I think I made a strange discovery here...

[caliskimmer]

So I was playing around with my Evo and I noticed my finger was not touching one of the capacitive buttons and it reacted. I hovered my finger ever so slightly over the home button without touching it and it reacted. I was baffled, so I went to get the Epic which was on the charger and tried this. It did not react. I barely touched the Epic's buttons and it didn't react. I gave it a very slightly push and it responded.

Ok, so this is what I'm thinking:

The Evo's buttons are true capacitive, but the Epic's buttons are in reality, resistive.

Is there any way to prove this through some hardware diagnostic or something?

Also, try this with the Epic's screen. If you put your finger ever so slightly above the screen, it will respond.

 

[relic419]

Well, they aren't resistive because they actually don't require any pressure, the Evo just has more sensitive buttons.

Sent from the Yellow Galaxy

 

[Shadnic]

If I move my finger slowly and gently, I can put the entire pad of my finger right onto the "capacitive" buttons and even move it around without them responding in any way. It takes a firm and well placed press to get them to work, but it hasn't really bothered me. It's never felt hard to use, just not super sensitive.

 

[Andrew Ruffolo]

I've had mine react without touching it

 

[dekcufi]

i thought there was a post on this already? I believe the epic buttons have to be pressed!

 

[PoundSand]

The Evo's buttons are true capacitive, but the Epic's buttons are in reality, resistive.

Is there any way to prove this through some hardware diagnostic or something?

um, it's much easier than that- push the evo's buttons with something non-capacitive and see if it responds (i doubt it will). use a plastic pen or something.

it's most likely simply calibrated to be less sensitive.

 

[Toast95135]

It seems to me that it's setup not to react unless you touch and hold it for a split second. I prefer it that way then if I was constantly hitting them by accident.

 

[Ontopofthegame]

That's because they want you to still treat them like buttons and avoid accidental touches. The Epic'[s has to be pressed down on. You can slide your finger across all 4 icons but without pressure it wont respond ;-)

 

[caliskimmer]

Well, that's my question. Why can't the buttons be recalibrated through software? It seems like the buttons were purposefully meant to be "resistive-like" but why aren't we given a choice to change the sensitivity?

 

[mcp6530]

i think they work from heat...i had a friend try my phone with her big ole fingernails that she uses on her touch screen and it wouldn't work with her nails...only works with a finger touching it seems....and yes, my buttons sometimes don't require actually being touched either.

 

[yellowxboy]

+1 on the heat theory

i tried responding to a sms via touchscreen after washing my hands and the screen went bezerk on me.. haha, my finger was still wet and swyping was insane

 

[SomeAudioGuy]

Capacitive touch tech works by changing the electrical conductivity of a panel, as the human body is also a conductor.

The buttons on the Epic are capacitive, but are programmed oddly. They seem to require a longer or lingering touch to register. This is probably a timing in software. Also it's hard to tell EXACTLY where the "button" is registering a hit.

This is why it's recommended that you use a light swipe, or at least "press" the "button" with the whole pad of your finger as opposed to the very tip of your finger.

It took me a little while to get used to it, but now I like it better than the jumpier buttons on other phones. On EVO for example I keep accidentally hitting "home" while playing Angry Birds...

 

[caliskimmer]

Capacitive touch tech works by changing the electrical conductivity of a panel, as the human body is also a conductor.

The buttons on the Epic are capacitive, but are programmed oddly. They seem to require a longer or lingering touch to register. This is probably a timing in software. Also it's hard to tell EXACTLY where the "button" is registering a hit.

This is why it's recommended that you use a light swipe, or at least "press" the "button" with the whole pad of your finger as opposed to the very tip of your finger.

It took me a little while to get used to it, but now I like it better than the jumpier buttons on other phones. On EVO for example I keep accidentally hitting "home" while playing Angry Birds...

Thanks for clarifying, I was about to explain the capacitive button technology. So it's a software issue, but not reachable through users or hackers?

 

[PoundSand]

wow.

You can slide your finger across all 4 icons but without pressure it wont respond ;-)

incorrect.

i think they work from heat...

also incorrect.

Capacitive touch tech works by changing the electrical conductivity of a panel

also incorrect.


Capacitance - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Touchscreen - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[raiderep]

+1 PoundSand. Mine don't work with a 'hover' over the button but they respond to any finger touch, not pressing. I think what's going on here is some folks have defective buttons and don't realize it. If I swipe very lightly across all four they go nutz and blink. Try this while the phone is booting or just busy doing something and you should see them blinking.

sent by an Epic4g through the cosmos

 

[caliskimmer]

What it looks like is that there seems to be an uneven sensitivity for the cap. buttons across all the Epics. It's almost if they've all been programmed differently. I can back raiderep with this one as my former Epic's capacitive buttons were amazing.

 

[caliskimmer]

wow.



incorrect.



also incorrect.



also incorrect.


Capacitance - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Touchscreen - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Dang it, I didn't read the post correctly. This is the right stuff here. Thanks for finally getting this definition down. lol.

 

[SomeAudioGuy]

Ok PoundStatic Nice Wiki link there, so nice to see you can snarkily use google... and maybe I got A WORD wrong, but this sounds pretty close to what I was talking about.

From the wiki:
A capacitive touchscreen panel consists of an insulator such as glass, coated with a transparent conductor such as indium tin oxide (ITO).[7][8] As the human body is also a conductor, touching the surface of the screen results in a distortion of the body's electrostatic field, measurable as a change in capacitance. Different technologies may be used to determine the location of the touch. The location is then sent to the controller for processing.

Or one could also say a measurable change to the electricity conducted through a material panel.

 

[caliskimmer]

Ok PoundStatic Nice Wiki link there, so nice to see you can snarkily use google... and maybe I got A WORD wrong, but this sounds pretty close to what I was talking about.

From the wiki:
A capacitive touchscreen panel consists of an insulator such as glass, coated with a transparent conductor such as indium tin oxide (ITO).[7][8] As the human body is also a conductor, touching the surface of the screen results in a distortion of the body's electrostatic field, measurable as a change in capacitance. Different technologies may be used to determine the location of the touch. The location is then sent to the controller for processing.

Or one could also say a measurable change to the electricity conducted through a material panel.

I'm going to thank you to for your answer.

 

[SomeAudioGuy]

So basically, wiki link definition throwing around notwithstanding, the main thing we're getting at here is that there is an odd (most likely) software behavior behind how the capacitive buttons on the Epic work.

I'm pretty recently out of Windows Mobile, where yuo could hack this kinda stuff to within an inch of it's life just by jumping into the registry, but is there an Android analogy?