Quote from: Target on May 07, 2010, 03:43 AM

Quote from: cranioscopical on May 07, 2010, 02:49 AM

Quote from: Target on May 06, 2010, 10:49 PM

the dreaded gadget goblin came out in me

That must have been orcward!

ohoh, a troll...

Let's cross that bridge when we come to it!

fairy nough

Quote from: Target on May 09, 2010, 10:37 PM

Quote from: cranioscopical on May 07, 2010, 08:39 AM

Quote from: Target on May 07, 2010, 03:43 AM

Quote from: cranioscopical on May 07, 2010, 02:49 AM

Quote from: Target on May 06, 2010, 10:49 PM

the dreaded gadget goblin came out in me

That must have been orcward!

ohoh, a troll...

Let's cross that bridge when we come to it!

fairy nough

And here's to your very good elf!

I am dwarfed by your generosity!

shirely you're not serious (though I'm afrodo you might be...)

if you are considering this Trust numeric key pad, Perry, then i'd say it's okay. it's very thin, i.e. the depth is about 1.5 cm at the most. the cable isn't very long - but that shouldn't matter for laptop use.

I haven't seen "Trust" locally (that doesn't sound very good, does it  ), but the description sounds very much like the cheap ones here. And like you I reckon that for the use it'll get, should be fine. Thanks for the heads up...

okay, new sidewinder x6 keyboard now bought from PC World (where i was going to get it from last week).

this is a very impressive keyboard. the numeric keys are out of the way on the left (but can be quickly slotted back onto the right-hand-side; if ever required). the keyboard retains the standard right position of the cursor and home keys - which i'm glad about as i've realised it do use these a lot without looking at them.

the feel of the keys is nice enough (how the eBay guy managed to ruin them i can't imagine). and they are illuminated - better than they are on the logitech g11 keyboard.

but most of all, it provides a good area for the mouse to move around and there are plenty of programmable keys (at least, 90 of them).

the bonus feature is that the programmable functions can be tied to specific programs, i.e. so a key will perform different actions depending on which program has focus - or you can have global keys.

the question is now what to do with the junk eBay sidewinder x6 keyboard.

i think i ought to do a full review about it, Chris.

i'm finding lots of little features about it that make it stand out from other keyboards.

e.g.

extra "bumps" on some of the keys so you can identify where you fingers are resting on the keyboard.

there are LEDs to indicate which "bank" (out of three) of programmable keys you are using. nothing that special there, but i've just noticed that there are extra LEDs to indicate a program is in focus that you've assigned unique programmed keys to.

it will take me a while to realise what is the best way (for me) to use all of these features. so after that i'll aim to do a write-up.

i love when we have these threads where one forum member is able to help another -- (nice work Target!)

so after that i'll aim to do a write-up.

that would be very cool.

the question is now what to do with the junk eBay sidewinder x6 keyboard.

You could see what happens if you hook its keypad to the opposite side of the new keyboard. Will both work?

plugging both numeric keypads in just disables them both

Well, at least it was an inexpensive way to find out.

Have you thought about one of these?

[attach]

heheh. perfect. well almost. i'm sure Vangelis had something similar that went the whole way around the back too - it looked like he was sitting in a nest made out of keyboards. i guess i've got something to aim for yet...

i guess i lost my enthusiasm to do a full review of the ms sidewinder x6 after i found it to be less than perfect.

Positive points:

• good key illumination across the board. key characters/text and key edges are illuminated. a dial allows brightness to be adjusted - or turned off.
• numeric keypad section can be, quickly, switched between left or right side placement. (two keypads, one either side, will not work - both will be disabled).
• numeric keypad on left side allows for more room for mouse travel (for right handed mousers). see negative comments below though...
• lots of programmable keys - plus LEDs indicate which "bank" of keys is selected (3 banks available, plus 6 of the keys use a toggle button to double them up).
• keyboard action feels quite "nice". i can't really offer more than that, it just seems better than my previous keyboard.
• volume control dial.
• 4 media keys, i.e. play/pause, back, forward, mute.
• some kind of "game" specific keys; no idea what they do.
• several keys have bumps on them. i haven't needed them but i can imagine it being useful if i made the effort to remember them.

okay, so nothing that unusual there.

