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DxO ONE camera attachment for iPhone and iPad review

I have been a digital photographer for over 15 years now. I started with the equivalent of an Instamatic, and moved up to a prosumer, then full DSLR cameras. I have bought and sold lenses, filters, and other equipment. While I don’t pretend to know how to adjust f-stops and ISO for challenging conditions, I have made some nice photos, been paid for some and awarded prizes for others. I’m rarely ashamed or embarrassed by my work. I’ve also bought into the iOS ecosystem hook, line, and sinker. So it was only a matter of time before I subsumed to the Siren call of the DxO ONE iOS camera. I pre-ordered this about three years ago, and my Lovely Bride kept asking “What is this charge on our credit card?” to which I would reply “It’s a new camera. It’ll be here any day now.” She’s sweet to believe in me. And she’s seen much more funneled into my photography habit. And it only took nine months to ship!

Note: Photos may be tapped or clicked for a larger image.

DxO has a long history in Photographic software. Their measurement software for photo accuracy is an industry standard for many. The DxO ONE, however, is the first piece of hardware they have produced. It doesn’t look much like a standard camera. For one, it doesn’t have a viewfinder of any kind. Second, there is no way to see what your settings are. The first version, before the first firmware update, could only shoot from within an app on a connected iOS device.

A physical release pops out a lightning connector, and attaching it to your iPad, iPod touch or iPhone launches the software that controls the camera and turns your device’s screen into a viewfinder.

While that was cool enough (and the DxO ONE’s 25-megapixel sensor easily bested the resolution of the 8 megapixel iPhone 5s I was using at the time), the first firmware update added the ability of the unit to take pictures independently of the iPhone using the black-and-white screen as a rough viewfinder. (Yes, black-and-white. Zero shades of gray. Think original Macintosh. See picture below – loads of dithering. Those are the boards of my deck, through a glass table.)

Crazy as it sounds, this is a James Bond/Man from U.N.C.L.E-type spy camera. I can pull something out of a cigarette pack that doesn’t look like a camera and grab a really, really good photo in dim light. In full color. My 10-year-old self would be screaming for joy about now. I regularly use it for concerts and candid shots, but just this weekend, I discovered what the newest firmware update added: remote control. As in, I can turn this camera on, set it up, and walk away, and snap photos from it at will from anywhere on the same wifi network. (Pictures below are of me snapping hummingbird photos. The first pic is focused on my phone, the second photo is focused on the DxO ONE on the tripod. Since the devices are both on wifi, I could have been anywhere on my network monitoring the camera.)

And the camera is so quiet and unassuming, it’s more stealthy than some nanny-cams. And, as I was researching further, I found it can also be controlled from an Apple Watch! Sure, you don’t get the nice preview with the watch like you do with the iPhone, but you can hit the shutter release without touching it, or looking at your camera screen.

Another advantage of using the Lightning Port is that you can easily pull the camera off and turn it 180° to make a selfie camera of amazing quality. (It doesn’t help the subject matter, sadly, but you get more details to edit out.)

Sometimes, you find a case that doesn’t give good access to the flat area around your Lightning port, but there are many on the market that do. I recently spent some credit card points on a tripod mount and lens mounting adapters, in hopes of finding a decent telephoto lens to fit.

Since this is a camera review, I guess I should have some comparison shots from a known camera. I shot three scenes on full auto indoors with no flash, outdoors with full sun, and indoors in a dimly lit area with flash. The ones on the left were taken with the onboard iPhone 6s Plus camera. The ones on the right were taken with the DxO ONE attached to the same phone. (The DxO is attached to the lightning port, so it’s on the opposite end from the built-in phone. This is what accounts for the slight shift in point-of-view.) The only changes to the basic auto setting I made was to force flash to fire in the indoor flash shot. There are no lights turned on in the room, or in my mini-studio, only the camera flash. The images are full-frame with no cropping or enhancement added.


 


 

 

 

 


 

In the first shot, it’s easy to see the increase in light the ONE’s sensor makes. There is some fuzziness, but that’s to be expected with handheld shots. The shutter button on top of the ONE makes you have to pay much more attention to camera shake since it’s a physical button, rather than the virtual button on the iPhone app.

In the outdoor shot, things look equal in the well-lit areas, but the details under the shade, like the bark on the tree left of center, fall apart on the iPhone. If you’re wanting to get all CSI on the background, like my neighbor’s garage or porch area, the DxO has way more data to play with.

