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Optimus Keyboard Starts Shipping
Tom's Hardware is reporting that the Optimus keyboard that everyone was so anxious for (although maybe less so when they saw the price tag) started shipping this week. "According to an announcement made on the Optimus project blog, keyboards are now shipping to customers who pre-ordered the $1564 keyboard nine months ago. Keyboards with passive keys are delayed and will be shipping in about a month, the manufacturer said. [...] Earlier this month, one of the first Optimus Maximus keyboards was sold for $2750 on Ebay." Engadget even got the chance to test one of these expensive toys out.
-LEDs are bright and clear
-Key Image Editing is quick and painless (use your graphic editor of choice)
-Still some quirks to work out with Macs
-High-quality parts and construction
-Requires extra strength for keypresses, so unsuitable for typing more than a few minutes.
Je me fous du passé
according to Engadget, not only is it wildly expensive, but it's painful to type on. I wish form followed function a little more often in the gadget world.
... Maximus keyboards was sold for $2750 And then when Russel Crow saw it, he went and got Litigiosus Andronicus and did the same.I think I have some good ideas for some more keyboard names:
My work here is dung.
Reminds me of the new style Bloomberg keyboard which is also huge and awkward to use.
...now what does it offer that makes it so special? Screens in the keys? I can get stickers if I wanted or maybe even swap the keys.
I think I shall call this new keyboard, Optimus Prime!
The DC supply plugs into the back of the keyboard, ugly for such a otherwise expensive and well designed keyboard.
Why couldn't they have a split end on the keyboard cable with the DC input and USB connections, that way you would have no DC cable in sight.
ALL my keys would be Tatu jpgs. Fuck the Optimus anyhow - I have a Lemur!
While it is cool and all. I think Multi-Touch displays may make these keyboards obsolete and perhaps cheaper too.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
So, the keyboard is painfully inadequate at doing the one thing keyboards are suppodes to be doing: data input. Kinda like a solid gold mouse that won't track, or a 80-inch monitor that won't display better than 800x600. Pretty pointless.
____
~ |rip/\/\aster /\/\onkey
This thing is the dumbest thing ever. Even more useless than the display on the G15 gaming keyboard. Who fricking watches the keys while typing or gaming?! And according to the review typing sucks on this keyboard. WTF? A keyboard that does not allow you to type properly has no reason to exist. And what looney pays $2750 for it?
Made by idiots, for idiots.
Flame on!
You know it makes sense, a little reminder from jointm1k.
I hope they have a built-in keymap setting for Duke Nukem Forever.
Since these things appear to be mostly geared toward Windows users (yes, I know, some Mac too) it's only a matter of time before somebody releases as script-kiddy utility for pwning your friends' and enemies' keyboard OLEDs.
I can see it now. Grandma is surfing for recipes and all of a sudden her nice new keyboards starts showing all sorts of inappropriate text and images.
And plus apparently it sucks as a keyboard.
-WtC
*** $!g +yP3d 0n 0p+!^^u$ k3Yb0@Rd ***
Creator of RPerl, Scouter, Juggler, Mormon, Perl Monger, Serial Entrepreneur, Aspiring Astrophysicist, Community Organiz
You know the ones I mean.
The simple truth is that interstellar distances will not fit into the human imagination
- Douglas Adams
I like the key of the two nekked chicks making out just below the YouTube and above the Excel keys....
Nice to know it's no longer vaporware, but I think I'll have to wait until the price drops by about $1500. Hopefully enough early-adopters are insane enough to blow $1500+ on this thing to expose as many likely bugs as possible.
I thought this had been relegated to "vaporware" a couple of years ago. It's nice to see they are finally are producing them.
I love the concept, although I'm not as excited about having the standard alpha/numeric keys in OLED, having all the function and option keys configurable like that is a fantastic idea.
Hopefully the price will come down and the engineering will get better. I actually think it would be great for laptops- where there are so many special function keys that can be difficult to see in dimly-lit environments. OLEDs are supposed to be extremely energy efficient, but I'll admit they would probably still use an excessive amount of battery power.
As for this- I need something I can type on all day that doesn't cost $450.
