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Optimus Mini Three OLED keyboard reviewed
Posted by
CmdrTaco
on Wed Sep 27, 2006 08:11 AM
from the well-thats-a-let-down dept.
from the well-thats-a-let-down dept.
Robbedoeske writes "The first Optimums Mini Three keyboards have been shipped to Holland and Tweakers.net managed to lay hands on one of them to review this precious gem." Apparently the drivers crash a lot, consume way to much CPU, the device is capable of only 3 frames per second, and the packaging makes the images look far more crisp than the actual device. And with a price tag of over $100, I'm scared to imagine what the price of a full keyboard will actually be should it ever actually ship. But it still would be neat.
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Don't worry (Score:5, Funny)
There's more to the Prime edition than meets the eye.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Per the article, the software is constantly updating the images to make sure they have the correct images, this is surely driving the CPU load higher than it needs to be
Re:Don't worry (Score:5, Insightful)
To me, this is a very cheap way to make the keyboard much more effecient, yet not raise the cost much at all ($10-20 max).
RonB
Parent
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
RonB
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
See here for hte docs and code [artlebedev.com]. This is really an Alpha version, but rapidly evolving according to TFA.
Any Key (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:2)
Keyboard not found. Press any key to continue.
Re:Any Key (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re:Any Key (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
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2 ways I saw of dealing with this stuff that were well done...
instead of "press any key to continue" pk-software (surely you remember pk-zip) used "press a key to continue" which meant that anyone with a brain would hit whatever they wanted, but those clueless types could press "a" and everything would be fine.
the second one was a keyboard I used to have, the main enter key was labelled "enter" but the one on the numeric keypad was labelled "return" (or vice-versa I can't r
Packaging? (Score:3, Insightful)
I am shocked... shocked I tell you to learn that the image on the package looks better than the actual device. How could this possibly have happened? Who would dream of such a thing?
Onto the device itself. I'm glad to see it develop and that it's more than just a concept. The technology is still in its infancy and it will take time for it to improve and come down to an affordable level. I'm looking forward to the day I can get a full keyboard like this.
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
*disclaimer: my PDA is about 6 years old, has 8mb ram, supports 16 shades of grey and a small but usable keyboard that you can actually type on, so i'm hardly the ultra techy ge
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The thing is about colour in a user interface; if you don't notice it, it's doing it's job. Colour cues should be unconscious and subtle, instructing your mind of the widgets function without you having to think of it.
Want to test this? Colour your "OK" option red and the cancel "green". See how many people it confuses.
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None of these applications require a switch
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Yes, only OLED technology allows them to achieve dazzling frame rates of 3 FPS.
I'm dumbfounded as to why they're shooting for the moon right out the game by trying to build devices with color OLEDs on every key. That's complicated and it's expensive -- save it for a later revision.
If they had done a first-pass design that used, say, 8x8 1-bit LCD matrices on the
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Of course, when it becomes ubiquitious, there will be certain downsides. You think the "zap the mosquito" ad is annoying now?
Wait until the mosquito starts buzzing around your keyboard.
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
Allow if it did, someone would write adblock to block the ads or TiVo for keyboards to skip the ads using magical time-shifting techniques.
L
wrapup (Score:5, Funny)
Has someone let Steve Ballmer know that Optimus has stolen Microsoft's marketing plan?????
"It still would be neat." (Score:2)
BUT I GOTTA HAVE IT!"
Steve Jobs must be behind this somewhere, because you are under the control of a powerful Reality Distortion Field.
Intresting.... but... (Score:4, Interesting)
Ugh.
I think a OLED full keyboard would be cool, but maybe if they used a double-USB device scheme it would be better: USB Keyboard and small USB storage for storing GIF files of each key.
dude.... virtual desktops! (Score:5, Interesting)
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RTS
Assign a group of units to a button, and the button picture changes to, say, what the majority unit is in that group! Also, you could use the keyboard as a secondary output device, and reserve, say, the numpad for an overhead map. Hell, you could press a key on the numpad to go to that area of the map on the screen, cutting down on scroll time.
FPS
Buttons light up for various weapons as they become available, complete with updating ammo counts! Ok, n
"Gem" (Score:2, Funny)
Slashdot stats in realtime! (Score:2, Informative)
This site can actually cope with a slashdoting pretty easily,
Nevertheless its pretty cool to look at their stats and see the slashdotting take place:
http://tweakers.net/stats [tweakers.net]
Scroll down to "reviews" to see the major increase in traffic since a few minutes.
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You stand corrected, sir.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Simply put, the server can't take the enormous load of
OLED for Monitor (Score:4, Interesting)
What actually happened to those predictions that OLED would soon replace LCD for monitors?? Is anything happening in the mainstream?
Breast keys (Score:2, Interesting)
This is a genuine question!
