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New Keyboard Technology
An anonymous reader sent in linkage to a story running on a few places about a
new customizable keyboard. It's a bit beyond anything you've probably seen before. Also
tom's has more.
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I always hear about these great keyboards, and I'd love to try one out, but they're never available in retail outlets like Circuit City or Masters Electronics. I always see your typical rectangular keyboard there, or those ergo keyboards. But never any of the really innovative ones like this! If they could get these sold in larger retail stores, then perhaps people would actually start transitioning to them. As long as I have to order them online, I won't buy them.
Cyric Zndovzny at your service.
Now I can have my CTRL+ALT+DEL keys in range for easy access!
Picture 1
Picture 2
Quite neat concept.
Dephine URL
That thing looks painful to use. I have enough trouble with a normal keyboard layout, but there's really no point to putting keys anywhere but directly under your fingertips where you don't have to move to reach them.... which is exactly what the CLAW has solved:
http://www.claw.com.au/
(It's been out for 5 years now too)
Looks like a pretty cool keyboard for hardcore gamers. But I just can't justify spending $149 on a keyboard.
Press Command-Spacebar to switch the layout from Qwerty to Dvorak in 10.4 - 0 dollars
Getting your own thread on Fark with pictures of Darwin after you starve to death clutching your $150 keyboard -- priceless
eve though there re oly 25 kes it works gret
Do not try to read the dupe, thats impossible. Instead, only try to realize the truth
What truth?
There is no dupe
How exactly can they claim that this is ergonomic, when they leave the layout to users, who may know nothing about ergonomics, and thus, create joint-damaging layouts?
Seems obvious, really. If I want to switch to an APL or Dvorak keyboard (or in a multinational european environment, different people using the same computer have different national keyboard preferences), the glyphs on the keyboard should change!
Combined with repositionable keys like the subject of this story, that would be pretty interesting.
The Belkin Nostromo n52 (http://www.tomshardware.com/game/200403061/) is sort of the same concept, with a bit of a compomise between features and ergonomics. Not all of the buttons are directly beneath a finger tip, but the use of shift states increases the number of configurable buttons to 104. D-pad and scroll wheel are there, too.
Long signatures suck.
the CLAW
The CLAW has 10 "keys" and every FPS made in the last 5+ years has dozens of keys that are needed to play well. The reviews I've seen don't mention any way around this problem, which to me says there isn't one.
And don't bring up that you can map the keys to do different things. That's not what I mean, I want to be able to move (4 keys), walk, crouch, jump (3 more), go next/previous weapon (2 more), select each weapon type (usually 9), talk (1) with only my team (1) or with everybody nearby (1). Then I'd like a few keys that do special functions like throw a grenade and then switch back to my weapons (Let's say 3). I'm sure I'm forgetting some, but right there we have 24 needed keys. This doesn't even have half that.
Pulp Audio Weekly - Geek News and Reviews
now not only do you have to memorize blank keys, you you have to memorize where you placed them! Genious!
*extra cost of 100 dollars to remove paint.
Well, maybe not.... I doubt your average high end gamer can do much better then the already available input modes for games that have had billions of dollars and over a dozen years of research put into them. And isn't this what hotkeys are for? Maybe for $50, I'd get one, but for $150, nah, I think this $12 IBM keyboard (or another alternative that isn't too much over $50) will do just fine....
In undeveloped countries, the consumer controls the market. In capitalist America, the market controls you.
It seems like this keyboard only gives you the power to make your situation worse.
On a normal keyboard, with the keys staggered, each finger can reach five keys easily - the one it's hovering over, and the two above and two below it.
On this fancy one, they have the keys arranged in a grid (which is the only other basic key pattern I can think of when you're working with a flat surface). In this situation, each finger can only reach three keys easily. And I fail to see what advantage straight up and down motion has over up and to the side a bit.
Other than that, I think the difference is just the angle of the keys with respect to your hand or body. I always figured it would be sufficient (and about $160 cheaper) to turn the keyboard. It's for gaming - you're only using one hand, anyway.
Now, if it were about 10 years ago and you wanted to make one of these with two or four separate pads on which you could arrange the keys so that several people could work from the same logical keyboard device for all those old multiple-players-on-the-same-screen games where you had to share the keyboard with your buddies, then we'd be talking.
When I heard about this a couple months ago it was of course a new and uniqe gadget and so I couldn't resist ordering one. Got the second set of keys and a spare plastic top panel so you can swap between a couple key layouts quickly.
The hardware is well made, the keys are high quality, and the software works fine (running under XP SP2 on a Dell gaming laptop).
I haven't done that much with it really yet. I think the problem with the device is that it basically does a good job of putting a lot of buttons within reach of your hand, but then a $10 keyboard also does an excellent job of doing this.
But the product does what it claims to, so if you want lots of customizable buttons I would have no reservations about recommending the Ergodex.
G.
That claw doesn't look to comfortable to me...
I have CTS (Carpal Tunnel) and my wrist bones have been fused in both hands since birth. I can't use any funky gadget like that one.
However.. having a keyboard where I could put the keys anywhere I want is a rediculously great trade up for me, and it'll help speed up my typing even more. One of the problems I have with English are the letters like Q and X. I'd much rather have a button like "Qu" and "Ch", or how about "Ea" and "ou", or any other super common letter combination. With the built in macro recorder, I could have my buttons exactly as I want them.
The only disappointment really is that this isn't a tap screen. I've been wanting a touchpad keyboard for some time that allowed for reconfigurable letter definitions.. Perhaps I'll get around to building it one of these days.
