Logitech Illuminating Keyboard

Logitech Illuminating Keyboard

Published December 10, 2008 at 12:15:11 AM, by Daniel Shain

There is something elegant about simply calling something what it is, and the Logitech Illuminated Keyboard is certainly that. With backlit keys and a minimalist form factor that still packs (just) enough features to keep you interested, this keyboard would make a welcome addition to any desk.

Setup and Design

Setting up the keyboard is easy. For basic functionality you just plug it right into a USB port and you’re good to go. If you want to customize the function buttons you’ll have to install the included quick SetPoint software though. Note that if you have already installed SetPoint for another Logitech product (like the Logitech V550 Nano), you won’t need to reinstall it.

Logitech’s Illuminated Keyboard is sleek and trim. It boasts an ultra-slim 9.3mm profile and a small overall footprint, so it will fit on any desk. The keyboard is all black except for the lighted keys and a small transparent border around the edge, which looks nice but adds nothing else. The keys also look nice when the backlight is on, but they disappear from sight when it is off, which means that whether you need the backlight or not you will want to keep it on.

The designers of this product made a few interesting decisions when it comes to key layout. Where the delete key and insert key are usually juxtaposed, for example, the delete key has simply expanded to be the size of two keys and pushed the insert key up to the function row. Perhaps this made Logitech think people would delete too many things, which is why they also shortened the backspace key by a couple millimeters. Whether you find these changes useful or not (we actually enjoyed the delete key after our initial shock, and never missed a backspace when we aimed for it), every key was designed with the PerfectStroke key system, which makes for easy typing. There are also small legs in the back that you can use to elevate the keyboard if you choose, and a fixed black matte wrist rest for your comfort.

Features

The most important feature of this keyboard is, as you might imagine, the illumination. There are three preset brightness levels, although we’re not sure why anyone would use anything but the brightest setting except for possibly those with sensitive eyes. The backlights light up every key evenly as well as the function keys, which are backlit in orange to differentiate them from the grayish blue hue of the standard keys. The actual numbers F1-F11 do not light but the icons of the desired function do, so it’s not really a problem, although if we were looking to full screen our browser in a dark room by pressing F11 we might have to take a few pokes at it.

The function keys are customizable, and there are some multimedia keys as well. You can bring up your media player of choice (ours was set to iTunes by default, but we later customized it to Winamp with SetPoint) and play/pause/fast forward/rewind with ease, and you can just as easily increase/decrease/mute the volume. There are eight other function keys which will do things like open your email or load up your home page on your standard browser by default, or else you can customize them through SetPoint. The most interesting customization to us was creating a custom menu, so that when you press the key it would essentially load up a right-click menu with a custom list of your programs or websites, which you can scroll through with the keyboard or else use your mouse to choose. We found this to be pretty useful, although it was a tad annoying that if you deselect custom menu during setup and then go back to it, SetPoint doesn’t save your list and you have to enter them in again one at a time. It was also convenient that SetPoint gave us the option to essentially flip the standard function keys with the custom ones, resulting in a single press for the special feature and the standard fn+ press for the standard keys. Overall you get a number of convenient options by using the function keys through SetPoint.

On most high end keyboards, like the Logitech G15, the list of features wouldn’t end there, but unfortunately here it does. There are no USB ports, there is no wireless functionality whatsoever, and there are no other ports or hubs or screens or sliders. The Logitech Illuminated Keyboard scores almost all its points from the elegant simplicity and, yes, the illumination. You do get a few customizable keys, but on the whole, the game here is simplicity whether you like it or not.

Performance and usage

Special features aside, the ultimate test for a keyboard is how well it actually types. Logitech’s Perfect Stroke key system actually makes for very smooth typing, allowing 3.2mm of key travel and uniform feedback for every key. Although we remember the feel of the individual keys being a little nicer, the key travel and feedback remind us a lot of the Lenovo ThinkPad X301, which we fondly remember typing on. The keys are fairly silent, although the space bar is noticeably louder than the rest of the keys, meaning that if you have a heavy thumb you still won’t be able to hide your typing from anyone else in the room.

In use, the illumination really does look nice in addition to being functional. Although we don’t ordinarily look down when we type, we found our eyes drawn to our fingers as they traveled across the keys. Working in the dark by the light of our screen and keyboard, we’d be lying if a little part of us inside didn’t feel like we were hacking the CIA to uncover an insidious conspiracy. Even if hacking isn’t your fantasy, we can all agree that this keyboard looks quite nice.

Conclusion

Overall, you’re getting an incredibly thin and stylish keyboard that really doesn’t have a lot of features for its price. In testing out the SetPoint software, we found it useful but occasionally quirky in ways that contrast with the elegance of the actual keyboard. The backlight looks really nice, but we were struggling to think of examples for when we would be working in the dark with an external keyboard outside of gaming (for which there are many better keyboards, although this would still work for it). Unlike a laptop we’re not going to bust it out on a plane or while we’re working in bed, although we eventually came up with a situation where you have a roommate who is asleep in your shared room, in which case the illumination would be quite handy. Whether it’s a necessity for you or not, we can at least assure you the illumination works perfectly after writing this entire article with our main light turned off.

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Technical Specifications

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