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Searching for Keyboards Loaded with Features?

Posted by Cliff on Thu May 29, 2003 08:45 PM
from the i'll-have-a-keyboard-with-'the-works'-please dept.
Hardware
halfgeek asks: "I was just considering how keyboard-centric I've managed to make my setup, even under the mouse-hungry Windows GUI (no shouting; I regularly SSH to my Linux routing box for experiments, bring up VMWare when I need some X, and can't live without Cygwin). Almost everything I would want to do can be done without moving a hand to the mouse. I can open up an SSH to my server with Win+Shift+V, bring up a calculator with Win+C, run a one-shot console command with Win+0, open up the MW dictionary website to a highlighted word by hitting Ctrl+C (to copy) and then Win+Enter (to look up the contents of the clipboard). (Much of this is implemented with Perl programs and WinKey.) I also make frequent use of the volume knob and mute button built into my Logitech keyboard. If there is any good route to finding the keyboard I want with all the features I'm thinking of at a justifiable price, whether prefabricated or a wicked mod, I would just love to know about it." There are quite a few options the submitter is looking for, but it basically boils down to is this: the more keys, the better. What keyboards have you found, in your browsing travels, that have been stuffed full of useful features?

"I'm aggravated over having the mouse still so separate from the keyboard, and I've been looking through the available options along the lines of keyboards with built-in touchpads. The closest I've found to what I want seems to be the Adesso WKB-120, but this is by no means the ideal choice. It does have three basic properties I want: One, it doesn't have the ergo-split form I so despise. Two, its touchpad is situated in the right place, just below the space bar. Three, it's all one piece, so I can keep the board off the desk and on my knees, where it belongs, eh. But it also appears to have those three intensely undesirable and horribly misplaced power management keys, and lacks the volume knob, mute button, and media controls. An illuminated keyboard would also be cool, but I'd take standard beige; it's just that my current black keyboard is hard to see in the dark."

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  • IBM trackpoint keyboards. (Score:4, Interesting)

    by FrenZon (65408) * on Thursday May 29 2003, @09:02PM (#6073058) Homepage
    I love my trackpoint (nipple) pointer that juts up in the middle of my keyboards - while it's not as accurate as a mouse or even trackpad, it's good enough to click on links or select the words/fields I need, with an absolute minimum of movement - I hate having to move my thumb down to a trackpad on a laptop, and then having to move it ALL the way across its surface a few times to get what I want.

    I lament how trackpoints are disappearing off laptop keyboards these days.

    • "I lament how trackpoints are disappearing off laptop keyboards these days"

      I recall seeing the first "touchpads" appearing after being used to all kinds of Toshiba's and Thinkpad's with little rubber eraser trackpoints.

      I was told that Toshiba owned the trackpoint technology, and charged a lot for it, so it was cheaper to put touchpads in laptops.

      Touchpads would not be so bad if not for the "missfire glitch" where bumping the pad with your thumb acts like a mouse click. I've lost many lines of text due to
        • "get a Mac. OS X has an option for touchpad clicking"

          I think it is more a situation of the hardware driver for the pad itself than the actual OS. In any case, no need to go Mac just to avoid the problem: most Wintel/LinAMD/whatever laptops and notebooks allow you to turn it off these days.

    • Re:IBM trackpoint keyboards. (Score:5, Funny)

      by The Clockwork Troll (655321) on Thursday May 29 2003, @09:13PM (#6073122)
      I love my trackpoint (nipple) pointer that juts up in the middle of my keyboards
      The technical term is "clit mouse" - I shit you not.

      It is a not-so-accidental abbreviation of "cute little thumb mouse".

    • "I lament how trackpoints are disappearing off laptop keyboards these days."

      I can't second that, I hate those things. Maybe they are better when you get used to them, but I have had to spend zero amount of time learning to use the alternative, the trackpad. That is, IF the trackpad is a good one (most seem to be). I used one that was supposedly based on heat sensing on a friend's Dell laptop, and it was the most utterly unresponsive thing ever.

