Have you ever heard of the Optimus Maximus keyboard? It's a project that took about 3 years to develop and the end result is an OLED key set ruled by QWERTY laws, but only as far as geometry is concerned. Since every key is in fact a small OLED screen, it can be configured to display any kind of icon/key/image you want. The provided software also allows you to assign different actions to the keys.

So why isn't the Optimus more popular these days? Oooo .... I don't know, maybe the (over) $1,500 USD price scared some users off. Or maybe they just didn't like the white theme. Anyway, irony aside, the fact is that you can't just throw a $1,500USD keyboard on the market without a big name to splash on the box (no, “Maximus” doesn't count).

However, it seems that another manufacturer is using the same ingredients, but with a different recipe. United Keys have designed a basic keyboard which adds another round of keys on the left side of the device. This 9-key set uses yellow monochrome OLED displays in order to represent each key. So, like on the Optimus, the keys can be configured with any icon the user desires. The problem is, that compared to the Optimus, these are monochrome LCDs and you can't really display full color images on them. Although they look great when used as symbols.

So what reasons would one have to buy the United Keys alternative instead of the original Optimus Maximus? Well, none, except for the 6-times lower price. Yes, that's right, divide the Maximus price into 6 little pieces and you will get that the United Keys solution only costs $260. Granted, it only has 9 OLED keys, but if you only are in need of a few customizable keys, then it's really a much better deal than the Optimus Maximus.

Moreover, if you're not willing to spend that much on the keyboard itself, then United Keys also offers a separate OLED keypad composed of the 9 keys for $200.


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