I don't get it? (Score:2, Interesting)
This reminds me of the "Tablet PC" revolution (I baught one). Although a great piece of technology there wasn't a significant increase in productivity or features that warented the extra effort to adapt to the technology.
A big win for any "bleeding edge" technology is if the added productivity and features out way the effort to convert from an existing platform.
Winning Examples:
iPod (MP3 Player)
Mouse -> Cordless Mouse
Touchpad
Cell Phone OS' (When a c
Re: (Score:2)
I dont know to what special type of keyboard you are reffering but a) It is possible to write (fast!) with one hand in a normal keyboard (see Dvorak one handed keyboard [wikipedia.org]). I have seen someone in action with that key distribution and it is amazing.
Tablet PC
You defin Tablet PC as a loser, however I think there has been a lot of maket for this computers. I would like to buy one, however they are quite expensive (and I am quite poor), maybe you did not liked it, and saw it as a gadget because
Huh? What exactly is this? (Score:2, Insightful)
Optimus was the Radio Shack speaker line at one time, so I immediately thought audio. Then I saw keyboard, then I saw three button, which sounds like a mouse. Then I saw excessive CPU usage, which doesn't sound like any keybaord OR mouse that I know of...
At which point it seemed that there wasn't whole lot of reasons to RTFA.
Bah... get a real keyboard! (Score:5, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
The Das Keyboard II is nicer to type on than the IBM imho...
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Reminds me of a dilbert strip (Score:2)
can't wait (Score:2)
Let me be the first to say thanks. (Score:5, Insightful)
Nice toy, but... (Score:2)
I work with a lot of design programs every day. As such, I get tired of moving my mouse from one tool to the other and have discovered (unlike many in my office) the joy of shortcut keys. While I first needed a cheat sheet to help with the differences between my various programs, after some repitition I was able to easily remember "V" in Photoshop is "A" in Multi-Ad Creator. While an Optimus would have been ideal at firs
Got there too late (Score:2)
Mirror! (Score:2)
...another mini3 review... (Score:5, Informative)
OLED Mouse (Score:3, Insightful)
Two OLED buttons would be just fine.
And they should be able to make a driverless interface using the HID class and USB. It's just silly to write your own drivers when USB drivers exist on all platforms to interface your hardware with.
Got one, been a bit disappointed. (Score:5, Interesting)
I've been programming this device for a weekends worth now. I checked the software they gave and it was ok. It does crash VERY often, though it's not the device that's causing the crashes. The USB to serial chip they use is made by Porlific and I think it's the PL-2303. Now googling for that seems to indicate prolific has had a bad history with working drivers.
Now being the nerdy hacker type, it seems that for me it only crashes when disconnecting by software. So my solution was to create a stub program in C# that connects to the device, stays connected all the time and listens for incoming TCP connections and routes those to the device. This way the computer stays connected to the device all the time and I can restart the controlling software as often as I like. Haven't had any problems with this approach yet. Still I hope Prolific fixes their serial drivers.
As for when it comes to the performance, I've noticed something weird. All of my software is currently in C# and has not been optimized. But when feeding the device with image data, the program that sends it to the device takes around 9%, while the program that generates the packets takes somwthing like 40%. This seems kinda weird and I do have some hope of fixing it.
As for the device itself, the reviews I've read have been pretty accurate. It always makes me feel bad to press a display. And the buttons are not as "solid" as I'd like.
But with enough work I hope to make even something good out of it. I was hoping of making an animated game, but no way of doing that with that serial adapter standing in between.
Re:It Shows Promise (Score:5, Interesting)
Three words, awesome case mod!
But practical use? No, not really, it could good for switching between virtual desktops. In some type of emergency management system you could even have a key blink if its associated desktop has some emergency situation you need to attend to.
Parent
Re: (Score:2)
Are you referring to the three key or the full keyboard? Because I agree that the three key is not really practical. But a full keyboard, now that would have some incredible uses. The first one that pops in my head is multilingual support. I'm constantly driven nuts by those little stickers all over my keyboard. Not to mention that the only indication of which language you're using under Windows is the small blue box in the corner.
Given how buggy Windows is at switching lang
For a full keyboard? (Score:3, Interesting)
In word processing applications you could show which keys do things such as undo, etc
When you hold shift or caps the letters can switch between upper and lower case
When you press CTRL the associated function keys could change to show their designated function.
Lots of possibilities here, though a lot do depend on the software itself supporting the keyboa
Not that simple (Score:2)
1. Have a look at some of those "crap ass CPUs" in laptops before shooting your mouth. An old 933 MHz P3 laptop will run circles around a similarly clocked P4 Prescott. The P3 features _much_ higher IPC (instructions per cycle). There's a reason why the Banias and Dothan (Centrino) and later Core/Core2 are based on the P3 core, and not on the P4.
The Prescott still wins o
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Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2, Funny)