In the final flash set, the body of the camera is about the same, with a little fuzziness on both shots. The texture of the strap in the DxO shot is far more clear when you blow it up, however. Given the distance from the light source, the lighting is better, too.

So, is the difference worth the price? Hard to say. Three years ago and two generations of camera phones, it was to me. On our last vacation, most of my travel photos were taken with just the iPhone 6s Plus. While I always wish for more glass for zoomed shots, I was very happy with the outcome. Adding a clip-on polarizing filter (which is not easily doable with the DxO) made a lot of difference in sunny outside shots.

Computational photography is making the size of the sensor obsolete much faster than the “camera guys” are improving the optics of camera hardware. Given Cupertino’s income from sales, they have far more resources to spend in this area than companies like Canon and Nikon, let alone poor little DxO. But, still, it’s a neat gadget, and I don’t regret purchasing it. Meanwhile, the price is down $100 from what I paid, but with the software updates, I’m still up to date. I love living in the future.

Source: The item for this review was purchased with personal funds. Please visit DxO for more info and Amazon to order.

 

Product Information

Price: $469.99 (retail is $499)
Manufacturer: DxO, Inc.
Retailer: Amazon
Requirements:
  • iOS device
Pros:
  • Small and light.
  • Tight build quality.
  • Software under active development.
  • Easy to connect to iOS device.
Cons:
  • It's so small, attaching lenses is difficult, and finding quality lenses is difficult.
  • Some cases don't let it fit device fully.

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DxO ONE camera attachment for iPhone and iPad review originally appeared on The Gadgeteer on August 14, 2017 at 8:30 am.

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Douni A5 Bluetooth speaker review

After reviewing a handful of portable Bluetooth speakers, I’ve found that some really appeal to me like the UE Megaboom because of its great sound quality (it has some bass!) and long battery life among other things, but others like the Logitech x300 do not. The Logitech x300 tends to dampen mid and upper frequencies when bass frequencies are playing. When the Gadgeteer was offered the Douni A5 Bluetooth speaker, I volunteered to review it to see how it compares to other portable speakers I’ve tried. After testing it, I’d say it competes rather well in the audio quality department, but not so much in the Bluetooth range department.

Contents

  • Bluetooth speaker
  • Power adapter
  • 3.5 mm Aux audio cable
  • Owners Manual

Technical Specifications

  • Battery Voltage: 11.1V
  • Charging Voltage: 15V
  • Output Power: 2*12.5W
  • Speaker Spec: 58mm, 12.5W (and has two passive radiators)
  • Frequency Response: 50HZ~18KHZ
  • Lithium Battery Capacity: 6600mAh
  • THD<0.5%
  • SNR:>90dB
  • Dimensions: 8.6″ long x 2.9″ wide x 3.5″ high (218 mm long x 74 mm wide x 88 mm high)

Design & Build Quality

The Douni A5 Bluetooth speaker feels like a durable speaker. It is a rectangular speaker that is black on the top and bottom and has a gray metal grill. It is the size of many other portable speakers (not the super small ones…). Its dimensions are 8.6″ long x 2.9″ wide x 3.5″ high and it weighs 2 lbs. 9 oz.All of the controls are located at the top of the speaker. The entire top of the speaker is covered in a rubbery material except for the plastic silver ring around the buttons.
The back of the speaker contains the ports. The ports are (from left to right): Aux Audio In (to physically connect a mobile device to the speaker), Aux Audio Out, 15V DC In (to charge the speaker), 5V Out (to charge your devices), and a Reset button (resets the speaker to its factory default settings).The bottom of the speaker is also covered in rubbery material to prevent the speaker from moving around while on furniture.

Use

Powering On/Off: When turning on the speaker, you must press the Power button for two full seconds. To turn it off, you must press it for one full second. If you have a device plugged in via the Aux audio cable, the speaker will not turn off.

Auto shut-off: After about 40 minutes of inactivity, the speaker is supposed to automatically shut off according to the Douni A5 product description on the Amazon. However, I was not able to replicate that – the speaker remained on until I turned it off.

