Optimus Keyboard Pre-Orders In Mere Hours 319
godzillopiteco sends timely word that Art. Lebedev Studio is finally going to accept pre-orders for the Optimus Maximus Keyboard — in just under 11 hours at the time this story posts, according to the countdown timer on the site. (Late last year we were primed to pre-order in December 2006.) Read the project's blog for some recent developments.
More details (Score:5, Insightful)
This thing has sounded, looked, and felt like another Phantom since the start...
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People actually want to do this, but the only thing stopping them is technology.
I guess at some point or other we have cursed keyboards for having fixed symbols and wished for something better, I remember the cards you used to place above your Fn keys for word processing and graphics programs, we all get freaked out remembering the keys to games and I would love to see my keys change fonts to match what I am typing.
This keyboard will give you all that, its not just another console - its new.
Having said all that, you can probably currently just keep a few customised boards [fentek-ind.com] and switch as needed for less than the current expected price.
Apricot did this 24 YEARS AGO(!) (Score:3, Interesting)
I guess at some point or other we have cursed keyboards for having fixed symbols and wished for something better, I remember the cards you used to place above your Fn keys for word processing and graphics programs, we all get freaked out remembering the keys to games and I would love to see my keys change fonts to match what I am typing.
You know, someone came up with a solution to this almost a quarter of a century ago... the ACT Apricot PC [old-computers.com] (released in 1983) had a keyboard which included six special keys with a programmable LCD display above them.
It's surprising that this idea never took off elsewhere. Granted, it would probably have been moderately (but not prohibitively) expensive then, but I'm sure that the cost would have come down. Maybe ACT had patented it, but if that was the reason, why would they sit on it?
I remember first c
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I don't see them being sold at an sort of rate that is going to drive down prices.
I have to agree, I think my G15 is going to work fine for me.
RonB
Re:More details (Score:5, Insightful)
this keyboard wouldn't really offer any benefit to a user since, at best, it can either display the current tool, or the next tool in the heirarchy of that button. in either case, i already know how to toggle to that next tool and i don't need the keyboard to tell me what the next tool is.
for $250 i might buy it. but for $1500, i'd recommend any photoshop user buy more ram, a bigger monitor (or a secondary or tertiary monitor) and a wacom tablet and still have some money left over.
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I don't think that's really fair. The Phantom was constantly promoted as "coming soon!" The Optimus OTOH, started life as a conceptual design. Optimus never promised a product from the design, and in fact stated that it would be too expensive with current OLED prices.
The only reason why they're making this keyboard is because there has been unprecidented demand for it.
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Re:More details (Score:4, Insightful)
I probably wouldn't spend $1500 for it, anyway. But once it hit the $600 to $800, I absolutely would - as long as it was in a ergo/wave form.
Re:More details (Score:5, Funny)
It doesn't, but you could program it to have one.
Slave girls not included. Slavery maybe illegal in your country
*Yawn* (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:*Yawn* (Score:5, Funny)
-nB
Better Come With a Happy Ending (Score:3, Funny)
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You must be dreaming, they claimed since the very beginning that it'll cost around the price of a high-end cellphone.
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Well, a "high end cellphone" costs from $49 (with contract!) to $499. This is 3x the price of a high-end cellphone.
1500? (Score:2)
Re:*Yawn* (Score:5, Insightful)
The exciting thing is going to be if there are enough pre-orders for them to start fabrication. If they can stay in business passed this point, and OLED manufacturers start ramping up, it's only a matter of time before the price comes down. I remember when plasmas came out priced around $20000 for a 42" (if it was that big). Now you can get them for much less. We don't know how their planning on fabrication at this level. With such a small production schedule, it would suggest hand assembly. If they managed to sell out that production run, whats to stop them from licensing it to a foreign manufacturer? You know, like we do...
Re:*Yawn* (Score:5, Insightful)
Wow... that's cool (Score:5, Interesting)
Then I kept reading. I will definitely be getting myself one of these!
Re:Wow... that's cool (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Wow... that's cool (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Wow... that's cool (Score:4, Informative)
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"if you like pina colladas"
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I won't. I fail to understand the attraction of these dubious bells and whistles when the whole idea is that we shouldn't need to look at the keyboard when we use it...
