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Images courtesy of Engadget
Russian studio behind Optimus OLED keyboard unveils name, photos of much delayed keyboard

The Art.Lebedev Studio, the company responsible for the vaporous Optimus keyboard, unveiled press shots of the Optimus Maximus, the newly re-named $1,490 keyboard featuring OLED keys. 

The Maximus will have 114 keys, some of them featuring 32x32 pixel full-color OLED displays that are replaceable and customizable by users.  Production of the keyboards began on February 7, 2007, the company announced.

The company is not showing the keyboard during CeBIT in Germany, even though it appeared that a working unit would be presented during the event.  Furthermore, the release date of the pricey keyboard will be pushed back until this December.  Interested customers were able to start placing pre-orders for the keyboard last December, with an expected launch date sometime spring 2007.

Artemy Lebedev, the lead designer of the Maximus, first announced the keyboard in January of 2006, receiving large amounts of press coverage due to the concepts behind the keyboard.

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Do they mean Monopoly Money?
By osalcido on 3/15/2007 5:28:41 PM , Rating: 5
because 1400 Monopoly Dollars is totally worth it




RE: Do they mean Monopoly Money?
By das mod on 3/15/2007 5:58:42 PM , Rating: 1
LOL ...
funny thing is ...
only the F keys appear to be OLED ....
....1400 ?? only if they accept my sister's food stamps ...


RE: Do they mean Monopoly Money?
By GaryJohnson on 3/15/2007 6:21:07 PM , Rating: 2
quote:
Every key of the Optimus keyboard is a stand-alone display showing exactly what it is controlling at this very moment.


Better Pictures:
http://www.artlebedev.com/everything/optimus/


RE: Do they mean Monopoly Money?
By GaryJohnson on 3/15/2007 6:24:01 PM , Rating: 2
Err, that's not the same keyboard, my apologies.


RE: Do they mean Monopoly Money?
By NainoKami on 3/16/2007 3:22:07 AM , Rating: 2
By GaryJohnson on 3/18/2007 2:13:57 PM , Rating: 2
The link I posted up is the Optimus, the article is about the Optimus Maximus (formerly Optimus-103?).

They have different key layouts.


RE: Do they mean Monopoly Money?
By TheBaker on 3/18/2007 1:21:34 AM , Rating: 2
OK, after seeing those pics, I will say that, while not worth as much as they are asking, that is one smokin' keyboard. When the price of OLED's comes down, this is how all keyboards will be made.


RE: Do they mean Monopoly Money?
By dice1111 on 3/16/2007 8:10:37 AM , Rating: 2
I'll just trade them Boardwalk and Park place for it. Maybe thow in a "get out of jail free" card...


RE: Do they mean Monopoly Money?
By masher2 (blog) on 3/16/2007 11:56:15 AM , Rating: 3
$1500 is a bit steep, but I'd easily pay $500 for such a keyboard. Hopefully someone else will step in in a couple years and offer one.


By darksilicon on 3/16/2007 8:12:06 PM , Rating: 2
This is where we need Meizu to come in...


wouldn't buy one until...
By Chernobyl68 on 3/15/2007 6:03:33 PM , Rating: 2
let me know when they've got an ergonomic version of it...




RE: wouldn't buy one until...
By PrezWeezy on 3/15/2007 6:19:46 PM , Rating: 2
Come on guys, all you have to do is find a PS3 somewhere and then it's only $300. Seems like a reasonable price to me. But I'm with you Chernobyl, it's not work a penny to me if it's not ergonomic.


RE: wouldn't buy one until...
By DOSGuy on 3/16/2007 12:08:31 AM , Rating: 2
The offer was that if you could find a PS3, he would pay you $1200 for it, so I think the $1200 is gross, not net. Once you've bought the PS3 for $600 + tax, you should have a $550 profit. Now all you need to do is find a PS3 and $950 and you can have an OLED keyboard. I'm still not interested.


RE: wouldn't buy one until...
By Belard on 3/16/2007 12:25:18 AM , Rating: 2
I was in Fry's a few hours ago... There were 6 PS3 standard boxes in the middle of the isle... ready to go.

I should get 2 OLED keyboards... ;)

On the serious side.

Once OLED tech is cheaper in general and production ramps up (the original price was $1000) - the OLED keyboard should become cheaper. I think once the price is well under $500 (like $200) they'll sell a ton of them.

Hopefully they could put some molded plastic/glass on top so that it has the CURVE of desktop keyboards. Many notebooks are almost flat - some are completly. While the FLATNESS looks better - they're not great.


RE: wouldn't buy one until...
By DOSGuy on 3/16/2007 2:21:31 AM , Rating: 2
Agreed. I was thinking about the problem of QWERTY, Dvorak, and international keyboards many years ago and came up with the idea of an "LCD Keyboard", which I attempted to patent in 2001. When I searched the USPTO database, I saw that someone had already beaten me to it. 6 years later, there may finally be a product based on that idea. If I could afford one, I would certainly love to have this keyboard. I missed out on the money, but at least I can feel some pride in having had an idea that was 6 years ahead of its time. In the world of technology, that's not easy to do.


RE: wouldn't buy one until...
By kitchme on 3/15/2007 7:23:55 PM , Rating: 3
You'd pay $1500 if it was ergonomic? Right.


RE: wouldn't buy one until...
By ElJefe69 on 3/16/2007 9:52:39 PM , Rating: 2
lol nice. :)

i could see 300 for this keyboard. It doesnt DO anything that is different technically. It is the best keyboard I have ever seen and if you were an international student with rich parents, this would be the keyboard to own. Of course, the dumb jock/short wearing moron in the winter white kid would nab your shit and you'd be ownd.


RE: wouldn't buy one until...
By BladeVenom on 3/16/2007 3:24:44 AM , Rating: 2
Didn't they say a long time ago that it wouldn't be more expensive than a cell phone? I know my phone didn't cost $1,490.


I don't get it...
By Snowy on 3/15/2007 6:46:49 PM , Rating: 2
What's so special about this keyboard? Does it grow money or something? Seriously, why would anybody want to pay fifteen-hundred dollars for a keyboard?




RE: I don't get it...
By oab on 3/15/2007 7:02:00 PM , Rating: 2
Because, the keys change their display based no the application that you are using.

I.E. If you fire up photoshop, the keyboard will not have the alphabet layout, but instead will be displaying all the shortcut keys for photoshop.


RE: I don't get it...
By isaacmacdonald on 3/15/2007 7:13:01 PM , Rating: 3
I'm not sure who the target market would be. Anyone who needs to use keyboard shortcuts (generally "power users" that do more than just fool around) has probably already memorized them.

Photoshop is a great example of a program where shortcuts save massive amounts of time. I use it all the time at work and can tell you it took maybe a week for me to have them down pat. Looking down at the keyboard to figure out what the shortcuts are would be useful to people just learning them, but after a short time the feature would be superfluous. The only people I can imagine getting a decent amount of utility from this would be tech schools.


RE: I don't get it...
By akyp on 3/15/2007 9:30:16 PM , Rating: 2
Yeah but don't you have to type in text sometimes in Photoshop? If you click on the text tool and the alphabet layout would appear again, that'd be neat, but I can't see that happening without support from Adobe.


RE: I don't get it...