Bluetooth Pairing: After powering the speaker on for the first time, it immediately went into pairing mode in which the Bluetooth symbol on the speaker flashed alternately blue and red. At this time, I needed to go into my device’s Bluetooth settings (first I made sure Bluetooth was turned on) and look for the newly discovered device listed as A5. After tapping on the A5, my speaker was connected and a voice prompt on the speaker said, “Connected”. It is possible to pair up to eight devices to the speaker (which means that the speaker will remember that it has been paired to eight of your devices). When the speaker is powered up the next time, it will connect to the device it was connected to last. To change to one of the other seven paired devices, you can press the Bluetooth button on the speaker for one full second to disconnect the speaker from the current device (a voice prompt will say, “Disconnected”) which will then put the speaker into pairing mode (the voice prompt then says, “Pairing”), after which you can go into your other mobile device’s Bluetooth settings to tap on the A5 in the list of paired devices to connect it to the speaker. Even though the speaker remembers up to eight devices that it has been paired with, this speaker apparently cannot be connected to more than one device at a time, unlike the UE Megaboom which can be connected to two devices at the same time and thus can play music from both devices without having to stop and disconnect from one device to connect to another.

This speaker is also NFC capable which means that you can pair it with an NFC equipped device. When NFC is turned on on your mobile device, you’ll only need to pass it over the NFC area on the speaker which is located just above the Volume Down/Up controls as shown in the photo above (Note: you may have to search for the NFC area on your phone). Pairing the speaker to my Nexus 6 phone was very easy using NFC. When passing the lower right quadrant of my phone (where the NFC hardware location is) over the NFC area of the speaker, my phone displayed this message, “Are you sure you want to pair the Bluetooth device A5? Yes or No”. After tapping on “Yes”, I was paired. When paired and connected, the speaker and device volume controls are in sync.

In the photo above, you’ll also notice the microphone next to the NFC area on the speaker that picks up your voice when using the calling features of the speaker.

The above photo also illustrates how the rubber top really attracts dust and lint. This is difficult to keep clean and this was as clean as I could get it!

When powered on, the speaker has LEDs to indicate its status. In addition, when the speaker is moved or it thermally senses your hand near the control panel, the control panel buttons light up for a few seconds so that you can find the correct controls when the speaker is in a low light setting.

LEDs (from left to right): There is an LED battery symbol, three LED dots, an “AUX” LED (not lit up in the above photo), a Bluetooth LED, and control panel backlights.

The three red LED dots indicate the level of battery charge: one dot = 30%, two dots = 60%, and three dots = 100%. When the battery is low on charge the Battery LED symbol will flash red (you will also hear a series of tones indicating low battery charge); otherwise, it will shine green.

When you physically connect your device to the speaker using an audio cable, the “AUX” LED shines green.

When your speaker is paired and connected to a device via Bluetooth, the Bluetooth LED symbol slowly flashes blue (and a voice prompt says, ”Connected”). When the speaker is in pairing mode, the Bluetooth symbol alternately flashes blue and red (and a voice prompt says, ”Pairing”).

As stated earlier, the control panel uses backlighting to illuminate the buttons for a few seconds when the speaker is moved or if it thermally senses your hand near the control panel. Thermal sensors – that’s pretty cool. You don’t have to turn the lights on to control the speaker.

Bluetooth Connectivity and Range: After pairing and connecting the speaker to my devices (Nexus 6 phone and iPod Touch 6G), just after turning it on, periodically I found that the connection would drop for a fraction of a second several times (within about a 15 second timeframe) and my device was only about one to two feet away from the speaker. This happened enough times to make this distracting and frustrating. I also noticed that with only one wall separating my device from the speaker, I frequently lost connectivity. When testing the line-of-sight distance from my Nexus 6 phone, I was only able to go 10 feet away from the speaker when the connection started to drop. When doing the same test with my iPod Touch 6G, I was only able to go 20 feet before the connection started to drop. Oy! This is exceedingly disappointing especially when the Bluetooth range is supposed to go up to 66 feet according to the A5 product description on Amazon.

Charging Time: The User Manual states that the recommended charging time is four hours. When charging it with the provided power cord, the LED dots would flash in sequence until a certain level of charge was attained (upon reaching 30% charge, the first LED dot remained on, and when reaching 60% charge the second LED dot also remained on, then when reaching 100% charge, the third dot also remained on). Even though the manual says the speaker should charge for four hours, I noticed that it took only about 1.5 hours to fully charge the speaker. When I charged beyond the 1.5 hours, there were no differences in the status lights.

Using the A5 as a Charger: If you should need to charge your mobile device in a pinch, you can do so using this speaker. However, it only provides 5V/1A so the charging will be slow.