Oh, wait, no Linux support. Just lost all of my interest.
- Typing on it, well, sucks. We kind of hate to say it, but this thing more than likely won't replace what ever keyboard you're writing your novel on - it's better off used as an absurdly configurable swiss army knife for tasks like gaming, Photoshop, or just about any other productivity app that doesn't require a lot of typing.
- Okay, why does typing on the Optimus suck, you ask? Well, although the keyboard uses mechanical switches and a lot of high quality components (evident when we pulled off some keys), and there is some clicky tactility to keypresses, as a whole it just requires way too much force to depress keys. And the larger the key, the more force is required, so enter is easier than space, but harder than tab. Let's put it this way, we sit around and type all day long and this thing wore us out in about 30 seconds to a minute. Carpal sufferers, beware.
What better way to spend well over a grand, I say!To do list for Windows
No wireless. More keyforce than an IBM Model M. Lame.
Welcome to the Panopticon. Used to be a prison, now it's your home.
Speaking of which, the full blown 103 programmable key version is $1564, but with less programmable keys it is cheaper. As follows:
Unfortunately, the G-15 does exactly what the Optimus will be doing 99.9% of the time, for $1450 less.
Also there's the Catch-22 that no geek actually looks at the keyboard whilst typing, so the demographic most likely to think it's cool is also the least likely to need it.
https://www.eff.org/https-everywhere
You must be new here. I know that that's right when the government satellites will get me, why do you think the planes fly at such a huge altitude when they don't have to?! Duh, so that its easier for the satellites to brain scan you!
But in all seriousness, I believe most of that movie (The Gladiator) was fabricated. Yes, there was a 'Maximus' (if that was his name) but the events surely did not transpire as they did in the movie. It's not like I'm making fun of "I Claudius" or actual documentaries on Rome.
My work here is dung.
Then the Destroyer will plug the Optimus into the Phantom, boot Duke Nukem Forever, and the universe will come to an end.
www.eFax.com are spammers
...since the price has apparently dropped from $1500+ to "only" $462, according to Lebedev's website. And as a $600 iPhone owner, I thought Apple was bad. I suppose at that price I could almost give it serious consideration, but I think I'll wait it out for v2.0.
How are sites slashdotted when nobody reads TFAs?
people still read that site? I thought it had faded away or was that Anand?
"And the larger the key, the more force is required, so enter is easier than space, but harder than tab. " whothehellneedsspacewhentheygota$2750oledkeyboard?
alias possession='chmod 666 satan && ls
The Inputbots wage their battles to destroy the evil forces of the Displayicons.
Of course, that may be a US-centric view of what a keyboard should look like, but I bet that since most of the standard alphanumeric keys don't need to be changed often, it is a waste of OLED functionality. We just want to make our programmable keys prettier.
*Sigh* It'll never happen... how many people (especially Grandma-types) have esoteric things like 17" LCDs or CRTs attached to their computer? We'll just have to stick to offending them through their Optimus Keyboards- at least they all have one of them!
"Slashdot - News and Chat Sites Deviant". (Click "homepage" link above for details).
You're not supposed to run the Optimus through the dishwasher if it gets dirty and crusty? :) And unless you're filthy rich, you can't chuck it and buy a new one.
So you either:
Type with gloves on;
Use in a clean room;
Spend a painstaking amount of time cleaning it.
The Optimus is best at home among all those other impractical gadgets, usually found in HOUSE OF THE FUTURE! exhibits, that aren't used by real people...
Am I seeing this properly? Are the hot keys in the second column in the engadget article as follows?
Firefox, Youtube link, Lesbian porn link!?
Well, what will probably happen first is the phantom, running DNF, will receive a specific keystroke set from the optimus and will initiate the processing sequence that provides the ultimate question to the ultimate answer.
THEN the universe will end.
Hey, if the tech industry keeps this kind of thing up, we might see a demo of Duke Nukem forever soon!
Obligatory blog plug: http://www.caseybanner.ca/
But seriously, I don't look at my keyboard. When I was but a wee tyke I took typing class and haven't looked down since. While I can appreciate the novelty of having it, how often does anyone look at their keyboard long enough to appreciate this while actually doing work? Is there something I'm just not getting here?
