Palm Portable Keyboard Review

By Brent Hecht

Manufacturer: Palm and Think Outside
System Requirements: Palm III, Palm IIIe, Palm IIIse, Palm IIIXe, Palm V, Palm Vx, or Palm VII, and Mac or Windows PC to use to transfer Keybord driver from a CD onto the Palm device. (Think Outside has also signed agreements with other companies to make the keyboard available to Handspring Visor and Windows CE users.)
Retail Price: $99.00
Availability: Out Now

Marketed and sold by Palm, but developed by Think Outside, the Palm Portable Keyboard unarguably is an innovative device. It connects to almost any Palm organizer and serves as a full-sized keyboard when extended but, when folded-up, it is barely larger than a Palm III. Can a keyboard that sports such portability still offer a comfortable typing environment? Can a Palm organizer be effectively operated with a keyboard? These are just a few of the questions I asked when I began this evaluation.

The Palm Portable Keyboard amazed me even before I connected it to my Palm IIIx. When I took it out of the box, it was smaller than my outstretched hand, but after going through the simple process of opening it, it became a true, full-sized keyboard. Heck, its keys are even bigger than the key’s on my iMac’s keyboard.

After being stunned by the set-up process, actually using the keyboard was a bit of a let down. Don’t get me wrong, the keyboard works extremely well and is very comfortable to type on. The problem is that the Palm OS is designed to work with a stylus, not a keyboard. Granted, certain functions, such as simple text entry, are much faster with a keyboard. However, other key functions, such as selecting an item from a menu, cannot be done from the keyboard. This means that you will need to keep your stylus handy, which is quite a hassle when you are trying to type. Think Outside did its best to remedy this problem; the keyboard sports four customizable “application” buttons (similar to the hardware buttons on Palm organizers) and a “function” modifier key... But the application buttons and a modifier key are simply not sufficient to make-up for the Palm’s intrinsic paucity of support for a keyboard. For instance, other stylus-required actions include selecting an application and editing the details of an appointment. On the bright side, the Palm Portable Keyboard does make entering non-standard characters much, much easier.

Given the Palm Portable Keyboard’s benefits and drawbacks, it will be most useful for two types of tasks: note entering and laptop replacement in rugged areas. In other words, if you are a student, the Palm Portable Keyboard is an excellent way to enter notes using an inexpensive Palm device rather than a laptop. Likewise, the keyboard, along with a Palm device, is an excellent way to enter large amounts data in places where power to recharge a laptop is not available. However, if you mostly use your Palm as a standard PDA (personal digital assistant) or use it for any other purpose than those described above, you will find the Palm Portable Keyboard to be a novelty rather than an item of utility. I have to admit, though, it would be a very cool novelty...

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February 08, 2012