It was the best of times…
New Equipment
So, without too much feeling of guilt. I’ve taken one major step in replacement of my equipment. That major step is in keyboard. The trusty and dusty Happy Hackers Keyboard that i’ve had since the year 2000 has run its course. The need for extra key functionality has become a necessity. I’ve found that i’m more productive having the extra keys at my fingertips without having to perform any extra key combos. For example, volume control is a big thing for me; and at work especially it has become a must. So today I bought the Logitech Cordless Desktop LX710 Laser.
Which is the long name for Logitech’s wireless mouse and keyboard setup. So far so good, it’s been pretty much plug’< -n->‘play. To the left side of the keyboard there are keys which provide zoom functionality and what looks like a brightness icon of some sort. I’ll have to figure out if keycodes exist or what the issue is there. As far as the “Shuffle” key goes to the right, i’ll have to figure out the keycode mapping there as well and then update Gnome/X11 so I can actually use them. Size wise it is a pretty big keyboard in comparison to the Happy Hacker.
It’s obvious that it’s going to take sometime to gear up but nothing that seems like it would be too bad. One thing i’m noticing now is the angle of the keyboard, even with the legs up (which they are in the above photo) it is quite smaller than that of the Happy Hacker. You can visually note how the keys on the Happy Hacker are aligned almost in stadium fashion with each row slightly higher than the next.
The feedback seems to be about the same and I already feel like I’m moving just as fast as I would if I was on my Happy Hacker. The CAPSLOCK key can be reassigned via Gnome to the Control key as that is a killer feature for me using the Happy Hacker. Another thing that will be an issue is battery life. The LX710 does come with 4 Duracell batteries which is nice but we’ll see how long they last. I don’t plan on pulling out the batteries or turning off the keyboard or mouse. So it’ll be a while before I can say what the lifespan is.
The Mouse
It’s a mouse. That’s about all that I can say at this point. It does have about 5 different buttons. None seem usuable besides the normal scroll wheel on the X and Y axis. However I haven’t gone into my X settings yet to deal with it. All in all I think it’s the right piece; now we’ll see if it’ll last as long as 8 years. I’ve got two HHK’s so they’ll be kept around for emergency cases. They could use a good cleaning too, so i’ll probably try to do that at some point.