Playback Time: When the speaker is set at a moderate volume level, my test revealed that the speaker would run for about nine hours. The User Manual states that the speaker should run about 12 hours. Of course, the playback time depends on the volume you play it at, but I expected that when the speaker is set at a moderate level, it would last nearly 12 hours.

Controls: I noticed that when using any of the control panel buttons, I needed to press each for one full second (except for the Power button which needed two full seconds when turning the speaker on). A simple split-second tap was insufficient to get the buttons to work properly. Once I learned the proper way to operate the controls, all of them worked well. I could play/pause, skip forward/back a track, or increase/decrease the volume levels. Holding the volume buttons down would increase or decrease the levels more quickly.

Calling Features: When you are connected to the speaker via Bluetooth and you receive a phone call, you must press the Call button for a full second to answer the call and press again for one full second to hang up. Call clarity on both sides was adequate. When I answered the call on the speaker and spoke within about eight inches from the microphone on the speaker, there were no issues. If I was a foot away or more, the caller indicated that my voice started to echo and was less clear.

Aux audio-in: When you connect your device using a 3.5 mm audio cable, this device supersedes Bluetooth devices. I also noticed that the volume on the speaker and device are not in sync when connected this way, thus, you’ll need to find your preferred volume level by adjusting it on both devices.

Frequency Range: Using my Audio Test Tone Generator Android app, I was able to comfortably hear 50-17,000 Hz frequencies (well, my kids heard them) when the speaker was set at moderate volume.

Audio Quality: This speaker can truly fill a room with music – it’s loud – at least it is to me. This speaker’s audio quality was quite impressive. It sounds just about the same as our UE Megaboom and it didn’t dampen the upper/mid frequencies like the Logitech x300 when playing bass-heavy music like Silent Shout by The Knife. Other music genres like classic rock (the Famous Final Scene by Bob Seger & The Silver Bullet Band), Celtic/new age (The Highwayman by Loreena McKennitt), and classical music (Clair de Lune) sounded crisp and clear. The vocals and the guitar on The Highwayman were beautiful to listen to. It is my perception that the speaker tends to slightly favor the mid to upper frequencies but I am not an audiophile so take that with a grain of salt – or several grains of salt.

Final thoughts

The Douni A5 Bluetooth speaker is quite wonderful to listen to until you get more than 10 feet away from it at which t_me th_ ___nection _tarts to _rop (“…time the connection starts to drop”). Yep. My studies have shown conclusively that this speaker suffers from separation anxiety. In addition, the controls need to be pressed one full second to work properly. The call features work well and the speaker does charge quickly (1.5 hours) but a full charge will only give you about nine hours of playback time when the speaker is set at a moderate volume level (as opposed to the 12 hours that the User Manual states). Even though the speaker sounds great, the Bluetooth range problems drive me crazy, thus I would personally pass on this speaker.

Source: The sample used in this review was provided by Douni. Please visit their website for more information or Amazon to purchase one.

 

Product Information

Price: $69.99
Manufacturer: Douni
Retailer: Amazon
Pros:
  • -Wonderful audio quality
  • -Charges quickly
  • -Has thermal sensors to detect when your hand is near the control buttons to illuminate the buttons
Cons:
  • -Bluetooth range is awful
  • -Control buttons need to be pressed one full second to get them to work properly
  • -Speaker plays for about nine hours on a full charge when it is set on a moderate volume level instead of 12 hours like the manual says

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Douni A5 Bluetooth speaker review originally appeared on The Gadgeteer on August 13, 2017 at 9:27 am.

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ŌURA Ring review

The majority of fitness trackers on the market have been designed to be worn on the wrist like a watch or worn at the waist clipped to a belt. But today, I am going to show you the ŌURA fitness tracker that is worn on your finger like a ring. 

What is it?

ŌURA is a ring with sensors inside the band that tracks activity like steps, sleep, respirations, and heart rate info.

What’s in the box?

ŌURA ring
Charging dock
micro USB cable
Quick start guide

The ŌURA ring is made of scratch resistant ceramic zirconia that is 100% non-allergenic. While it might look like a plastic ring in the images, it feels very hard and smooth like something made of ceramic. It’s also waterproof to 50m /164 ft, so you can wear it while showering and swimming.

The ring is available in stealth black like the one sent to me, arctic white, and mirror black.

The shape and size of the ring remind me of a guy’s high school class ring. The ring does have some weight to it, but not enough to be bothersome.

