Or, to give it its full title, the
Palm TM Portable Keyboard.
It is a truely truely nifty device. The full skinny can be found here: http://palm.com/products/keyboard/.
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- It is tiny. But when unfolded (which happens in a cool double-folded M shaped way, like some kind of 21st Century oragami) it is easily big enough for the full QWERTY keyboard.
- It also sports an extra 4 function buttons. These allow you to access the Palm's hard buttons without reaching up and pressing them, even the backlight.
- Provision is made for dialog boxes too. Both through extra marked keys (New, Done, Delete, Show, Details, OK ...) and the ability to select any random on-screen button can be chosen.
- A little stand folds out to support the Palm itself, holding it at a good (but non-adjustable) angle.
- It is light. I don't have good scales, but it is light.
- It comes in a nice neoprene zip-close case.
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- It isn't rigid enough. You can only use it on flat, hard surfaces. It's OK on a train, or a plane, but not in an automobile.
- It has an American key layout. (The @ is above the 2. This will only irritate people used to the UK layout, who will notice that the @ and " are switched and that the \ is in the top-right rather than bottom left).
- It is not cheap. They Retail for $99 from Palm.com. Brits should be looking at 50 to 60 UKP.
- The keyboard comes in two flavours, Palm III style devices and Palm V style devices. I think that a seperate version is available for the Handspring (maybe). I purchased the former, and now I'm put off buying a Vx because I'd need a new keyboard.