Re:Wow... that's cool (Score:5, Informative)
You could use one of these [thinkgeek.com]
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Re:Wow... that's cool (Score:5, Funny)
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Isn't the 2nd version a buckle-spring keyboard? (you know, like the old school IBM keyboards with the extra 'clicky' sound) That would account for the price increase. Buckle-spring keyboards, although noisy and not too friendly in a business environment(mostly due to the noise), give off a very satisfying audible and tactile feel upon each keypress, unlike the more common membrane keyboards. Plus, buckle-spring keyboards do not wear out like membrane keyboards. I have a buckle-spring, and while it's a bit h
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Keyboards are about far more than typing, though. Just think about games--I don't usually get too far into games anymore because I don't want to spend half an hour memorizing the keys. A game is supposed to be fun. If I can look down and see what each key does, I can start playing immediately. The keyboard could be switched out of text mode to allow me to eliminate on screen palettes and toolbars in Photoshop. It can show users what keys do in iTu
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Each and every time you take your gaze off the monitor, off the code, your brain has to look at the keyboard. This is a little bit like saving a register on the stack doing an unrelated task and then loading the register back up again.
In short, spillage will slow you down a bit, the best way to become more productive is to memorise the shortcuts and not have to look at the keyboard.
I personally have and use the das keyboard [daskeyboard.com]. It's completely blank a
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On most computer desks with trays, you have to lower the tray a bit for this to work comfortably, and adjust the cha
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I type in English part of the time, and in phonetic Korean part of the time, and the rest of the time I'm trying to get Chinese characters (actually Korean han ja, but very similar in scope... thousands of characters from the Chinese set) out of various keystroke combinations. It would be quite a boon to me if this thing could remap on the fly. Even worth $1500. But I'm not buying one until I know it'll do what I want. I'm also curious about the lifetimes of the OLEDs. My keyboard is powered up 24/7.
A bit pricey (Score:4, Insightful)
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I'm in, as long as it comes with a free copy of Duke Nukem Forever.
Re:A bit pricey (Score:5, Funny)
At that price, I'd expect to get the Optimus *Prime* keyboard, and it better transform into the leader of the Autobots, too!
Chris Mattern
Re:A bit pricey (Score:5, Interesting)
You have it. All Optimus models so far are like this: Optimus 101, Optimus 103, Optimus 113.
All of those are prime numbers, and I doubt it's coincidental.
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Re:A bit pricey (Score:4, Funny)
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Advertising (Score:4, Insightful)
This isn't a story. This is an ad.
If it's a real, successful product, it will be available tomorrow, the next day, probably next week, and at a lower price in a few months. If not, well...
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Re:Advertising (Score:5, Insightful)
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And you can keep your membership cards.
I'm in. (Score:2, Funny)
and I'm sure chicks will dig it!
What would be more practical... (Score:5, Insightful)
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Also, within vi/vim, depending on whether you are in command or input mode, the 'hjkl' keys could be arrow keys (as well as appropriate symbols etc for the other keys).
Of course.. all this assumes you actually look at your keyboard while using it. Strange that the das keyboard [daskeyboard.com] has not markings on its keys at all, and is proud of it. There is some logic to it.. I suspect having
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For me it's usually not so bad, because I touch type and my layout is qwertz, which isn't that different (I actually prefer qwerty, but I need 4 letters which don't exist on qwerty). If I install an OS which I haven't localized yet it gets quite annoying finding special keys, which are not that common (e.g. []|{}).
Re:What would be more practical... (Score:5, Insightful)
Different keyboard modes have a much wider scope than layouts and languages. It's for displaying the right icons for when you are playing Quake, for displaying the effects of shortcuts when you are in Photoshop, for displaying the right functions when you switch modes in vi, for showing the right characters when you hold down Alt Gr when you want curly quotes, em dashes, etc.
I think a keyboard like this could be very useful even to computer novices — perhaps especially to computer novices. I've been using computers for decades, and I haven't memorised a fraction of the keyboard shortcuts I could find useful. It would be a lot easier for me if I could hold down Ctrl and look at my keyboard to see the right key to press. If a power user like me can't learn all the shortcuts, how could a newbie?
The real problem is that they went all out for the full-colour display, the animation, the integrated USB mass storage, etc, when you can get 99% of the value of this thing with a monochrome, high-latency, no-hard-drive version for a fraction of the cost. There's no way I'd pay this much for a keyboard, but I'd certainly jump at the chance if somebody were offering the cheaper version I describe. I've heard of various proof-of-concepts, but nothing for sale to end-users outside of the USA.
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Might work for you, but I don't think I'm alone in making keyboard purchases based on the placement of those keys you're referring to as standard. It's been too many years to bother counting when some semblance of standard was replaced by design considerations which, in turn were based mostly on aesthetic considerations
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If you wanted fewer fancy keys you could always get the mini version [artlebedev.com]...