As you will notice in the image above, the part of the ring that touches the underside of your finger, has three raised sensors. According to ŌURA, these sensors:

  • Senses the arteries in your finger, just like the hospital pulse oximeter
  • Captures 250 samples per second for a constant flow of reliable data
    Detects blood volume pulse, body temperature and activity level with advanced sensors
  • Determines sleep stages with precision comparable to clinical sleep labs

There are also two flat contacts inside of the top of the ring that are used to charge the ring’s internal battery.

Included with the ring is a small white charging dock that has two spring loaded electrical contacts.

As you probably have already guessed, the ring is pressed down on the post in the center of the dock. When it’s seated properly, a yellow LED on the dock will pulse to let you know that the ring is charging. When charging is done, the LED remains steady.

How do you know what size ŌURA Ring to buy?

With most fitness tracking devices, you don’t need to know your exact wrist size to order one. But with ŌURA, even if you do know your ring size, you might not want to buy the ŌURA in that size due to the sensors that stick up from the bottom of the band.

How do you know which size to order? ŌURA will send you a free ring sizing kit which includes a set of dummy rings of the sizes that they offer. They suggest that you wear the size you think you want to buy for 24hrs to make sure it’s the right size for you. Everyone’s hands and fingers can swell during the day or night and you don’t want to buy an ŌURA ring that is so large that the sensors don’t make good contact with your finger or too small that the ring gets stuck on your finger.

The only ring I wear is a silver wedding band. The ŌURA ring is definitely on the large side for a ring that I would want to wear 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

It took me a little while to get used to wearing the ŌURA because the band is wider than what I’m used to. But if you already like to wear larger rings, it probably won’t be a problem for you.

If I’m going to wear a fitness tracking device, I’d rather it be on my finger than my wrist. I can understand that this is a personal preference, but the ŌURA ring felt less in the way of my everyday activities than wrist worn trackers which tend to rub my wrist when I’m typing which is what I do all day long.

It’s also less annoying to wear at night compared to a wrist worn tracker for sleep tracking.

The only time I took off the ŌURA ring was when I was working out on a TotalGym because the skin on my finger would get pinched between the ring’s band and the TotalGym handle.  If you don’t know what a TotalGym is, it’s a cable style exercise machine that has handles that you pull to do various exercises.

Tracking your stats with the ŌURA ring

First of all, what stats can ŌURA track?

During the day when you’re awake, the ring tracks the timing and intensity of your daily activity (and inactivity) and at night while you sleep, it tracks your pulse waveform, heart rate dynamics, body temperature, and movement to identify the different stages of your sleep.

You can read about the accuracy and how it works here: https://ouraring.com/the-science/

Since the ring does not have any type of display to show you how you’re progressing towards your goals, you have to install the iOS or Android ŌURA app on your mobile device. The ring uses Bluetooth to sync the data with your phone or tablet.

The app has an easy to read interface that is arranged into a dashboard, sleep, activity, and readiness screens.



The activity tracking screen shows info like the number of steps you walked, distance traveled, active time, and how long you were inactive each day. All of this data is used to determine your daily activity score. You can use this information to improve your health by consciously getting up and moving more.

The readiness tracking screen uses info about your sleep from the night before, your resting heart rate, body temperature, and more to create a score that lets you know if your body is ready for your next epic workout or if you should take a nap instead.



The sleep tracking data captured by the ŌURA ring provides a lot of good info on how restful your sleep is (or isn’t) by showing how long you were in each sleep level, how long you were awake each night and your resting heart rate. Just like with activity, ŌURA gives each night a sleep score.


A dashboard view shows your overall scores on one screen.

The app is pretty good, but it is missing one obvious feature, which is a live view of your stats. Although the ring tracks your heart rate, your body temp, and respiratory rate, you can’t check to see your current reading for any of those stats.

There’s also no way that I’ve found to export the data, but it does sync with Apple Health.

Battery life

Since the ring is small and it’s collecting data 24/7, it shouldn’t be a surprise that you’ll need to charge the ŌURA ring more often than other wearable trackers. During my review period, I was charging it every 2-3 days. The good news is that the ring charges pretty quickly, so you can put it on the charger when you get home from work and it will be ready to wear and track again in about an hour.

