Stowaway Keyboard

Well it took a little effort to collect the keyboard.

Ordering was no problem, once I Froogled and found a set of sources I decided on the most rerasonable and ordered it.

As it was a Friday afternoon it didn't seem worth getting it next day delivery so, showing admirable restraint I opted to use Royal Mail delivery. I mistakenly put my main office of residence for the delivery address, forgetting that I would be away for the day at the county HQ. The postman had to leave a card requesting that I collect the parcel from the local sorting office, as there was no-one to sign for it.

So, a day later than it might have been I turn up at the office. I glanced at the card and noted the opening of the sorting office was 8am and closing was 6pm. I couldn't leave until lunchtime but then I dashed off to collect the parcel - to find that it had closed 45 minutes earlier and would not open till 4.10pm!! Imagine my disappointment.

Eventually I got a lift to the office and collected the parcel with no hassles; I even caught an early bus and got home 40 minutes early. I got tired today, can't shift this sore throat, so it took nearly e hours before I dug the package out of my rucksack.

Setup was amazingly simple. Having unpacked the keyboard I realised I had not got a computer to run the setup cd. I decided to see if I could go online and download the drivers - it was amazing. As the Stowaway site opened it had already determined the type of driver I needed. I didn't trust it so went through the mnanual selection process and came up with the same driver.

I downloaded the driver and it detected that a built in driver was running and gave me the option to turn it off. I turned off the generic driver and was up and away.

The keyboard feels very natural and I am already typing at near full speed. The action of the keys is responsive and I love all the built in functions. The key board has functions marked in blue to match a corresponding function key and a set of similar green marked function keys. There are functions for launching things like email, for opening a new email and sending it, appointments, calendars and a bunch of other of things.

I have already produced this email in a quarter of the time I reckon it would take me with a stylus - even if I inked it. This should make interacting with websites easier on the Dell, even if the site is a little tight to see.

It should certainly be easier to add items to this blog. Now to test the Send function button.