HP Leap Motion Keyboard

works great

It does not work all the times.

There is nothing here that makes this keyboard worth 100 schmucks. The motion controls barely work. Well, they work, but it's hard to do anything with them and they aren't very accurate. I'm sure you've played wii and know that you can wave a wiimote around and the cursor moves on the screen pretty accurately. The wii "mouse" controls are tons better than any computer control you get from the leap motion controls.Then there are some games that are forgettable after 15 minutes. Some of them work ok, but not very well. And there's no killer app that I'll ever go back to the site for!There's one demo that shows virtual hands on the screen that are supposed to follow your hands. Watch how much is screws up--doesn't show the right finger, shows the hands at the wrong angle. Then when it gets too far off tracking, the hands disappear and it resets. Just seeing how far off this demo is from really tracking my hands shows me how far off this software is from really working.Hey, I've paid $100 for a keyboard before. If the keyboard were awesome, this could still be worth it--but it fails on the keyboard front too! For as small as it is, it's kinda heavy. It definitely feels sturdy, but it feels too heavy. The keyboard is really small and the keys are just a little smaller than standard. It feels cramped to type on it. It's also uncomfortable to type on it for any length of time. The chiclet keys have a very short throw and when you press them all the way there is a hard stop at the bottom of the throw, It's uncomfortable to type for long. The number pad is full size, but still not comfortable for typists. If you're desperate to try leap, you can get the sensor as a separate USB device and then use your own keyboard.I'm not against motion controls. I'd love to control my computer as in minority report. But even just playing around, my arms got tired. If the technology was better, I would definitely use it some. But seeing that this leap technology is already on version 2 and feels like pre-beta, I just can't see the Leap getting any better anytime soon.I want to like it. But I can't suggest it, and wouldn't buy it. It might get better, but I can only review it in its current state.

I like the feel of the keyboard. Really easy to type with and it's quiet. But as far as the Leap portion of it. It's good for fun, but really not practical and it is buggy. I thought I could use it with Windows 8.1 to activate tiles. It's a bit quirky. It doesn't always work with the apps. I tried calibrating, but could never get to the score of 80, which you are supposed to for optimum performance. Then I'd get this error message that there is a low bit rate and that I should plug into a USB port and not a hub. I moved the connection from the front of the PC to the rear and still got that error. Using applications in Windows is a challenge. Unless you use it with the Leap apps, all other apps don't work very well.It comes with a "Shortcuts" app so that you can interface with a Windows Internet browser, but I'd get error messages that the background app is not loaded and I need to run it. I would launch the shortcut app again and sometimes it would work. It's inconsistent. The troubleshooting states to unplug and plug it in again. I tried that, but sometimes it would work and sometimes not.To activate the Leap unit, you just need to press the "Fn" key and then the left side of the spacebar. But, when you do, it doesn't really do anything. You need to launch an application such as Shortcuts or the Leap App Home. There is an app that comes with it that allows you to interact with a flower, by pulling the pedals off. This is fun for about 2 minutes. How about the ability to launch Windows 8.1 applications using your finger positions?One of the other things about this keyboard is that it seems like it demands a lot of processing power when the Leap is activated. It may be why I'm getting the "Low Bit Rate" message. There is a way to use Low Resource mode. but it's greyed out so I can't use it.Overall, if you are using the Apps designed to play around with the technology, then I guess it's okay, but that gets old pretty fast. I like the concept, but applying it to a more practical use doesn't seem to fit.