Final thoughts

There are 100’s of fitness trackers on the market, but I’ve only seen two fitness trackers that are rings and the ŌURA ring is one of them. Maybe that’s why fitness tracker rings are so expensive. That’s the biggest issue that I have with the ŌURA… the price. Most people don’t have an extra $299 – $499 to spend on a wearable fitness tracker. If you don’t mind the price, this is a really cool activity tracker and makes me hope that it will spark a trend for more smaller wearables like this one.

Source: The sample for this review was provided by ŌURA. Please visit their site for more info and Amazon to order.

 

Product Information

Price: $299 – $499
Manufacturer: ŌURA
Pros:
  • Truly wearable
  • Waterproof
Cons:
  • Expensive
  • Large ring for smaller hands
  • No display on the ring

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ŌURA Ring review originally appeared on The Gadgeteer on August 11, 2017 at 10:54 am.

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Cherry MX Board 6.0 Mechanical USB keyboard review

Keyboards. A recent poll shockingly suggests that nearly half of personal computer users own one, and fully two-thirds of that group use them to type stuff. Are you in this elite group? Are you looking for a (spoilers) solid, quiet keyboard with an ominous red glow attached? Let’s talk about the Cherry MX Board 6.0.

Cherry is a bit of an anachronism. Known by most consumers more for their key switches than their keyboards, Cherry has actually been producing keyboards since 1973. One would hardly be expected to know this unless they have worked a retail job and found themselves using one of the many point of sale keyboards that Cherry has released over the years. I recall working in a video rental store that had a Cherry POS keyboard in the 90’s, and seeing what spilled into it leading to seemingly no harm at all, developed an admiration for the brand that lasts to this day.

Cherry doesn’t only produce specialized POS keyboards, however. Several keyboards designed for the home user have been released throughout the years, and many of those are excellent. Notable for their solid build quality and no-nonsense design sensibilities*, Cherry keyboards tend to be a great choice if you want to buy a keyboard and know it will last.

The MX Board 6.0 is notable for Cherry’s new backlighting system, an extremely solid aluminum frame, and what Cherry calls RealKey technology, which I’ll touch on later.

THE LOOK

The MX Board 6.0 is attractive to my eyes, with a modern (but not too modern) frame and an excellent removable, magnetic wrist rest. The duotone red and blue lighting scheme is a bit overwhelming at first, but for good reasons. The initially blinding red that appears when you first turn on the keyboard is unsettlingly bright, but it’s better than most for two reasons. First, one CAN set the brightness of the lighting on the keyboard itself, allowing you to go all the way from nothing at all to blinding. Second, the way the light is passed up through the key caps is quite direct, meaning you can turn the lighting up or down and still have great readability on the keys at any brightness without the effect of turning the PCB UNDER the keys into a huge wash of color. I’ve found this direct lighting to be very easy on the eyes once set at your happy place. Some keys switch lighting colors in order to indicate which mode you are in – something I’ll touch on shortly.

USING THE MX BOARD 6.0

While the MX Board 6.0 obviously uses Cherry key switches, it doesn’t use the “clicky” switches that they are perhaps best known for. Instead, the MX Board 6.0 uses Cherry MX Red switches, which are very linear, and have no bump or hump to overcome as you press them. This isn’t to say they aren’t true mechanical switches, and they feel far more satisfying to press than the cheaper membrane based options you’ll find on the keyboard included with your Dell. The takeaway when it comes to whether you will enjoy the tactile feel of the keys really depends on what you’re used to. If anyone is planning on buying any mechanical keyboard featuring Cherry switches, I strongly encourage you to purchase one of the inexpensive (<$15) key switch “samplers” you can find on Amazon. There really are significant differences in the feel of different mechanical switches, and you can save yourself a potential headache by trying out all the options on the cheap.

The MX Board 6.0 has all the keys you’d expect to find on a full sized keyboard, but adds three multi media keys – fast forward, play/pause, and rewind at the upper right corner. Adjacent to those is the Cherry key which switches between what Cherry calls Office and Performance mode. Office mode appears at first to be just “regular” mode on any keyboard. The Windows key works as expected, and you can ALT+TAB, ALT+F4 and CTRL+ALT+DEL all you like! See how that’s just unexciting and pretty much not worthy of mention? There’s a secret to Office mode, however. It also overrides typematic key repeat in a subtle way, preventing multiple characters being sent when you hold a key down just a little longer than you mean to.

