Would anyone miss the Break and SysRq keys?

Monday, June 29th, 2009

If there’s one PC peripheral that’s seen about as much change as the Queen’s hairdo over the past 20 years, it’s the keyboard. Sure there have been attempts to jazz it up with ergonomic layouts, wireless transmitters and models with flashy shortcut buttons, but by and large, if someone plugged a 1989 model keyboard into your PC you’d barely notice the difference.

The deathly pace of keyboard evolution is actually a barrier to progress, according to HP vice president Phil McKinley, who I met last week. “The keyboard is still a hugely intimidating factor for users,” he told me, referring especially to users in developing countries who haven’t grown up with computers. “It still has a System Request and Break key on the keyboard. When was the last time you touched the Break key?” he asked.

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The not so humble keyboard

Wednesday, August 6th, 2008

If I asked you to name the most mundane part of your PC, chances are the humble keyboard would be high on the list. For most it’s just there: it has the requisite keys, all in their usual place and they make things happen on your screen.

Some use several fingers simultaneously to work it, many others prod with fat single digits. The vast majority come bundled with PCs, and few people would ever consider spending more than pocket money on a new one. Few, but not zero.

We’ve seen Art Lebedev’s Optimus Maximus keyboard. It “justified” its extravagant price tag by placing a small OLED display behind each of the 113 keys. Specially programmed software is then able to change the picture on each of the 48 x 48 pixel displays. See it in action here. Perhaps you could change each key to a vomit pattern to disguise your reaction on seeing the $1,500 price tag.

This was then complemented by Art Lebedev’s 15-key Pultius number-pad. Just in case you felt you weren’t getting enough value from your investment. (more…)

My guilty secret ad the problem with my “” key

Monday, June 30th, 2008

I have a guilty secret; although I work o PC Pro, I’m actually a avid Mac ethusiast. I fact, I’ve bee called a fa-boy by some in the past.

They’re everythig I eed from a PC. After a day istalling bechmarks, swappig out hardware ad searchig for drivers, all I wat is a machie that works well ad ever eeds tikerig with. The gorgeous OS and chassis desigs are a ice bous, too.

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Requesters need to learn their place

Wednesday, May 7th, 2008

Generally speaking, one of the things I like about Windows is the fact that you can do everything with the keyboard. Don’t get me wrong – when it comes to drawing pictures and such, give me a mouse any day. But when all I want to do is launch a program or select a menu item, I find hitting a few keys a far simpler and more efficient way of doing so. (This, in fact, is one of my major gripes with Mac OS X – but that’s a rant for another day.)

What I don’t like is what happens when some requester leaps up while I’m typing and steals focus from the window I was typing into. (more…)

Keyboard beyond belief

Friday, April 25th, 2008

If you’ve ever stared down at your lap and thought, “Hey, if only the crotch of my trousers had an integrated QWERTY keyboard”, then today is the day you’ve been waiting for. Almost every gadget website and blog in the world have picked up on the handiwork of one Erik De Nijs who, apparently, has designed a pair of jeans with an integrated crotchboard (we’re patenting the term, so hands off Belkin, Microsoft et al), as well as a mouse and knee-mounted speakers. Now we assume that these technojeans have Bluetooth, or at the very least some kind of wireless connectivity. Walking away from your PC or laptop while shackled to it via a USB cable could, possibly, be an expensive mistake. But, as there’s more than a faint whiff of Nathan Barley-esque nonsense about the whole affair, we certainly won’t be too surprised if it turns out to have been perpetrated by a devious art student from Shoreditch. And even if we do finally lay our hands on a pair, we’re going to be typing very, very softly indeed.