[Tom]

A nifty new smartphone combines the traditional keyboard layout known as QWERTY with the slim lines of the kind of cellphone that usually offers just a number pad and a multitapping system to pick out letters.


The new smartphone -- a personal organizer combined with a wireless phone -- is a BlackBerry 7100t that works exclusively with T-Mobile service. It offers a new system -- a compromise of sorts -- for typing one letter per key. The 7100t also offers a host of other organizer, Internet and phone features that are both sophisticated and easy to use.


Smartphones -- which combine personal organizers with wireless phone and Internet service -- traditionally offer one of two systems for entering words.


Those that resemble regular cellphones usually offer just a number pad for dialing numbers and a multitapping system for typing. For instance, the ''2'' key can be used to write a, b or c. To spell out words, you must tap once to select the first letter, a quick two times for the second and three times for the third.

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