News Optimus keyboard due out in a month

http://www.bit-tech.net/news/2008/01/08/optimus_keyboard_due_in_a_month/1

CES 2008 - Many who have followed industry news are quite familiar with the Optimus Maximus keyboard. We have good and bad news - it's out next month and we've played with it, but it costs $1500 USD.

 

meh

 

How easy are the keys to swap?

 

If you only buy 1 OLED key, does it come with normal keys for all the other positions, or do you also have to buy a set of normal keys as well?

 

1500 is ... ouch (even 500,- is for a keyboard)
On the other hand, it seems a great product and you get what you pay for.
I hope it will survive until I'm obscenely rich to buy one

 

They are very easy to swap,



they just pop out and you push it back in, there is a strip header the key presses into.



Couple of problems I saw were that it's WAAAAY to easy to get dirty, the keys are fingerprint magnets. One other more personal issue was that the keys were too smooth, so it really felt strange pressing on them. It was like they needed some roughness like normal keyboards have.

 

Of course it costs a lot, it's like having a few dozen mini monitors all lined up infront of you. You could probably use them like normal monitors too with the right software, have all pretty patterns and even watch movies on your keyboard. Lol, pointless, but cool.

 

The only reason I would want that keyboard is so to make ripples of colour spread from each keypress. That would look awesome. I generally don't ever look at my keyboard so displaying meaningful things on them would only be a gimmick.

 

Well I'm glad to see that the keyboard comes with a key lock to prevent people from taking it, on a another note the other keyboard that is in development on their site seems pretty cool as well. Also, is it just me or does the plastic on the keys look incredibly smudged?

 

Go ahead and lock the keyboard to the desk.... I'll just nab all your OLED keys and swap them for standard units ohlol

 

To me it's an obscene waste of resources in any way possible.
And where the black design with black buttons and black power and usb cord looks really good I don't understand why in H*** they've chosen to demonstrate it at CES using a white keyboard with black keys and black cords coming out of it. It looks like a monstrosity straight out of the 90s.
The original render was a beauty but this final product looks so sad IRL. The USB ports are okay sort of but the SD card sticking out? It's a freaking eye turd. And the cords are placed so you really notice them. The jacks should have been hidden so it was only the wires coming out. And that at the bottom of the keyboard. Not in the freakin' middle (horisontally). Strike 1 in my book.

I think some things went wrong at the last mile with this product. Unfortunately because the concept was b e a utiful.

 

warranty?

 

They have both colours at CES, Brett and I just managed to be in front of the white one.

You really cant see the SD Card, it's almost flush with the back when it is in.

 

I don't remember if Brett asked, I didn't, but the life of the keys he said is 20k hours. That might be the point where they are half as bright....

 

No, unfortunately I didn't really think to ask about warranty life. As Henry said, keys have about 20k hours mtbf. Oh, and a big thanks to him as my photographer for it (as I've no macro lens)

 

I want one.

 

http://www.artlebedev.com/everything/optimus-tactus/

Wow!