      Brushing aside this isolated experience, I would like to ma

      • Re:IBM trackpoint keyboards. (Score:5, Informative)

        by einTier (33752) on Friday May 30 2003, @02:31AM (#6074537)
        Personally? I love them. Cannot stand the trackpads. I can't imagine any geek liking them over an extended period of time. Why? Let me count the ways.

        1. Trackpads are imprecise. Very imprecise. I can get incredible precision out of my trackpoint, nearly as good as I can with a mouse. To achieve the proper granularity out of the trackpad, I've got to jack up the sensitivity, which leads to the other problem.
        2. There's not a 1:1 relationship with the screen. To move the pointer across the screen (unless it's a banzai run, and sometimes not even then), you've got to drag, lift, drag, lift, drag, lift, rinse, repeat. I feel like I'm using a mouse on a desk about two inches square. If I get pointer to the point where I can move it quickly, I can't get the fine control I need.
        3. With all that lifting and pushing, inevitably, I get a nice 'click' when I didn't want one. God forbid I should touch down on the pad with a double touch, then I might really do something I didn't want.
        4. The touchpad is under my thumbs. Who in the world thought this was a good idea? OK, yes, I know that you can set it to turn off the touchpad when you're typing -- but it's still a hack, and you shouldn't have to do it. Even when it's 'turned off', it's still possible to do actions you didn't intend, particularly if you pause for a second to study your code. It's just another imperfection of the touchpad.
        5. This is kind of a continuation of the above, but one of the things I love about my trackpoint is that I can use the mouse and never take my hands off the keyboard. It's the best of both worlds. On the few occasions I need to use the mouse, it's right at my fingertips. I don't have to move my hands or anything except move my index finger over a bit and my thumb down.

          I know there are others, but it's 2:30, and that's all I can think of for now.

          I find most people who have trouble with trackpoints have problems for two reasons. Number one, they don't realize that the harder you push, the faster the pointer moves. Slow pushes give you great precision. Hard pushes zoom the thing across the screen. Number two, most people aren't used to pushing on something that doesn't move and getting a response. The stalk isn't supposed to move, but it will record even the slightest brush of your fingertips.

        • "4. The touchpad is under my thumbs. Who in the world thought this was a good idea? OK, yes, I know that you can set it to turn off the touchpad when you're typing -- but it's still a hack, and you shouldn't have to do it. Even when it's 'turned off', it's still possible to do actions you didn't intend, particularly if you pause for a second to study your code. It's just another imperfection of the touchpad."

          What are you talking about? My thumbs go on the spacebar... Do you have giant thumbs? ;) You

  • The most useful keyboard for me. (Score:4, Insightful)

    by AtariAmarok (451306) on Thursday May 29 2003, @09:02PM (#6073061)
    The most useful keyboard for me is a standard keyboard:

    Nice standard wide space bar, without the never-used Windows keys

    Backslash above a regular-height enter key (no double-high enter key with the backslash in any of 5 other locations).

    Standard layout, not the "think before you hit every key" (un)natural keyboard.

    The superior tactile click of the IBM keyboard from the PC-AT era. I don't think these are around any more, and nothing still even comes close.

    If there is one thing that should be standard, it is a keyboard layout. Extras are fine, as long as they are outside of the regular key area, which should be left alone. It is pretty unreasonable to have to learn different touch typing for different keyboards: the basics should stay the same. Nothing more frustrating than trying to hit the blackslash and then realizing it is one of those perverse Logitech or E-One keyboards that has "more enter key" where the backslash is.

    • In fact, the IBM keyboards witht eh tactile 'click' are indeed still produced (IBM sold off their keyboard division years ago, and they are sold under a different name). You can buy one at PcKeyboard.Com [pckeyboard.com]. They even offer an updated model with the additional Windows 95 keys (winkey and context menu), and a pointing stick (like the ones found on IBM thinkpads).

      A detailed article on the old IBM keyboards can be found here [dansdata.com]

    • The superior tactile click of the IBM keyboard from the PC-AT era. I don't think these are around any more, and nothing still even comes close.

      Since others have already pointed out current sources for this keyboard, and I can't really comment on that since I haven't ordered anything from them, I guess it's up to me to just point you to The Article [dansdata.com], in case you hadn't read it. Whoa, that became a very long sentence.