Audio/Video/Graphics editing (Score:2)
I'm
Careful now (Score:2)
a new marketing avenue ! (Score:3, Interesting)
Wow, hard to believe (Score:5, Funny)
Finally! Well, Eventially! (Score:5, Funny)
way too much (Score:2)
Good Ol' Dependable (Score:3, Informative)
Besides, shortcut keys are for the lazy folk, IMHO.
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Why for Odin's sake... (Score:4, Insightful)
What I want (Score:3, Interesting)
I want to be able to press, for example, a key that's labelled instead of typing
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DX1 Input System [thinkgeek.com]
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The X-keys Professional [piengineering.com] is one of those. You can insert little printed pieces of paper for the key caps, and the software allows you to program macros for every key. There are other models available on that page, too.
(No, I'm in no way affiliated with them, I don't even own one myself.)
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Why should I give a damn? (Score:2, Insightful)
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$1500 for mild functionality? (Score:2)
Then you could make a huge custom touch pad that also had software buttons for whatever you wanted.
Disclaimer: this is prior art =P
looks nice but does it have... (Score:5, Funny)
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Any /. ers own a Deck keyboard? (Score:2)
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Linux (Score:2)
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Most likely - no. Their current three button keyboard is Windows only with a Mac driver currently in development. It's all closed source as well. This is stupid of course as their innovation is in the hardware design, not the driver code, but it probably will take someone to reverse engineer the USB packets used by this thing before Linux support becomes available.
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It also doesn't work on Windows or OS X.
Re:Linux (Score:4, Informative)
Given that the Optimus Three has an alpha driver available, [ookoo.org] I'd say it's reasonable to guess that the full keyboard will have support very, very quickly; and based on some of the things they say about all of their input devices (open standards and all that), and given that they seem to fully approve of the Linux driver (with a link to it from their own website [artlebedev.com]), the new keyboard's driver will probably be based on the existing Optimus driver.
Optimus. Because people quit caring about Amiga. (Score:2)
Coming soon! Lookit - here's a prototype board (photo)..
Be ready for Amiga OS 4 - NOW!!
There are some things that you can rely on in this world. One of them is the protracted development period for specialized hardware/software.
Sometimes vapor does condense..
I see a market for this, small anyway (Score:2)
Right now all the professionals among those people either have to buy a specialized keyboard or input device or stick little tabs on or above t
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Good thing, too -- according to the page, they're only planning on making about 400 of them per month anyway.
What is this thing? (Score:2, Funny)
Why not... (Score:2)
Why couldn't they do something simpler? Like an LCD panel under the keyboard, and each key just spies down on a portion of the panel, maybe with some optics to make it look nice and focused, etc.. (I call patents!) Seems a lot more sense than having a separate OLED on every single key, which is probably what led to the outrageous price of this beast.
Given the beating most keyboards take, I'm assured
Re:Why not... (Score:4, Insightful)
Too much money.... (Score:2)
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a good cell in Russia costs more then USD 1,564.37 (Score:2)
as they said this will cost less then a good cell phone.
phones at that price are about the same as the i-phone with a forced in to a 2 year $40 a month data + voice plan.
BSOD (Score:2)
Good flat keyboards not so rare now (Score:2)
Unfortunately for Optimus, they've now taken so long that I have a solution I'm perfectly happy with that I'm already typing on. I picked up a Logitech diNovo Edge [logitech.com] keyboard recently. Great typing f
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As the car industry has known for years those are both very valid reasons!
Look at the import tuner market... non-functional body kits, huge spoilers on front wheel drive cars, 'carbon fibre' overlays for regular steel hoods, etc etc etc.
Supplying expensive equipment for the gullible is a very profitable business! Just ask the audiophiles! ;) *ducks*
Re:Unless.. (Score:4, Funny)
Oh, and I just bought my oxygen free gold dipped hand braided carbon fiber triple analog 186.2 bit digital monster extreme seat covers with pleather inlay...
they added 50hp and 20dB to my civic.
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Wings on FWD cars (Score:2, Interesting)
I assume you meant "wings" when you wrote "spoilers"*. Anyway, a wing or spoiler on a front wheel drive car is not counter-intuitive. Many racing series use wings on front wheel drive cars (for example, see SCCA's Speed World Challenge [world-challenge.com] touring series, where a number of FWD cars from makes such as Acura and Mazda implement wings). Your assum
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Second, the cars you're defending are usually first gen Dodge Neons painted in "ass kicking" primer color and they don't go over 55 mph unless it's down hill with a STRONG wind behind them.
You did geek out a bit more than a Star Wars fan after hearing Vader called "Kirk" but that's ok, you're on
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