Prediction: The real iPhone killer is going to be sex robots from Japan. Think about it.
When I first saw this keyboard about a year ago (I think) I thought it was extremely cool and wanted one myself. Now I look at it and wonder "what's the point?"
Obviously it'll get most use out of games where re-mapping keys is essential. But how often do you look at your keyboard while playing a game? I know I never do. I memorize the mapping.
Maybe the keyboard would make it easy to switch to different mapping sets.. but I'm sure there's software that will do the same thing, and not cost $1800.
"Action without philosophy is a lethal weapon; philosophy without action is worthless."
Now we actually CAN download keyboard drivers!
Proud member of the American Non Sequitur Society. We might not make much sense, but boy do we love pizza!
* Product that even Apple fanboys consider high-priced
Engadget also has a video they posted here.
http://www.engadget.com/2008/02/22/video-optimus-maximus-install-setup-configurator-and-use/
HOWEVER the video is currently broke. I'd expect them to have it fixed soon for your viewing pleasure.
The greatest revenge in life is massive success.
After 30 years working on those typewriters she is still not confortable with modern computer keyboards. Her hands just fly to fast (and hard) and she is always talking about "those old good times" when you needed to actually PRESS a key and not touch it to write.
So I guess this keyboard will appeal to some people anyway.
It's time to realise that Abble's products are the biggest abomination these days. Just say NO to the dumb iAbble way!!
If you have to look at the keys to figure out which finger to press down, you're typing way, way, way too slowly to be getting serious work done. You might as well use a mouse and an on-screen keyboard, I'd think.
but I'd never pay for it. I would like a keyboard better than the generic (Windows) PC or Mac keyboards. Does there exist a keyboard without the Windows or Mac option keys anymore? I'd love to get one (new) if it costs less than $30.
In the Engadget article, one of the keys has a picture of two girls holding one cup. I'm not certain that's what I think it is.... Even if it's not, kudos to Engadget for the implied reference.
... the year of Optimus on the desktop.
What's next? Duke Nukem Forever?
Never underestimate the bandwidth of a station wagon full of tapes hurtling down the highway. -- Andrew S. Tanenbaum
After that, the screens on each key will be covered by cheetos and doritos crumbs
*Ducks*
3 usb cables? : /
Setup, config and testing.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LvExx3YAyFQ
The greatest revenge in life is massive success.
Nah. It will just respond "INSUFFICIENT DATA FOR MEANINGFUL ANSWER".
You'll have to wait a little while for a Multivac capable of answering that one.
Slideshow... boring; losing... consciousnesssssssssssssssss
Oh, say does that Star-Spangled Banner entwine / The myrtle of Venus with Bacchus's vine?
Keyboard,..$1500
Baby with glass of koolaid,..$1
Finding out your $1500 dollar keyboard no longer works,..Priceless
Same here, when I learned to type on old cast iron manual typewriters it was a contact sport...I even managed to break my model M years later because I still type that way, hard to unlearn it it appears......I am not fast, but am quite "authoritative" when I type, heh.
I think people who grew up with electrics and computer keyboards are probably better and faster typists though, as a sort of general rule of thumb. Less motion and effort is just bound to be faster.
I bought a fifteen dollar keboard ten years ago and still use it as my primary typing instrument. It's the cheapest, most basic layout you could ever find. I went out of my way to find something that didn't have all kinds of hotkeys built into the top and an uncomfortable plastic wrist "rest" along the bottom (as I like my gel one just fine).
"He who can destroy a thing, controls a thing." --Paul Atreides, Dune
Touch typing
Some of us get tired of waiting too long though.
Besides, you'd think by now, that the answer would be obvious.
This space for rent. All reasonable inquiries will be entertained at proprietors discretion.
I don't think you'll have to worry much; the fourth vaporware horseman was Longhorn/Vista.
Playing Duke Nukem Forever with an Optimus keyboard on Windows Vista... somehow I think the "apocalypse" you mention would exist only in the system running it.
