X61 - adding third language to the keyboard

[dr_st]

My girlfriend is studying Russian and wanted her Thinkpad to have a trilingual keyboard. Since Lenovo offers no such option, we took her X61 to a keyboard customization shop and engraved Russian on the English/Hebrew keyboard.

The end result looks rather nice. Much better than stickers. Now I just hope that the paint lasts.

[LegendaryKA8]

That's rather nice... I wish there were some services here that did that... at the very least I could refresh a keyboard with the letters worn off. I'm pretty picky about my TP keyboards and have replaced several older ones with brand new replacements... not cheap.

[t140568]

That does look very nice, indeed.

I can't help but wondering... is there really a shop dedicated to keyboard customization?

[dr_st]

I can't help but wondering... is there really a shop dedicated to keyboard customization?

Yes, and in fact much more than one.

Many Israelis like to take advantage of significantly lower laptop prices in the US (and some countries in the far east, like China/Thailand), buy laptops on their trips and bring them back. Many of these would like to get Hebrew on their keyboards, and engraving is usually far cheaper than replacing the keyboard with an official localized one. In fact, for certain models not sold in Israel, such a localized keyboard may not even exist.

Furthermore, the ethnicity here is much more heterogeneous than in the typical country. With about 20% arab population, and additional 20% of the population who are immigrants (mostly from Russia and ex-USSR countries), there is interest in adding additional languages to laptop/desktop keyboards.

Overall, the demand is sufficient for the businesses to thrive.

And they also do other keyboard customizations, for instance assigning special labels for the keys, for application-specific macros (i.e. music-editing, gaming, etc.). Although these are probably are only about 2% or less of the total customization jobs.

[t140568]

Wow. Very cool. I guess I didn't expect such diversity.

I'd love to get the Windows symbol removed from my desktop keyboard and have something more Linux-oriented.

Also, how much does a customization like you have cost?

[dr_st]

I paid $35. I've seen prices between $25 and $40.

[Utwig]

I learned to type in Russian by looking on keyboard layout on paper. So none of my keyboards (TP USB keyboard, T42p, X61T) have Russian letters but I type in Russian on all of them. It would be fun to have a Thinkpad with blank keyboard .

There are no engraving services here, you can buy stickers but those would spoil the feel and aesthetics of my Thinkpads.

[dr_st]

There are no engraving services here, you can buy stickers but those would spoil the feel and aesthetics of my Thinkpads.

Been there, done that.

Most of my keyboards, like yours, don't have any Russian letters on them (including all my Thinkpads), but I type Russian blindly pretty OK, but not nearly as fast as English, and not as fast as Hebrew. I still end up hitting the key next to the key I need fairly often, especially when it comes to the edge keys (the ones at the right ends of rows, which are non-letter symbols in the standard English layout).

What bothers me is that my brain seems to have been stuck for the past several years, and my Russian typing skills have hardly improved. I'm starting to doubt whether I will ever go to "the next level".

[fasteez]

awesomely beautiful, reminds me of a giant hp48, nice color scheme .. and quite cheap too.

[crashnburn]

Nice.

It would be nice if you could share the contact info of any of these who could / would offer their services by mail / parcel.

[Utwig]

I improved my Russian typing skills by adding lots of chat contacts who write in correct Cyrillic (most people from ex SU do, most people who moved out don't). There are also programs for improving typing: Windows: Typingmaster is not free and I'm not sure if it supports Russian. Linux: KDE has a learn to type game/utility and it supports different languages that KDE supports. It's free, if you have many Thinkpads you can install Linux with KDE one one of them and drill typing every day.

[dr_st]

Recently I was doing some testing on my X32 vs X61, so here is a rare photo of them side-by-side (click for bigger).


You can see the different approach to trilingual keyboards - X32 on the left uses stickers, X61 has the keyboard engraved, as was shown in the earlier photo. The problem with stickers (other than they visibly look like an add-on and not an integral part of the machine), is that the paint will smear / get erased after several years of heavy use. Not that this X32 is expected to see such use...

What bothers me is that my brain seems to have been stuck for the past several years, and my Russian typing skills have hardly improved. I'm starting to doubt whether I will ever go to "the next level".

And I am pleased to say that after 10 more years, I am at least somewhat better at typing Russian blindly than I used to be.

[Vopu]

This looks insanely beautiful, neat and tidy for sure. i think they use laser engravers don't they ? I have seen laser engraving done on top covers but never knew on key caps How long should one last , is it a repeat process to refresh the lettering after certain time ? Also , have you seen/(can it be done) a braille keyboard with this method ?

experimental engraving done here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Z_p2BT_y4U

Vopu

[dr_st]

This looks insanely beautiful, neat and tidy for sure. i think they use laser engravers don't they ? I have seen laser engraving done on top covers but never knew on key caps How long should one last , is it a repeat process to refresh the lettering after certain time ? Also , have you seen/(can it be done) a braille keyboard with this method ?

This one is not laser engraving, but a mechanical engraving with ink-filling of the grooves. I had it done in one of the most experienced, recommended shops that do this kind of thing, and the fact that 11 years later it still looks great, the ink hadn't faded or chipped off, is a testimony of the quality of their work.

I checked, and it looks like they do offer laser engraving now (mostly for backlit keyboards), which costs more than twice of a regular engraving. So far I haven't found anyone here adding braille to keyboards with this method, though.

[Vopu]

and the fact that 11 years later it still looks great, the ink hadn't faded or chipped off, is a testimony of the quality of their work.

Well, for 35$ you really can't complaint can you And again this really looks awesome. Well done you.

I checked, and it looks like they do offer laser engraving now (mostly for backlit keyboards), which costs more than twice of a regular engraving. So far I haven't found anyone here adding braille to keyboards with this method, though.

One would think due to the process of engraving say mechanical or laser , braille should not work as the letters/symbols are carved to caps then filled with ink as braille is designed to be a raised surface symbols against a flat base yet i have no idea if one in need can also feel the engraving instead of protrude letters/symbols for touch. A friend asked me about this a long time ago and as far as i could search back then, stickers or the transperent overlays were the only options other than specially designed braille keyboards/readers/note takers or smart displays. A use of technology on improving the disabilities of millions in need with special needs has always been fascinating to me.
Vopu

[Nicci00]

wow, keyboard engraving, that's really nice. I've been thinking of rigging something like that with my university's hacker-space CNC machine, I prefer the Latin American layout that is sadly quite rare for mechanical keyboard keycap sets (don't blame them, Latin America is quite a small market for 'luxury' computer products like that), so I was thinking of using the CNC machine to mill out symbols on blank keycaps, and use acetone-free nail polish to color the lettering. Nice to know someone in the world actually does that.