Re: Stylish keypads?

["wkearney99" <wkearney99@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

> I suspect that people are bothered by such things on a continuum, with my
> MIL able to find any source of artificial illumination through several
> layers of lead.  :-)

One might suspect it being more of a MIL personality disorder instead...
<grin>

> I, on the other hand, can fall asleep in a room full
> of squawking police scanners.

Oh I'm with you there, I can fall asleep with TV on.  But if nothing's
making a sound and there's a single bright LED left on the satellite box it
bugs the hell out of me.  Go figure.

> That's why I think so many control makers have adopted
> the rubber membrane model for any device that gets touched by human
fingers.
> Also, a membrane keypad probably makes manufacturing a lot easier since
the
> buttons don't have to be mounted separately.

I think that's the bigger reason.  Being able to stamp out a series of
rubber panel membranes with their momentary contacts is undoubtedly a lot
less expensive all around.

> Yeah - but . . . They felt inspired to change the button and ball layout
as
> well and that made it peculiarly uncomfortable for my particular hand.

There are two distinct styles from MS and several from Logitech (and
others).  I greatly miss the layout of my old Kensington TurboRing but it
was REALLY bad at accumulating crud.  I prefer the 'move with fingers' style
instead of the ones rolled with the thumb.  That and I much prefer the
scroll wheel on the MS Trackball Explorer as it's right there under the
thumb and not out in some stupid location like Kensington's latest
offerings.

> At least with the MS trackball (old style) all the crud builds up on the
three
> bearings and the two axial rollers.  But it's an impressive amount of
crud.

Only impressive in that the tiny gap needed for roller actuation gets gummed
up by it.  The optical ones keep themselves clean by having an opening at
the bottom that lets the crud fall out instead of gumming it up.

> At least they don't wear off after extended use the way a lot of cheap
> remotes and phone buttons do.

Yes, there's that too.