More exciting for some would be the Performance mode. A touch of the Cherry key will take you from Office to Performance mode, and several changes happen at once. First, the Windows key is disabled, indicating the change by turning the backlight from blue to red. This prevents you from dropping out of, for instance, a hardcore session of Commander Keen or whatever you kids are playing these days if you accidentally tap the wrong key. Further, it disables the ALT+TAB, ALT+F4 and CTRL+ALT+DEL combinations that the Office mode allows. While I have no gripe with the first two, disabling CTRL+ALT+DEL is not my favorite feature, as I frequently need to unlock my computer with that combo, and more than once I’ve found myself frustrated that I couldn’t log in, only to find that I had left Performance mode active.

Anyone who’s used a laptop will be familiar with the now ubiquitous FN key, and the MX Board 6.0 has one. Pressing it along with F5 will dim your keyboard’s backlight by a whopping 1%. Yes, there are 100 levels of brightness control for the backlighting, and you might find yourself using FN+F5, or FN+F6 (brightness +1%) quite a bit until you find your happy place. The keyboard will remember your backlight settings, even when powered completely off, which I find a nice touch. If you want to adjust the backlighting more aggressively, never fear! FN+F7 will push it up by 10% while FN+F8 will drop it by 10%. Finally, FN+F9 will toggle the backlight on or off entirely.  One thing I noticed that was not ideal was that the blue lit keys do not dim at the same rate or scale as red.  This can lead to an issue where most of the keys are barely lit while the blue keys blind you as if you somehow angered them. Pressing CTRL+FN will toggle the FN key on or off, indicating the status by changing the LED backlighting between red and blue.

The backlighting can get almost aggressively bright

The brightness can also be reduced to just a hint of red

The included wrist rest is excellent. It feels ever so slightly rubbery, with just enough texture provided by an inset repeating MX motif. The rest is held on via magnets and can be removed or attached without lifting the keyboard. Once attached, it feels secure and does not create an uncomfortable seam where the keyboard and rest meet. Perhaps best of all, due to the materials used, it is very easy to properly clean the rest with simple soap and water.

Expletive just got real – Realkey, that is

One last bit that I quite liked. The MX Board 6.0 features what Cherry calls Realkey technology, which essentially solves a problem you likely didn’t know you have. Keyboards have what is technically called “bunches” of keys on them. The traditional approach to turning a key press into a letter appearing on the screen is to set the keys up in rows and columns on the circuit board. By reading which row has a key that’s been pressed, then reading which column, a traditional keyboard will get input like B7 and that’s when it’s sunk your battleship. Sorry! It will get input like B7 and know that when row B and column 7 are active, it should print a J (I’ve just made this up. You don’t want to know what’s ACTUALLY at B7.)

In the MX Board 6.0, however, all keys are read at all times. This means that unlike most keyboards, you can press any number of keys at the same time, and each of them will register. Let’s do a little experiment to illustrate what I mean. Open up a text editor, place all of your fingers on a key, then press them all at once. Here is an example of me doing just that on a Razer Blackwidow Ultimate: adsfl. My fingers actually pressed asdfhjkl, but when two keys in the same column are pressed, it’s a crap shoot as to which will actually be read. With the MX Board 6.0, every key will register, every time. Why would one need such a thing? Very fast typists will tell you that some keyboards are better than others, but not be exactly sure why. As it turns out, there are plenty of people who can type so fast that keystrokes are lost because they take place at essentially the same moment, with one key being released as the next is being pressed. Realkey solves this issue entirely, and I would like to see more keyboards feature this type of technology. This also helps for gamers who frequently hold down several keys at once. Neat!

Minor complaints

It’s not all roses with the MX Board 6.0. A few small annoyances can be found. Chief among these would be the lack of any macro functionality. For a keyboard that has what amounts to a gaming mode (performance mode), I would expect to see some degree of customization. Also, while the backlighting is excellent, there is no function to selectively toggle the lighting behind any specific key. While this is in no way a deal breaker, it would have been nice to have the ability to, for instance, turn up the lighting beneath the WASD keys for fast indexing while gaming. This really is a minor complaint, but with the rest of the keyboard being so excellent, the minor issues are more annoying than usual.

One issue that might dissuade the excited reader is the price. The MX Board 6.0 will cost you between $150 and $200 depending on which retailer you prefer. That is not cheap by any standard, but you can console yourself by remembering that in a pinch it can be used as a bludgeoning weapon due to its extremely solid aluminum frame.