- RG>
Hey pal, this isn't a pleasantforest, so don't waste my time with pleasantries!
For some reason, I feel like a larger display should have been used on the spacebar and modifier keys? Obviously, it's not necessary for the intended purpose, but to me it just looks wrong.
- RG>
Hey pal, this isn't a pleasantforest, so don't waste my time with pleasantries!
$1500+ and no MIDI connectors? That seems pretty cheesy. How's the piano sound?
Squirrel!
/me huggles AC HTH--HAND :-D
Crap. What did the new CSS do with the "Post anonymously" option??
For me, maximizing physical desk space is very important. Plus, I touch type.
But it certainly does look like a neat device. Kudos to Lebedev for getting to a point where they can actually ship this beast. I know what it's like to hanker after a cool new gadget, so I send my best wishes to all those who have been aching to get their fingers on one of these things.
I can remember clearly every time my geek gland kicked in and made me super-excited about getting some new toy. Last time it was when LED flashlights began to filter onto the market; I spent nearly eighty bucks on a killer LED flashlight which takes 3 D-cells, and was overjoyed to do so. Before that, it was a mini lap-top which had no moving parts (other than the keys and the screen) and which specialized in word-processing and document reading; the Asus EEE would have satisfied me in a big way, but this was a few years back and the best I was able to do was an old HP Jornada 820 found on eBay, (and which I use a heckuva lot more than that flashlight, but LED flashlights are still super-cool IMHO). --Before that, it was one of those lightsaber toys with the extending blade. Very exciting days! Oooh! And long before that, I remember being really pumped to get one of the original mini-leatherman tools. I've had that for nearly twenty years and I still used it regularly. Great gadget!
So enjoy your funky keyboards!
-FL
I will personally neuter anyone who buys this and leaves it in qwerty.
Not necessary, but here's a slideshow from CES this year of photos that I took:
http://flickr.com/search/show/?q=maximus&w=91852742%40N00
This thing way too damn expensive. That's for sure.
except for the fact that it's really wide and keyspacing is kinda odd...
It's great to use some of the memory used/cpu usage monitors to check system activity during system-intensive processes. is the system frozen? I can look to see if the memory and cpu meter is pegged. If it shows idle then I know I screwed up something in that last application I ran.
used as a media progress timer and such, lets me stay full screen and still check what point the video is at for future editing or reference. Also lets me shut down the monitor when the computer is just playing background mp3's, I can see what's up on the display.
Plus, huge programmable macro keys are cool. Good enough to get some people banned from certain MMO's. And, it's a good solid keyboard. Over a year old and still typing fine.
Plus, I got it cheap because the box was damaged:)
But the Optimus? I can't even get overpaid, Mac using (image obsessed), wannabe tech weenies to think it's a cool idea-not even if it was $500. Guys that'll buy iPhones, $100 "audiophile" speaker cables and Wacom Cintiq drawing tablets (personally purchased to do a few photo edits at work) say they "can't see any use" for it, even if it were a third the price. At $1500, not even the former dot-com millionaire is interested.
My computer is less than a year old. My keyboard is 15 years old. It's so old I have an AT->PS2->USB adapter just to get it to work with my present computer.
You have to be careful when talking about resistance. Old skool keyboards are considered good because there is a significant difference in force from before the key has activated to after it has been activated. So if you just nudge a key, it has some firm resistance, then when it clicks, it has almost no resistance at all (at least until you hit bottom). But since the portion of the key press where resistance is firm is so short, it still doesn't take much effort to press keys, and it's also very easy to tell by touch whether or not you were successful in a key activation.
The problem with most modern keyboards is they're light, AND they're light for the whole press - so it's very easy to accidentally press a key to the point that it moves, and then very hard to tell whether it moved far enough that you got a keypress you didn't want. Now, if instead of a modern LIGHT keyboard you just have a modern HEAVY keyboard (more resistance), it may be harder to accidentally press a key, but you still don't have good tactile feedback as to whether you've actually pressed a key or not (you've traded not knowing if you accidentally pressed a key for not knowing if you successfully pressed one) and have just made your fingers work harder.
