Now this keyboard should be sold with every PowerMac!

[zv470]

Wow Apple should buy this patent!!!

Wow.

I'd like to see this idea applied to Apple's keyboards, not that keen on the look of the design, but I love the idea, WOW

 

[xisforextreme]

reminds me of that virtual keyboard, wonder if they could do something similar with that

 

[acedickson]

Someone should contact Apple about that keyboard and then point Apple to this thread. I think it's an awesome idea too. I love new gadgets!

 

[Nermal]

this keyboard is sweet, wonder what the price tag will be on this?

"In brief, the keyboard is likely to become available in 2006, will be OS-independent and “will cost less than a good mobile phone.”"

 

[Zmmyt]

If it doesn't get too expensive I would love to have one.

 

[jamesW135]

Very nice

Very nice, I hope this is sold in the next couple of years.

 

[Diatribe]

"In brief, the keyboard is likely to become available in 2006, will be OS-independent and “will cost less than a good mobile phone.”"

Very nice, I hope this is sold in the next couple of years.

If it doesn't get too expensive I would love to have one.

Always funny how people never read the thread but only reply to the first post...

 

[cubist]

The idea is not new at all, keys with programmable displays have been available for at least 10 years. They are used in airplane cockpit equipment because they are extremely expensive.

What's different here is the estimated cost. If these guys can produce these for "less than a good mobile phone" - I read that as $500 - they will sell well. I'd also be concerned about the display longevity.

 

[dornoforpyros]

Obviosly that is flat out awsome, But my concern would be how well the keyboard holds up over time? I mean we've all spilled a drink or two into a keyboard and I'm sure many of your keyboards (like mine) are full of crumbs.

 

[killmoms]

cubist: They're OLEDs, and OLEDs last a pretty long time. No backlight worries and such.

dornoforpyros: I've never spilled drinks into my keyboards, because I'm a careful cat. But it looks like the keys all have solid end-caps on them, and I'd imagine the bottoms are protected against that somehow, since obviously this keyboard would have more electricity running through it than your average one. I would think that even if the prototype doesn't, if this keyboard ever went into production those things would be considered.

 

[thrillz3]

I wonder too if someone could come up with a more effective keyboard that has less keys on it, using this, that adaptively shifts key assignments?

Less keys? http://www.frogpad.com

 

[aboutthat]

Wow Apple should buy this patent!!!

Wow.

I'd like to see this idea applied to Apple's keyboards, not that keen on the look of the design, but I love the idea, WOW

I don't know how to do this, but perhaps someone should contact and 'suggest' to Apple to buy this thing and get it into production and make sure it's all done correctly...they're sitting on a gold mine...any Apple employees on the board who want to line themselves up for a promotion, bring this thing to your boss

If it becomes more mainstream/standard equip. I can just picture some way for advertisers to tap into it. Ads might magically appear under your fingers, making spam just a keyboard tap away...your enter key suddenly starts flashing with low APRs for refinancing your house, etc. This keyboard is fab, just have to put the right constraints on software possibilities, make it all user controlled without the possibility of outside key changing.

 

[iHacker]

My guess is that it will probly come out at llike $150 to $200 range. I am hapy with my standard apple keyboard until this comes out!

 

[joshwest]

keyboard

i think it be a great idea if they worked this in to the powerbooks then the ibooks i think it would spiffy them up.. and also mac-ize it and use the full size for g5's

 

[Ahmed]

thats an amazing keyboard!! i would pay up to 200$ for a keyboard like that!!

 

[Jay42]

You know what, this almost doesn't surprise me.

 

[wheezy]

Wow, what a cool product, I really like how it matches the aluminum!

Also, a great informative website. I liked such information as

"Moscow is the capital of Russia."

"Our studio is located two blocks from the Kremlin." (The KGB must have been developing this and they stole the idea)

"It has a numeric keypad because we love it."

"There’s no snow in Moscow in summer."

I seriously thought of all these questions when I checked out this keyboard.

 

[Veldek]

Latest news on Hardmac.com:

- USB2 and maybe Firewire keyboard
- it could integrate an external power supply.
- it will cost between 200 and 300$.
- It should be available within one year

 

[ldenman]

simply. Amazing!