"Victory means exit strategy, and it's important for the President to explain to us what the exit strategy is." G.W.Bush
I bought an Ergodex keyboard exclusively for gaming a few months ago. It took them 4 weeks to fill the order -- apparently, they haven't been able to scale large enough to distribute through the retail chains.
Being able to move the keys around is just one of many features that make the Ergodex valuable to me. You can also program complex macros and key-chords to a single keystroke on the fly. You can fine tune the timing of the individual keystrokes to the millisecond.
Right now I have my Ergodex set up for World of Warcraft. Anyone who has a few high level characters in the game know how quickly you fill up your toolbars with hotkeys and macros. The ergodex allows me to have an extra couple rows of hotkeys placed exactly where I want them. It also lets me chain precicely timed combos in a way that WoW's UI won't let you do at all.
The Ergodex will store profiles for different programs and automatically switch to that profile when you run the program as well. The buttons have great tactile feedback, and when you anchor them on the Ergodex they do not shift or wiggle one bit. You can also buy extra keys and an extra clear transparent keytray so that you can swap out entire sets.
At $150, it's not cheap. But considering that i've spent $400 for my graphics card that I'll end up replacing in 2 years, I expect to get a lot more bang for my buck with this upgrade. I wouldn't consider gaming without one now.
Oh, right, yeah. And the next thing you're going to demand is being able to change to an APL font without changing the spastic golf ball.
This is the real world, buddy.
KFG
Do shift+alt+numlock and magically numpad5 becomes your left mousebutton.
(in X11 this is, in windows it's ctrl+alt+numlock if I'm not mistaking)
"The day Microsoft makes a product that doesn't suck is the day they make a vacuum cleaner."
You could build a keyboard out of these switches but at this point it'd be a little large (i don't think the switches are available in key-sizes), and they're expensive. Nifty idea though.
A keyboard with LCDs on each key seems like it would be needlessly expensive. You can get full LCD-touch screens where you can make a keyboard, but even this has a very niche appeal: it doesn't give the same feedback of a regular keyboard and, of course, the LCD is prone to getting dirty & misregistering strokes (especially in a multiuser environment).
It might be cool to hack one of those virtual keyboards. You know, the ones that project the keys via a laser. This would be cheaper & more maintainable than LCDs, but still no feed-back.
For personal use & for the money, I'd just get an old IBM Model-M & put the keycaps in whatever order I wanted.
A keyboard for EMACS!
Why not fork?
Argh - I wish you'd have looked harder sooner.
c tive ... they recently ceased operations. Maybe you can still get one. Reconfigurable with their Java tool, huge touchscream, low force needed, etc. I only have their iGesture - I didn't want to fork over the cash for the keyboard untested, but after realizing that I still need a general purpose mouse but at least the keyboard would have reduced that need - I went back looking, and found they'd closed shop.
Touchstream LP
http://www.fingerworks.com/
http://www.google.com/search?q=touchstream&safe=a
I don't know the situation behind it all, but it seems like they could've lowered their pricing before going out of business and saved their butts - maybe they never really broke even so they couldn't.
cyn, free software and *nix operating systems enthusiast.
i think they should make a keyboard with analog key setup for gaming (so i dont need a walk/run toggle button) that woudl kick ass.
is there such a thing out? and woudl any game make use of it right away?
Movies made by a crazy person
http://www.youtube.com/marginalpro
Wow, remind me to use the preview button... Try this
No, I tought so. I'm still clacking away at my old IBM Buckling Spring keyboard. This keyboard has lasted since 1987, and is the best one I've ever came by to write on. So it's such a pity that they can't make new keyboards, with all the fashionate hotkeys, and loose keys (yes, I know this keyboard has loose keycaps) and such, with proper Buckling Spring switches under each key.
Sure, it'd cost twice as much, but maybe I for once would get a new keyboard? Ok, I'm not the target group for this new keyboard, but still. If I found a new and attractive keyboard (which I find all the time, like logitech's wireless), but with real buckling spring, I'd buy it at once, even if it'd cost a few hundred dollars.
Those rubber-dome keyboards is just shitty to write on! So if anyone knows of a black keyboard, that ain't so deep as the Model M, has some hotkeys and has real Buckling Spring mechanism, I'll buy it at once.
Me wants a real keyboard!Assembling etherkillers for fun an profit
I think the point he's trying to make is that he wants to see it in real life and maibe even try it before he buys it, somthing that isn't possible when buying online.
Probably to make shure he isn't buying the famous cat in a bag.
All indicators show that the human race is selectively breeding itself for stupidity.
Take you original 10$ keyboard, might be even wired one. Pull out ANY KEYS and leave only the key combination you desire, there are practically countless combinations(!!!).
Now all you need is a software like Girder or any macro related application and fire your personal shooter away.
Here are some examples.
140$ saved!
Read about this last year:4 ,00.asp
http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,1558,155513
If you can go without tactile feedback, there's a neater toy you could buy. Check out the Fingerworks Touchstream LP. The entire thing is reconfigurable. The key layout shown is just an overlay. You can replace it with one for a dvorak keyboard or create your own. It also has the added benefit of mouse emulation so you don't have to take your hands away from the "keys." The technology is similar to the trackpad used on a standard laptop, only a bit more sophisticated. It can track all your fingers at once along with the amount of pressure being applied. Downside is that it's a bit spendy. $350 last time I checked. :(