Wrap up

The MX Board 6.0 is a solid (literally) keyboard that I can recommend wholly to anyone who wants a non-clicky, high-quality keyboard that will surely last many years. If you don’t need much in the way of customization, you will surely appreciate the solid build quality, lightning fast response time, and sleek design. Gamers will likely find themselves frustrated by the lack of customization, but as a business productivity keyboard, I give it top marks.

*except the MX Board 9.0 which looks like the Cylons won, then started making keyboards.

Source: The sample for this review was provided by Cherry. Please visit their site for more info and Amazon to order.

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Cherry MX Board 6.0 Mechanical USB keyboard review originally appeared on The Gadgeteer on August 11, 2017 at 8:00 am.

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Aukey SK-M12 SoundTank Bluetooth outdoor speaker review

Bluetooth speakers come in all shapes and sizes these days. Finding one to meet your particular set of requirements is a tough job. Aukey has recently entered this market with a tough nicely sized unit that integrates speakerphone functions as well as weatherproofing and long battery life – the SK-M12 SoundTank. I was sent one to test.

Note: Photos may be tapped or clicked for a larger image.

The Aukey website lists the specs as:

Model Number: SK-M12
Technology: Bluetooth 4.1
Profiles: A2DP, AVRCP, HSP, HFP
Input: DC 5V
Driver: 2 x 5W
Charging Time: ~6 hours
Play Time: 30 hours
Standby Time: Up to 100 hours
Battery Type: Rechargeable Li-Polymer (2600mAh)
Range: Up to 10m / 33ft

The unit measures about 8” x 3” x 3”. The front and rear faces are covered by perforated aluminum pieces, while the other four surfaces are rubberized. The five control buttons are all on the top (+ and – for volume, phone answer/disconnect, power, and a Mode button), nicely covered but clearly marked. (I base my designations of “top, bottom, right, etc.” by orienting the face with the logo upright.) On the right small side is a red hard plastic carry loop. On the opposite small side is a red soft silicone door that covers the charging port and an AUX input jack. The cover is very tight but swings out of the way once you’ve opened it. I was not able to open it without a key or nail file since my fingernails are pretty short. Your mileage may vary, but you won’t have to worry about it popping open by accident!


On the bottom panel, there is a 1/4” 20 socket that fits a tripod screw. You can use this to place the unit on any stand, bicycle handlebar mount, or lamp shade harp that has this same thread size. You can also hang it from the red plastic loop to a pack, tent pole, or tree branch while you’re out camping or hiking. With 30 hours of playtime and 100 hours standby, you should easily make it through a long camping weekend. I found that with the power off, the charge degraded very little over a week or two.


The 2 5W drivers push through a lot of sound, so you can disturb the neighbors from a good distance away. Sitting and working beside the unit, you can’t turn it up more than 20-30%. It puts out some real volume. The sound is clear and full, too, not just loud.

While “rugged” and “outdoor” are tossed around in marketing materials, there is no documentation of any weather or dust resistance. The official seller account on Amazon said it is “splash proof” but not waterproof. So, dewy grass on a camping trip, misty rain on the deck, but maybe keep it high and dry at the pool.

Pairing was quick and accurate. Using the AUX connection, you can change between the Bluetooth and hard-wired sources by holding the Mode button. It’s not quick or clean (sometimes it doesn’t switch), and you can’t control the other device from the speaker after you’ve changed it to the other source, but it’s a step toward alleviating that frustration of wanting to watch a movie on an iPad, and having your phone bogart the Bluetooth connection to your speaker.

One strange thing about the metal plates that cover the speaker and the rear cover: they look like outlines of some type of dog treat. Whenever I brought this speaker out to play with a group, it was always the first thing that anyone noticed. “Is that the Scooby Snack speaker?” This speaker is no dog, but it may become a faithful companion.

Source: The sample for this review was provided by Aukey. Please visit their site for more info and Amazon to order one.

 

Product Information

Price: Normally $45, but currently out of stock at Amazon
Manufacturer: Aukey
Retailer: Amazon
Requirements:
  • Sound source with Bluetooth or AUX output
Pros:
  • Very Full sound.
  • Phone controls and volume easy to see and press.
  • Rugged outer edges will protect it
Cons:
  • No IP-xx certification for waterproofing or ruggedness.

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Aukey SK-M12 SoundTank Bluetooth outdoor speaker review originally appeared on The Gadgeteer on August 10, 2017 at 5:06 pm.

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