Negative points:

• programmable key software manager is pretty terrible. it's a click, click, click, click kind of method to set anything up (well, lots more clicks). very annoying. i've decided to ignore it for most things and just use autohotkey instead.
• no back risers. keyboard lies completely flat unless you put something under the top edge (a bit of wood in my case).
• numeric keypad on left side still doesn't seem to make a great deal of right hand mouse room. i'm still hitting the keyboard's right edge with my mouse. i've thought about getting a keyboard that has more of a laptop keyboard size and layout. i haven't bought one because i think it's still handy to have the home and cursor keys on the right - where i expect them to be through habit. (i could also blame my MX Revolution mouse for being too wide.)
• escape key is further to the left than "normal". annoying as i touch type.
• F, function keys, are a non "standard" size. so they are wider and closer together. annoying as i touch type.
• macro buttons are close to main keys - easy to hit the wrong key when going for Ctrl key.
• key remapping not very clever using the software manager. autohotkey has to be used instead. e.g. can't make key s6 map to Ctrl key (to avoid problem mentioned above).
• back light is red. that's it. it would have been nice to have a choice of blue and green too. the red does look quite nice though.
• volume dial is slow to respond.
• they keys ¦ and | are the wrong way around.
• the macro keys can be slow to respond. i set some up for cut/copy/paste. a quick hit of those keys might only perform a single key hit, so the output is like this instead: x/c/p instead of ctrl+x, ctrl+c, ctrl+v
• no obvious place where the keyboard manager saves the configuration files.

Conclusion
they keyboard is okay. i can live with the faults, just a matter of getting used to things or working around them (with autohotkey). i've been a bit too busy to set it all up how i like - after that i'll, probably, realise how much better this keyboard is than my last one.

it isn't the ultimate keyboard i was hoping it to be. a better key manager program would make a big difference. i'm not sure what i really feel about the home and cursor key placement. i do like a bit of tradition but removing them would give more mouse room - maybe this mouse room issue is nothing really.

will i buy another keyboard?

maybe. if so, then it will be something completely different - one more like the laptop size i mentioned. i've just not seen any good ones with good key illumination. you may say why do i need lights when i touch type, i obviously don't need to look at the keys. well, i don't know all the keys - so i do have to look sometimes - and it's quite dark in here in the evenings.

edit:
forgot to mention a very obvious negative point:

- numeric keypad on left means you have to relearn the key layout with your left hand. i seem to have resorted to using the top row number keys instead. not really sure if i'll ever force myself to learn how to dial all the numbers with my left hand on the pad.

i guess i lost my enthusiasm to do a full review of the ms sidewinder x6 after i found it to be less than perfect.

no need, you've just covered all the necessary ground.

It's disappointing that they couldn't come up with a better implementation of the macroing software, especially as there are already many examples that do work well (I've done a little more research and it appears this is a common complaint for this hardware - it also appears that some of the keys may not work if the software isn't installed)

I wondered about the numpad placement as it seemed like it was really intended for lefties, and you're experience confirms it (that said there's nothing to stop someone retraining themselves to use it that way, though it may mean they'll never be able use a 'normal' keyboard again...)

I'll be interested in you're continuing adventures with this - it seems like less may be more here

thanks for the update!!

just discovered another bad point about the sidewinder's default program for managing hotkeys...

...you can't use the Winkey. 

maybe you can use it if you fiddle around with the "macro" manager side of things. but i really can't be bothered to go through all that as it's far too convoluted.

but, seriously, no winkey support? this is a microsoft branded keyboard - how can they ignore their own key.

retards.