 

[runplaysleeprun]

Keys could be animated when needed.

Can you imagine, the whole keyboard acting like a giant dispay for itunes showing the different levels of audio (cant bloody remember what that thing is called that shows the different levels of audio, like a wave, i know it has a name....) in different colors? As the music is playing, the whole keyboard is just sitting there lighting up with the audio. man, that would be cool. or even set as the visualizer for the music. man would that be sweet.

 

[weldon]

Typing in Russian is a pain on an English keyboard. I used the stickers that came with my old Cyrillic localization kit from Apple (remember those in the OS 8 days?). They work OK, but I would buy this keyboard in an instant (as long as it had a good feel).

I can totally understand how a design firm in Moscow would be inspired to come up with something innovative to solve the problem of typing in Cyrillic and English.

It would be even better if the keyboard driver/utility would allow you complete freedom to remap keys. One of the big issues with a cyrillic keyboard is the question of using the traditional Russian layout or a phonetic layout that corresponds to the English QWERTY layout by trying to place the Cyrillic letters with the transliterated English letter. I had a great phonetic layout in WordPerfect for DOS way back in the day, but I haven't been able to duplicate it. I've read a number of documents about how to customize keyboard layouts for both Windows and Mac, but I usually get stumped somewhere along the way where I want to change one key for another. A keyboard like this, with total customization, that displays the character being used would be incredible.

 

[FoxyKaye]

Would all those little displays would be quite a drain on the battery power? Would the switchable display files for the keys be kept on the computer and transmitted via BT, or maybe on some internal flash drive in the housing?

I was thinking along similar lines - where does the burden of processing the keycaps fall: to the CPU, or to something that accompanies the keyboard itself? Seems like there wouldn't be a lot to do, just line the correct keycap displays up with the correct program, but who knows what kinds of computational power this would require...

Latest news on Hardmac.com:

- USB2 and maybe Firewire keyboard
- it could integrate an external power supply.
- it will cost between 200 and 300$.
- It should be available within one year

Cool - very Star Trek: The Next Generation - I'd save up for it and get one, though maybe wait till the rev. B's are released.

[Edit]:

Typing in Russian is a pain on an English keyboard. I used the stickers that came with my old Cyrillic localization kit from Apple (remember those in the OS 8 days?). They work OK, but I would buy this keyboard in an instant (as long as it had a good feel).

I can totally understand how a design firm in Moscow would be inspired to come up with something innovative to solve the problem of typing in Cyrillic and English.

It would be even better if the keyboard driver/utility would allow you complete freedom to remap keys. One of the big issues with a cyrillic keyboard is the question of using the traditional Russian layout or a phonetic layout that corresponds to the English QWERTY layout by trying to place the Cyrillic letters with the transliterated English letter. I had a great phonetic layout in WordPerfect for DOS way back in the day, but I haven't been able to duplicate it. I've read a number of documents about how to customize keyboard layouts for both Windows and Mac, but I usually get stumped somewhere along the way where I want to change one key for another. A keyboard like this, with total customization, that displays the character being used would be incredible.

I completely agree on all points... Russian on any keyboard in college was hell, even with the right fonts and interpreters for WordPerfect...

 

[raynegus]

I sent this thread to Apple along with a link to the product. So keep the comments clean!

 

[hob]

Can you imagine, the whole keyboard acting like a giant dispay for itunes showing the different levels of audio (cant bloody remember what that thing is called that shows the different levels of audio, like a wave, i know it has a name....) in different colors? As the music is playing, the whole keyboard is just sitting there lighting up with the audio. man, that would be cool. or even set as the visualizer for the music. man would that be sweet.

I just fainted. Sorry. That is the most orgasmic idea I've heard for the last year!! (And it wasnt exactly a slow year ) I never thought i'd be this excited about a keyboard!!

 

[mkrishnan]

- it will cost between 200 and 300$.

To be fair, the actual interview quote was: "I can hardly imagine it to be less than $200 to $300 (USD). Sounds like a lot for a keyboard, but most modern mobile phones cost about that." Which is slightly different....

But still, like hob said, this is an amazing idea....