Keyboard Leds Possible Mod ?

[twobit]

Down the track when I get a second unit for modding, I'll solder in some LED's and Resistors to do a backlight.

In the meantime, however, I'll just use a USB booklight type thing. Something akin to this.

 

[Zotty]

It's dark now, and my laptop's LCD is illuminating my keyboard. I don't mean it's barely visible, I mean I could read a book in this light.
Where is your god now?!

Ooooh I feel so sorry for your eyes (reading the screen, not the book)

 

[elwing]

sorry, but why in the first place would you illuminate your keyboard? it's an input device, not an output... there's nothing interesting to read on the keyboard...

 

[Prometheus]

Whilst many of us can do so, believe it or not, not everybody can type without looking at the keys on occasion, for various reasons. With this in mind, it's quite easy to see why some folks would find this to be useful for them.

 

[peca]

It's dark now, and my laptop's LCD is illuminating my keyboard. I don't mean it's barely visible, I mean I could read a book in this light.

I don't know how You use Your notebook, but I use it with lid opened at angle about 100° to 120°. I dark I prefer minimal display backlight only. I such configuration I really can read print on keys. If I close lid a little (50°) and add BL brightness, then I can read key's print, but barely see what is on display. Maybe You have eyes as a cat.

 

[zhasha]

It's dark now, and my laptop's LCD is illuminating my keyboard. I don't mean it's barely visible, I mean I could read a book in this light.

I don't know how You use Your notebook, but I use it with lid opened at angle about 100° to 120°. I dark I prefer minimal display backlight only. I such configuration I really can read print on keys. If I close lid a little (50°) and add BL brightness, then I can read key's print, but barely see what is on display. Maybe You have eyes as a cat.

When booting the backlight will be set on max and I rarely bother to change it. I occasionally do and then I can't read the keys when the display is tilted up, but on max backlight (keep in mind: default setting) I can read in the light. That might also be why I prefer having my code editor have a dark background.

 

[Snorbert]

If you want a backlight, all that should be needed is a new, translucent keymat, and some 42ish LEDs (depending on which keys you want lit)

If you used a translucent (as opposed to transparent) keymat, you'd probably only need 2 or 3 LEDs. The light would diffuse through the plastic and illuminate all the keys, especially in a very dark environment. Lighting a second colour for the alt-keys would be tricky.

how about this for yet another silly HW suggestion for Pandora 2 - two SMD LEDs on each side of the keypad PCB, with little lightpipes mounted on the upper case section that sit over the LEDs and send all their light sideways into a translucent, white keymat with dark chars printed? That means the keymat wouldn't have to be completely overprinted with very durable black ink to prevent light spill from spoiling the character shapes - if you use dark printing on a translucent mat you won't notice so much if the character outlines aren't totally black, or if a little bit of black ink gets knocked off the character itself.

Of course with dark keys and light characters, you might not notice any less well lit areas of the keymat so much... much like displaying all white backgrounds on some cheap LCDs can let you see where they cut corners on the backlighting.