Owners of eyeballs, rejoice! Optimus swaps back to color
By Paul Miller 
posted Dec 8th 2006 12:51PM
posted Dec 8th 2006 12:51PM
After a whole lotta public outcry, not to mention our own fair share of whining over here on Engadget, the Art Lebedev peeps are Doing The Right Thing and switching the Optimus 103 back to color keys. It's naturally going to take a bit longer like this, since this new no-compromises model -- or, at least not that compromise -- will be based on some not-quite-ready-for-prime-time OLEDs. Right now the new plan is for pre-orders to take place in February 2007, instead of December 12th, and the price is still up in the air, but we get the impression Art Lebedev could've either cut features until they had an overpriced hunk of plastic nobody wants, or taken this tack, which involves a few more months of waiting, and most likely a few more dollars, but should be worth it in the long run.[Thanks, Jimmy D.]
I cry vaporware.
Nice to see they've brought it back, it definately makes it appealing again but I think too many people have already made the decision not to buy it. The damage is done.
that is so offensive to people who dont have eyeballs
gawd
It's not really vaporware at all. OLEDs exist now in growing mass quantities, while the price continues to drop. February might be pushing it, and the $1200+ pricetag might be too muhc, but it is hardly vaporware. If Lebedev doesn't do it, someone else will. A concept like this is by far too valuable to simply let escape. I think your only claim to that is that they put color back into it. You're mistaking that for "adding color for the first time". It had it to begin with, then they took it away, now its back by popular demand. 2 years ago, it would have been logical to call BS from the start, but people and technology have pushed it way beyond concept and put it into practicality.
$1200+ is still way too pricey for a keyboard if you ask me though, especially considering I just built a whole computer with dual video cards and matching monitors for barely $2100, so I will continue to rock my Eclipse board, and just memorize shortcuts, like a human with a functioning brain.
"like a human with a functioning brain."
Woah... where do I get one of those? I stopped by the mall a couple weeks ago looking for one, every store I stopped in just looked at me blankly like they'd never heard of one...
The "L-shaped" enter key is what killed it for me. Those things are abominations.
If they FIX that and bring back the launch keys during this "return to color" then maybe they'll recapture all that concept buz they've squandered over the past year.
Rushing to market, shedding features all the way, was the absolute worst thing ArtLebedev could have done.
I hear the Optimus is considered a World of Warcraft exploit. A future patch will render the keyboard useless in this regard. Blizzard will cite a move to a "more secure version of Lua."
WOOT!! Pleasantville rocks!
Where's my dinner?.......
I cry realware.
Lebedev has been making actual products in this realm of computing for a little while now. They've also shown actual development pictures in their project blog.
Just because someone's doing something cool doesn't mean it's automatically vaporware. People probably thought that same thing when someone announced the first "portable computer" (laptop).
A $2000 keyboard is what people should be expecting. Mouth-breathers usually can't accept the fact that new sh!t is only for the 1337 and being 1337 isn't cheap. Trust, there will be plenty willing to pay if the product lives up to its claims.
By the time this comes out, LG is already gonna be mass producing that new liquid fueled, oled screened laptop... http://www.engadget.com/2006/12/02/lg-debuts-ebook-concept-laptop-with-oled-screen-liquid-fuel/ ...that has a nice little oled keyboard already built in.
I'll be the first to get that badboy.
I got my eclipse II keyboard at newegg.com for like 50$
"or taken this tact, which involves "
The correct word is "tack". To take a different tack comes from the sailing world where tack refers to the course of the vessel with respect to the wind direction. Tact is synonymous with diplomacy and not the intended meaning here.
Sorry to be untactful in taking this tack.
Somebody wake me when this thing actually comes out. Ever since the last hey-now about the black and white half-keys, I tuned out. I use a Virtually Indestructable Keyboard and I can't imagine this thing's going to move me to change. Don't get me wrong- I'm on board with the concept, I'm just tired of being jerked around by premature reports that end up meaning nothing. If these guys want to avoid generating ill sentiment, they'll learn to tie their publicity a little closer to their release schedule and leave the big announcements until they've got something to show us.
I heard it's gonna ship with a copy of DNF
This thing is kind of pointless. Besides letters and a couple of shortcut keys why bother.
This thing is definitely vaporware. That doesn't mean it's never going to come out -- that's not the definition of vaporware -- but at the moment it is quite vapory. The interminable development cycle, the tantalizing yet insubstantial product shots, the ever-changing feature set and price point -- all classic hallmarks of vaporware.
John Gruber put together a recent "fireball" on the topic that seems quite relevant here:
http://daringfireball.net/2006/12/omnivapor
Dvorak's gotten this one right. What's the point? You aren't supposed to look at the keys when you're typing! So why make them look pretty. A 10-20 key sidepad would be a better idea, cheaper, more do-able, and more useful than their 3-button model.
I so don't care anymore.
Note that tact can also describe a feel or perception.
I'd be happy with the same keyboard, with standard keys all over except the keys on the left. Why not just have a standard set of keys and the extra keys are user-definable.
Granted, I see the advantage to having ALL the keys change for programs, games, etc. But let's keep the cost down and just have 12 customizable keys for now.
I agree. USE A STANDARD US LAYOUT! I am Canadian and I still can't stand anything but a US keyboard. Those big enter keys and tiny backspace keys piss me off. I would never buy the keyboard untill they changed the enter key layout.
Plus, I assume that this Optimus "103" will not include the 10 user programmable keys on the left side. I think this is stupid as those are probably the best keys on the keyboard. I don't mind spending good money on a good product, but how much more could it cost for 10 keys?
In conclusion, stick with the 113 layout and change the enter key. That is all.
overpriced hunk of plastic nobody wants - you said it!!
In other words: They weren't going to make the deadlines for the black-and-white version, either.
"The price of a nice cellphone" to me means $500. Sure they stripped it down and now agree to go back to where they initially got everyone's attention. They all complain and they agree to go back to the original plans but the price will nearly double. They keyboard I would have paid $500 for jumped to $1200 with half the features, then again the features are mentioned but the price tag increases? $2000?!~!
I think not. I am done reading on this. They could have had my $500, maybe even $700, but this is insane. Did anyone ever consider that perhaps they knew the feature cut would cause complaints and this is simply a way to raise the price in disguise? Conspiracy theorists unite!
I want black and white buttons!! It's much more artistic. And you can't put a price on good art, so I'm willing to pay $3000 for the B&W version.
This would be nice for changing layouts (QWERTY-Dvorak) as a first-time user. I once tried the Dvorak layout, but I couldn't get used to it until I had remembered the new key positions (which I couldn't have done without writing the keys on my laptop in pencil- but that rubbed off so many times that it got annoying.)
Woohoo! I'd pay through the nose for the color one. Good move Optimus!
Evan Evans
Seriously, if they wanted to charge $1,200 for B&W LCD keys, I can only imagine what they'll want for the color ones.
I can't wait to see what this does to the ship date as well. At this rate, you might as well promise a bundled copy of Duke Nukem Forever with each keyboard, because they seem to have to use the same development method :(