Sony Wireless Keypad - No love?

[Anapan]

I've had one of these for a couple of years, and just tried pairing it with my Android phone. It works perfectly. PC & Laptop? Yeah, it works there too. For the price, it's the best, cheapest, smallest wireless prehiperal I've ever owned. You can press a button on it to turn the keypad into a mouse touchpad. To me that's brilliant. It's going for about $40 here in Canada (I paid $15 at a pawn shop). I paid more than the full price of it for my other 3 Bluetooth keyboards (2 were portable and one with a touchpad on the side - all years ago). I never use them since I switched to RF for better battery life and responsiveness, but this may be my new standard while playing games rather than grab the full sized Logitech keyboard... On the PS3 the touchpad isn't so useful, but everywhere else it's really great! I can use this on my PC to control everything. Most of my other small keyboards don't have an ESC key, that means I can't get out of my current activity without going to another device (exit the emulator/stop the video and exit the player).

Is anyone else using this and their Sixaxis to control their media center PC?

[CavZee]

Actually forgot this thing existed. Heh.

[CRTGAMER]

Good info, getting it to work with your phone.

I tried the PS2 version of it, the Nyco iType2, but on the console. The keys are too tiny for me to get precise key entry on the fly, but I do like the wider placement of the analog sticks. Also have the ridiculously large Logitech Netplay Keyboard. Both have low use for the PS2 since there are only a few games that work with it.

[jinx]

I bought that thing and returned it on day 29. I don't know if it's my hate for the "texting" style of typing or the device it's self. I really gave it a chance by using it every day, but just couldn't do it. The buttons where difficult to press, I'd find myself hitting the wrong letters, and it took me too long to finish what I was trying to say. The keys just felt really stiff to me, and it was awkward to use. I loved the idea, and the fact I didn't have to keep the keyboard in my lap, but it just didn't work for me.

[Xeogred]

I take it it's USB like standard PS3 controllers? I've never plugged one into my PC before so I'm not sure if it's simple plug and play even with those too?

Would be cool if you could somehow map the joysticks to act like a mouse, lol. I've been considering wireless keyboard/mouses now since I dual monitor with my HDTV for media, so yeah maybe I'll have to check these out too.

[Anapan]

The wireless keypad is Bluetooth only, not USB interface (the mini-USB port is only for charging).
The Sixaxis is not USB either, you need to plug it into USB to make it connect to a computer via Bluetooth while using a special driver/program to make it work (they are both Bluetooth wireless HID).

You can map Directinput controllers on PC to act like a mouse. The program I use for that is Joyshock (previously commercial, but the company made it freeware before folding). I'm sure there are others, but it's always served my purposes. It takes into account analog sticks for mouse movement speed, but can emulate accelleration as well when you build the control profile. It also accepts hotkeys to move the mouse pointer into a position (like the start menu or top-right X to close).

The reason for making this post is I just found out that if you have a Bluetooth USB dongle or it's built into your computer the Sixaxis & the Sony Wireless Keypad can be used for everything and you dont need to use the analog sticks on the controller for mouse movement - The Wireless Keypad has the ability to be used as a mouse via it's keypad emulating a touch-pad like laptops have below their keyboard. With the two of them I can fairly comfortably control my PC without using a standard keyboard or mouse. Sure the buttons are small, and it's easier to grab a keyboard for writing stuff, but for gaming I do not need anything else but those devices.