  • There's only one answer, no need for a thread: (Score:5, Informative)

    by FFFish (7567) on Thursday May 29 2003, @09:03PM (#6073063) Homepage
    PCKeyboard [pckeyboard.com], who own the rights to the venerable IBM high-tactile keyboards (aka "the wing of death").

    They also have myriad options and some extremely programmable/configurable keyboards.
    • Not only to they have the modern version of the IBM Model M - they have one that has a trackpoint just like an IBM Laptop. I'm using one right now.

      It's clicky as hell, costs me $99, and I could bludgeon someone to death with it.

      Best. Keyboard. Ever.

    • They may own the rights, but you can get original IBM 101-key keyboards from ebay regularly for about $12. I own 7 myself (Best. Keyboard. Ever.) for all my machines.

      My co-workers hate me, BTW. They claim the noise is deafening, but an average of 100 words per minute can't be wrong! :-)

  • Focus Electronic (Score:5, Informative)

    by Drakon (414580) * on Thursday May 29 2003, @09:10PM (#6073104) Journal
    I use a keyboard from Focus Electronic [focustaipei.com] called the FK-8200 [focustaipei.com]
    I sincerly regret not waiting for the FK-9200 [focustaipei.com] to become available, since it has a trackball in the center of the keyboard.
    This keyboard is great.. it has a built in calculator, a clock with batteries for when the machine is off, and 12 macro keys that can be mapped to just about anything..

  • There is only one keyboard, the Model M. All others are false pretenders.

    Repeat after me: Model M - the one true keyboard. All hail Model M.

    Model M [modelm.org]

    If you turn over your keyboard and find that it does not say Model M on the bottom, you are not a true human being.

    It's not hard to find your own. Ebay lists them all the time. I pulled 12 of them out of an insurance company dumpster last year.

    Model M!
    • I've found a hoard of Model Ms at a thrift store. $3 each! Needless to say, i'd never pass up an opportunity like that.
    • Any keyboard that doesn't have the control key in the correct place -- just left of the 'a' key -- couldn't be considered the "one true keyboard".

      Sean.
    • word to the model m.

      i refuse to use any cheap-o plastic pansy ass keyboard when i can use my tuff-as-nails steel ibm clicky to beat the hell out of anybody who dares enter my cave...

      cheap, indestructable, and the keys come off real easy to throw in the dishwasher occasionally.
    • The keyboards that used to ship with the circa ~1998-00 Compaq Deskpro boxes are pretty good. They have great spring feedback, are quieter than the clickety ones and don't take much space up in the ole' desk.

      I use them at work and have three new ones at home, bought from a second hand computer store here in town. I figure I'm set to about 2015 or so - assuming the PC doesn't transmogrify into a mind-controlled device or something like that.

    • The model M is the best keyboard ever.

      With that said, there are a few drawbacks which are very unfortunate:
      • They are only in PS/2 flavor.. no ADB, USB, etc.
      • They are no longer manufacturered
      • They only come in beige (or yellow, depending on age and environment).
      • Corded only, no wireless.


      I would die for a black, wireless, usb IBM model M. Maybe I should hack one. I suppose the USB problem could be solved via an adapter.

    • Sorry, as nice as the 'M' is, there is no comparison to a Northgate Omnikey, especially the Ultra [northgate-...repair.com].

      I still have one. It weighs over 10 pounds, so it doesn't move. The feel of the keys is heavenly - perfect amount of force to depress, and a wonderful click when you do. All the keys are where they should be, including a superior diamond pattern for the cursor keys.

      If you haven't used one, you don't know what you're missing. Northgates are still the golden standard for anyone who knows.

      jonathan

  • I like the ideas---I, too, have a Logitech keyboard (specifically, the Cordless Elite Duo [logitech.com]) with volume, mute, etc. keys built in, and several shortcuts set up in (at least) a similar way.

    Other than the volume and mute, and the wheel on the left side, though, I find the many additional buttons along the top almost as distracting as a mouse. Right now, they're essentially all mapped to different websites, and I still have to look at them and pick out the right one before hitting it.

    Maybe it's because of to

  • Keyboard Hall of Shame (Score:5, Interesting)

    by AtariAmarok (451306) on Thursday May 29 2003, @09:54PM (#6073341)
    Enough about the best and most useful keyboards. How about the worst ones?

    Here's a couple to start with:

    The first Macintosh [bott.org]. I think Apple was so awestruck with the new idea of the GUI that it looks like the keyboard was a mere afterthought with the the first Mac. What they ended up including was designed to encourage mouse-usage; with its heavy-force keystroke requirements and its almost rudimentary nature.

    the Atari 400 [heydon.org]
    Anyone remember saving $400 over the price of the full-keyboard Atari 800 by getting one of these things? It spawned a cottage industry of replacement keyboards.

    TRS-80 Color Computer [aceadvanced.org]. The keyboard on the "ColorTRaSh" was eventually improved, but the earlier models had Fisher-Price written all over.

    • You can easily add the Sinclair ZX-80 [nvg.ntnu.no] and ZX-81 [nvg.ntnu.no] to your list. And let's not forget the IBM PCjr [oldskool.org], shall we...

    • The Commodore Pet (Score:2, Interesting)

      by RocketJeff (46275)
      While those are bad keyboards, the worst of all time has to be the one on the original Commodore Pet [cyberstreet.com] - it had tiny keys laid out in straight rows/columns and they were laid out alphabetically (not qwerty or Dvorak). If you knew anything about typing, it was painful to use!

      The later versions of the Pet had standard keyboards - it made the Pet into a good, usable computer.

  • Windows is the best mouseless UI there is (Score:4, Insightful)

    by farnsworth (558449) on Thursday May 29 2003, @10:00PM (#6073364)
    even under the mouse-hungry Windows GUI

    Are you insane? I don't care for Windows, but it is the most advanced mouseless UI there is. You can do everything without even having a mouse plugged in at all. The same cannot be said for gnome/kde or X in general. Granted, Windows is decidedly not a CLI, like your ssh sessions, but it's still the best there is if you don't like to use a mouse.

    I recall reading something about how some beta of windows 95 or NT 3.x failed a DOD acceptance test because a lot of it depended on the mouse, so Microsoft spent considerable time making it work fine in case of mouse failure.

    • In ION under X I don't have to touch my mouse. ever.
      just FYI
      It's basically the 'killer app' that's keeping me on linux... I can run Xchat, Gaim, Phoenix (or whatever it's called now), ZINF, etc, ad nausium. Putty is actually a better terminal than many of the linux ones, and I can do most of my development on a shell into another box. Windows is Free, and so is Linux. The only differences are (a) Xwin32 is much harder to crack than Xfree86 and (b) windows's Window Managment SUCKS.
    • The same cannot be said for gnome/kde or X in general.
      I beg to differ: http://ratpoison.sourceforge.net [sourceforge.net]

    • I recall reading something about how some beta of windows 95 or NT 3.x failed a DOD acceptance test because a lot of it depended on the mouse, so Microsoft spent considerable time making it work fine in case of mouse failure.

      I suspect it's because originally, Windows was an on-the-shelf software product which ran on DOS. People would have to make a deliberate choice to get Windows. Lots of PC owners didn't have mice, so requiring one would probably have made Windows less appealing.

      Contrast with the X W

    • Are you insane? I don't care for Windows, but it is the most advanced mouseless UI there is.

      My Dell laptop's touchpad is knackered to the extent I have to turn it off permanently, so I have plenty of experience of using windows without a mouse (in the office I use a trackball). While quite a lot of features are available without the mouse, it isn't particularly easy to use and in general 'skinnable' apps (ie anything that isn't using standard windows widgets, increasingly common) suck bigtime.

      I find the
    • Are you insane? I don't care for Windows, but it is the most advanced mouseless UI there is. You can do everything without even having a mouse plugged in at all. The same cannot be said for gnome/kde or X in general.

      Yes it can. I do everything using the keyboard, including moving and resizing windows under X (with sawfish.) I kid you not! Care to show me how to do that in windows? Of course, gnome's philosophy from gnome2 onwards is "you can do only what we let you to, because we know better than you",

      • Re:Windows is the best mouseless UI there is (Score:5, Informative)

        by kiwimate (458274) on Friday May 30 2003, @06:51AM (#6075239) Journal
        Yes it can. I do everything using the keyboard, including moving and resizing windows under X (with sawfish.) I kid you not! Care to show me how to do that in windows?

