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43S Poll (yes, here is one!)

Posted: Sun Sep 23, 2018 9:03 am
by Walter
Let's assume it's Christmas and you have one wish for free: which design of the 43S surface do you prefer? Enjoy voting!
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Re: 43S Poll (yes, here is one!)

Posted: Mon Sep 24, 2018 12:38 am
by dlachieze
I choosed the one on the far left:
  • I don't like the two on the right because the light background around the screen makes the yellow and blue marks difficult to see (not enough contrast). It makes also the small black border around the screen area much more visible and any variation in the screen / bezel alignment in production will be highly visible.
  • I don't like the one on the left because of the light background on the soft keys which makes them too different from the other keys below.
  • And you didn't ask but if you did I would have also said that I don't like the light background on the number keys on all choices .

Re: 43S Poll (yes, here is one!)

Posted: Mon Sep 24, 2018 3:44 am
by rprosperi
I was lazy and simply voted for the far left candidate, but I do agree with all of Didier's comments.

I don't think previous (recent) versions of the keyboard had the white background on number keys, did they?

If these keys were double-shot, then something like that may work, but the large painted white areas will easily and quickly scratch and/or chip and will look terrible.

But the far left design looks great!

Re: 43S Poll (yes, here is one!)

Posted: Mon Sep 24, 2018 8:32 am
by DA74254
I also voted for the far left.
Contrary to dlachieze, I like the white number keys, but agree on all other points.

Re: 43S Poll (yes, here is one!)

Posted: Mon Sep 24, 2018 9:36 am
by Walter
dlachieze wrote:
Mon Sep 24, 2018 12:38 am
I don't like the two on the right because the light background ... makes also the small black border around the screen area much more visible and any variation in the screen / bezel alignment in production will be highly visible.
Correct. If I had known in time, I'd have voted for a light border around the screen as people did generally some years ago. Alas, we have to take it as it is now.
dlachieze wrote:
Mon Sep 24, 2018 12:38 am
And you didn't ask but if you did I would have also said that I don't like the light background on the number keys on all choices .[/list]
rprosperi wrote:
Mon Sep 24, 2018 3:44 am
If these keys were double-shot, then something like that may work, but the large painted white areas will easily and quickly scratch and/or chip and will look terrible.
The DM42 features brown and yellow keys; I don't see why the 43S can't feature brown, yellow, blue, and white keys. Just food for thought - not pictured yet.

Looking forward to further opinions :)

Re: 43S Poll (yes, here is one!)

Posted: Mon Sep 24, 2018 4:33 pm
by HPMike
Far left and lose all the white keys.

Re: 43S Poll (yes, here is one!)

Posted: Tue Sep 25, 2018 3:33 am
by rprosperi
Walter wrote:
Mon Sep 24, 2018 9:36 am
The DM42 features brown and yellow keys; I don't see why the 43S can't feature brown, yellow, blue, and white keys. Just food for thought - not pictured yet.
If the numeral keys indeed can be a separate color than the other keys, I would probably support that, though white is ugly and too high-contrast in my opinion; a beige, similar to Woodstock keys, or perhaps a grey; these provide enough contrast and would clearly delineate the separate nature of the numeric keys. When I looked through a bunch of machines I was surprised at how many prior models used this technique, from the very earliest models up to the 50g and Prime.

I would also strongly support having true yellow and blue shift keys, these add a small but important touch, and provide a true sense of class and professional appearance.

But I would guess that having 4 different color keys would to the overall cost.

Michael - is is possible to provide a ROUGH guestimate of the added cost to add these extra colored keys, so that folks can weigh-in on if the extra cist is justified?

For example, if it adds $4-5 to the cost, who wouldn't say yes, but otoh if it adds $20, they I think few would agree. Maybe I'm way off with these data points but you get the idea.

Re: 43S Poll (yes, here is one!)

Posted: Tue Sep 25, 2018 6:31 am
by Thomas Okken
My two all-time favorite HP calculators, the 41C/CV/CX and 42S, don't use a contrasting color for the number keys at all, and while the esthetics of that are debatable, I have never found it a problem. I suppose any frequent calculator user relies more on muscle memory than their eyes for finding the keys...

Re: 43S Poll (yes, here is one!)

Posted: Tue Sep 25, 2018 11:27 am
by Walter
Classics, Woodstocks, and Spices all featured coloured keys ... also Voyagers and Nuts did to less extent. Just the Pioneers started with monochrome keys.

Re: 43S Poll (yes, here is one!)

Posted: Tue Sep 25, 2018 1:29 pm
by Thomas Okken
Walter wrote:
Tue Sep 25, 2018 11:27 am
Classics, Woodstocks, and Spices all featured coloured keys ... also Voyagers and Nuts did to less extent. Just the Pioneers started with monochrome keys.
If you can see a color difference between the number keys and the other keys on the Nuts (meaning the 41 series, I assume) and the Voyagers, your eyes must be sensitive to different wavelengths than mine... :shock: