Gearhead Wireless Keyboard

I have a collection of several hundred Long Playing records, LPs. I want to listen to this stuff in my car, which has a USB connection to its stereo.

The solution is Audacity! This is Free Software, available for Windows, Mac and GNU/Linux. See the screen image to the right. This records the audio. I can make some corrections to tone and volume if necessary. If I install the "nonfree" packages, I can export to the MP3 format my car understands. I have installed GNU/Linux and Audacity on a cheap, second hand computer that is now located behind my TV set. An additional resource provided by this machine is a floppy drive. At least, this will be a resource when I find a floppy cable for it. The store where i bought it managed to not provide one. It also did not plug the DVDs into power. At least those cables were present.

I connected the receiver's auxilliary output jacks to the line-in jack of my computer, which I have named TV.

Click on the pictures for higher resolution versions. The window decorations look weird because I am running GNU/Linux, with the X Window System, and the FVWM window manager.

The keyboard dammit!

This is an article about a keyboard!

I went to Tiger Direct to buy stuff for the computer. I needed a keyboard and mouse. TV lives in my living room. There is no desk for a keyboard and mouse, so when I saw this Gearhead "Wireless Touch" keyboard, I saw that it might be useful. I cannot remember the exact price. It was around forty bucks. It was more expensive than some full sized keyboards with mice, although I forget if they were wireless.

Not surprisingly, the keyboard is wireless. This makes it functional regardless of where I am sitting in the living room. There is no mouse. There is a touchpad with two buttons underneath, performing the function of a mouse, all sort of like a laptop computer.

Carefully examine the photos, especially the lower one, out of the box. There is only one shift key. This pretty much kills any chance of you doing proper touch typing with this thing.

It works! I plugged the wireless receiver into TV's USB port. I installed a pair of AAA batteries. I installed Fedora 20. It took some fiddling around with cables and ports and sound cards, but that was not the keyboard's fault.

What is not obvious from the photos is that this keyboard is tiny. My fat fingers do not fit on the home row for touch typing. I am over six feet tall. A tiny woman or a child may be able to touch type with this thing. The best I can do is two finger hunt and peck. Even if you are a tiny woman or a child, the lack of a right-hand side shift key will keep touch typing a challenge. If your plan is to write (or touch type) the next Great Canadian Novel, you need a desk and a proper keyboard, or a decent laptop.

If you are not a touch typist, this thing is way less limited. It might work fine.

An additional issue for GNU/Linux and other X Window System users is the mouse keys. X uses the middle mouse button for menus, and as a paste key. You highlight text, click where you want to insert it, and then middle click, or click on the roller. On two button mice, you click the two mouse buttons together to get middle button functionality. Not on this keyboard! This should not be an issue for Microsoft Windows users.

When not in use, this keyboard sits on the shelf next to my TV, and my computer TV. It is tiny, so it fits in the space available, out of the way.

Summary

The Gear Head Wireless Touch keyboard performs the task I bought it to perform. I can log into my TV , launch Audacity, and record stuff from my stereo. When not in use, it fits out of the way in a small space, next to my TV.

If you plan to do serious work with your keyboard (and computer), get a real keyboard.