        With pleasure.

        Use the ALT-space key combination. This will bring up that window's control menu, including options to Restore (switch between full screen or windowed view), Minimize, Maximize, Close...and Size or Move. If you select Size or Move, you can then resize the window or move the window around the screen using the arrow keys. When done, press the Enter key. Presto -- all without a mouse.

        You're welcome.

  • roundup (Score:4, Informative)

    by yarbo (626329) <moderkaka AT gmail DOT com> on Friday May 30 2003, @12:32AM (#6074092)
    a good roundup of fancy keyboards here [extremetech.com]
  • Good lord, man! Listen to all your complicated specifications! I especially like the last one, whinging about how your current keyboard is black and that makes it hard to see in the dark. Want a super-1337 keyboard but can't touch type, eh? What are you doing that could possibly justify a ultra-custom keyboard? Oh, never mind, it appears you are adjusting the volume of your PC sound system, even muting it! Wow, it is pretty important to be able to do that quickly and efficiently, as it directly affect
  • Does anybody know how to get all those extra keys (volume, forward, back, search, my computer, calculator, etc) to do something useful under linux?

  • PI Engineering's X-Keys (Score:3, Informative)

    by Zocalo (252965) on Friday May 30 2003, @05:15AM (#6074943) Homepage
    PI Engineering [ymouse.com] make a range of rather nifty "keyboard extenders" for all those keyboard macros. I've got my eyes on an X-Keys "Stick" or two, but want the USB version which has been "coming soon" for a few months now, so should be imminent. The only drawback is that the management software utility is Windows only, although you can still program the keys directly or use a Windows PC and then tranfer the keyboard to a Mac/*NIX box. Since you have Windows anyway that shouldn't be a major problem in your case though. They seem open to developing custom solutions though, so *might* be prepared to provide the info necessary to develop a *NIX version of the programming tool. In my experiences with programmable keyboards however that's only really of use to people who need to either bulk program the things or flip between application specific macro sets.
    • those prices in USD? if they are then they're a little ridiculous don't you think? $80 for 16 keys?
      • Yeah, it's an expensive solution in that context, no doubt about that, $5 plus tax and shipping per key in-fact. However, when a keyboard dies it's almost always the QWERTY/space keys that fail, not the FN keys, so if we assume we go through three QWERTY keyboards to one X-Keys (probably harsh on the X-Keys) then you could look on it as $80+3 standard keyboards instead of 3 programmable keyboards. Here in the UK I can get a Cherry QWERTY for the equivalent of $20, so that's a total of $140. I can get a C
        • I'm not arguing than those with a fatter wallet than I will easily be able to justify the cost. However, in the end you are still getting 16-keys for $80. A mass produced strip of buttons like that should be very inexpensive. You could easily go out and buy a whole new keyboard with at least as many of those extra keys for far less than $80.

  • Touchstream Keyboards (Score:2, Informative)

    by Argot (38772)
    I repeatedly drool over Touchstream keyboards [fingerworks.com]. I can't justify the expense, but the entire keyboard is a touch-sensitive surface (like those laptop glide pads), and has an absurd number of macro functions (including ones for emacs).
  • cygwin now has a usable X server for windows, so VMware is a little excessive. Just ssh into your other machine and export X to your windows machine. (Putty has X forwarding that works if your ssh client doesn't provide support for it)

    There's a few nuance/quirks, but far less than VMware
  • With an Apple II, the keyboard had all the features of, well, an Apple II.
  • I bought a Microsoft ergonomic keyboard a couple years ago. I can touch type and I actually find that my touchtyping speed improves with ergonomic.

    Anyways....
    On the upper rt corner is a key marked 'sleep'.
    Should have been marked 'Blue Screen of Death' cause that is what it caused.

    At the time I had an awful computer desk and the only way I could really get things done was with the keyboard on my lap. I can not tell you how many times the upper right corner would find it's way underneath the desk and then

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