the special characters on the iphone keyboard like <>!? or capital letters. It would be FANTASTIC if the next model incorporated some transparent material that utilized the backlighting of the iphone to shine through the physical keyboard.Now for the actual keyboard - amazing. It's just like you would expect on any physical phone keyboard. Keys are clicky and feel good to press, only seldom misstyping. Even with that being said. I STILL TYPE FASTER WITH TOUCH SCREEN. It is not a matter of "getting used to" the physical keyboard - the simple fact is that touch screen typing with fingers will always be faster than physical buttons. I also think it's a little thick and could be made thinner to reduce some size. Of course while the keyboard is out you lose some functionality of the phone and can't see 1/3 of the screen, this again could be solved by using a transparent material.All in all, this physical keyboard will only be useful if you are typing long essays on your phone in a well lit area. Otherwise there is nothing wrong with the touch keyboard.
Trustpilot
1 day ago
2 days ago