The trick is a short, firm press to activation, then a click to long light press after that.
paintball
Do people still look at their keyboards?
I won't buy one, but maybe someday I will buy something with cool cheap displays, in part, because early adopters helped bring the price down for the rest of us.
You just feel bad because there is some dummy out there that has $2750 in discretionary income that you'd like to have.
This issue is a bit more complicated than you think.
One keyboard with all keys passive for sale. Reply to this add for details.
Now the road has been paved for Duke Nukem Forever to come out, with Chinese Democracy as the soundtrack.
"Champagne for my real friends - and real pain for my sham friends!" http://ericblade.postalboard.com/
Picture based password entry - you type in your password by selecting a series of images selected from the keyboard - for extra security you have the picture selections shuffle around the keys after each key press - yeah I know - that'll be a pain hunting for the correct sequence, but at least anyone trying to use a keyboard sniffer will be suitably thwarted (until such time as they come up with a way to intercept all those keyboard commands and responses being sent to and from the keyboard and the computer).
"Also note that they only seem to make keyboards with the PS/2 interface-- not USB."
I'm typing this on a USB "Model M"...
(Actually this one: http://pckeyboards.stores.yahoo.net/en104bl.html )
I managed to wreck one a few months ago by spilling a cup of tea into it. I went three weeks on a more modern squishy keyboard before I gave in and ordered a new one.
No sig today...
"Problem: Design a smart remote control that is truly configurable but completely intuitive to use."
(Mr. Lebedev, let me know if you are looking for a product manager.)
...if Ferraris were faster and a fifth as expensive I might think about getting one.
No, this is for people doing video editing or music production or other multimedia editing, where you might easily have a couple of hundred functions tucked away behind various Ctrl-Shift-Alt key combinations, and which change depending on which edit screen you're in, or which function key you just pressed. If you're in an audio editor, and you mark out a section of audio, there might easily be forty or fifty different functions that you might want to apply to that block: cut/copy/paste/save-as-file/silence/optimise/filter/replace/retune/add-to-library ... the list goes on and on (when I was prototyping an all-out audio editor once, I think I had about sixty different region-edit functions).
If you're using one of these programs, the main function of the keyboard isn't inputting text, it's launching functions and actions by key-command shortcut so that the user doesn't have to dig through menus and dialog boxes. And of course, the big problem is that although a keyboard has enough buttons to launch all these functions, they aren't written on the keys, and even if you buy a custom keyboard for something like Logic (with the commands printed on the key-caps), you don't have context-sensitivity or proper customisability, and if the company adds or changes key-commands on a new software update, you're left behind. If you use a couple of different audio editing apps and a couple of video editors, plus a few other bits of specialist software, plus photoshop, and you can't face the idea of ordering seven different custom keyboards and finding some way to switch between them, then this is probably a very nice gadget for a cramped pre-production studio.
Keep a cheap generic keyboard tucked away under the desk for those times that you need to do some serious typing.
Eric Baird
I too used to be a limp-fingered effete typist, pussyfied by the zero-resistance keys of modern laptops. And then, five years ago, by chance I found salvation. My baby was an ancient, grime-encrusted Fujitsu 4700 -- a genuine steel-spring keyboard from the dawn of the computing age, lying dejected in the used-parts bin. I brought it home, cleaned it up, plugged it in, and discovered that it took the force of my whole arm to depress a key. Typing "hello world" tired me out. But I knew that I would master the keyboard if I was to preserve my self-respect. So I began my training. The first month was a haze of pain. The first year, I felt I would develop carpal tunnel. The second year, the pain started to fade. And now? Now, I type in ecstasy, as the metal-on-metal racket of the 4700's keys thunders through the rooms of my house and scares my neighbors' pets. And with every key press of that hoary input device, I broadcast to the world: "I am a man, and I am alive!"
Anyway: my point is, no pain, no gain. If typing on a buckling-spring keyboard does not train your finger muscles, then why would you want to buy one?
Just to be consistent with it's user base demographics...
A fool throws a stone into a well and a thousand sages can not remove it.
Dude, you really don't want me to meet your sister!
-mcgrew
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest