The SIP Shootout over at Eten Blog dot Com comes to a close today as we announce our winners of the various categories. If you have yet to read Parts I, II and III of the SIP Shootout series, we recommend you start with that before proceeding with this article. Otherwise, you’ll miss all the fun of the various tests we conducted. However, for those of you who can’t wait to see which SIP reigns supreme, then this is the moment you have been waiting for. Before we announce the winners and our choices, let’s recap the top SIP(s) in the various categories.

Top SIPs

• Availibility of SIPs - Keyboard, Block/Letter Recognizer, Transcriber.
• Storage Space Uptake - Keyboard (PocketCM).
• Screen Coverage - Transcriber.
• Predictive Text Input - Phone Pad (HTC), TouchPal (Cootek), TenGO (TenGO), Keyboard (PocketCM).
• Stylus Requirement - Transcriber.
• Quick Messaging Entry - Keyboard, Block/Letter Recognizer, Keyboard (PocketCM), Easy Keyboard (Eten).
• Ease of Use On The Move - TouchPal (Cootek).
• Accurate Entries - Easy Keyboard (Eten), Phone Pad (HTC).

Awards

Well there’s no point to have a SIP shootout without giving out awards to the winning SIPs so here it is. If you are looking to try out a new SIP, these awards will definitely help you in making that decision.

Overall Top SIP: Keyboard (PocketCM)

This award is given to the SIP that scores the highest in all the tests we conducted. These tests are the usual features a user would be looking at when choosing a SIP so that summation of all the scores would show the one leading the pack. Thus it is no surprise that Keyboard by PocketCM comes in tops because it ranked highly in most of the tests conducted.

Best SIP For Single-Handed Use: Phone Pad (HTC)

This award is given to the SIP that is easiest to use when you are on the move. While we did have a category for one-handed use SIPs, this is more of an overall result that included other factors as well. While you want a SIP that had big keys for easy entries, you would also want one that allowed you to enter those data accurately and be able to quick message. In this case, Phone Pad (HTC) came in first with Keyboard by PocketCM coming in a close second, just 0.5 points behind.

Best SIP For Long Messages: TouchPal (Cootek)

When it comes to long messages, having a good message can save you a lot of time. In deciding the winner of this award, we summed up Availability, Screen Coverage, Predictive Text Input, Ease of Use and Accurate Entries. When writing long messages, you want as much screen space as possible and while TouchPal by Cootek does not score well in this area, it does well in other areas which are just as important. It should be noted that TouchPal and Phone Pad scored the same in this award but we decided to give it to TouchPal because anyone could own it while having Phone Pad on your device is not (legally) possible unless you own certain HTC models.

Best SIP For Stylus Use: TenGO (TenGO)

What about users who love using the stylus? I was surprised but there are such users as well. If you fall into this category, then TenGO by TenGO is the SIP for you. It is small enough that you have a large area left for the screen while at the same time, you can choose to use predictive input or enter data character by character. If you tried using the same SIP without a stylus, you might end up making more mistakes due to the small space required for individual character input.

Most Intuitive SIP: Transcriber

If you had to choose which SIP was usable under any condition (where you have the option of using 2 hands), then the Transcriber would be it. You are familiar with the different characters and just tracing this out on your screen will input those characters. If you are having problems finding the keys for each character on a SIP, that problem does not exist with Transcriber.

Eten Blog dot Com’s Choice SIP: Keyboard (PocketCM)

This award is given based on user preference. Sometimes, no matter how you score a shootout, you just feel comfortable with one SIP, even if it ranks lowly. In this case however, our choice coincides with the Overall Top SIP. The reason we have chosen Keyboard by PocketCM is because it shows a lot of promise is currently free, has the smallest footprint and also usually provides us with fairly accurate data entries. It may not be as feature packed as other SIPs but it does what we need it to do and does it well.

Conclusion

We have tried to be as impartial as possible in this shootout. Nonetheless, others would have different opinions of this and we look forward to hearing from you how we could have made this shootout better. It would go a long way in improving upcoming series as well. As one reader had mentioned in an earlier comment, even though other SIPs may prove better, the fact that he is unable to get his various characters in his language on those SIPs have narrowed his choice to just a few.

So let us know your thoughts and leave a comment below. It will greatly help others in making SIP decision choices as well.

What’s your favorite SIP?

Tags: Series