My Keyboard is Disgusting

[mitchedwards]

I used to work in a hospital. The keyboards at nursing stations are enough to make a cockroach gag.

[Johnny]

Oh Johnny you are hilarious. Your posts bring a smile and ray of sunshine into my day everytime :D

Thanks BFF. I think you are swell too.

[Earth 2 Chris]

We had a new graphic designer start about a month ago. He inherited all the previous guy's stuff. This previous guy worked in the office for a while, then moved out of state and worked from home in Virginia. When he quit, he sent all his stuff back.

The new guy comes up to me last week and asks me if we had any extra keyboards. He said his was kind of gross, and that he was a bit of a germaphobe. We work on Macs, and the only older ones we had didn't have the eject CD button on the keyboard, which you need for new Macs, so an old one wouldn't do him much good. He kept going on about how he really needed a new one, and I told him just to get the IT guy to order it. After hearing him go on and on I finally came over to see his keyboard, thinking "It can't be that bad".

There was a...clump of...hair of some kind caught under the plastic that covers the keyboard. It was all matted and just...stuck together to boot. It literally looked as if someone took the keyboard and used it like a cheese grater on their privates. Ugh.

Needless to say, I advocated he get a new keyboard. He did, and the new Mac keyboards are VERY low-profile, with very little chance of nasty stuff getting stuck in between the keys and such.

Chris

[Adam West]

Aren't standard keyboards relatively inexpensive now.

I would think when they get super nasty...just pitch it and purchase a new one.

[dmo]

They do make laser keyboards for a thousand dollars a pop. You lay down two light discs and it creates a laser beam light grid virtual keyboard on your plain wood desk. Your fingers touching each virtual square key actually works. I don't know if these things have been released to the public but I have seen them in computer magazines when they first designed them. Amazing.

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/61/223347816_73780efe39_o.jpg

I also have a a "roll out" rubber keyboard I take to clients houses or when I am working on computers for clients in the kitchen. I got mine for thirty bucks. Very handy. Rolls up and fits into a plastic cylinder for easy storage.
The only downfall, they are not fast typing. The keys have to be pushed down really hard.

http://www.testandtagsupplies.com.au/zencart/images/RBKEY.jpg

My buddy at work bought one of those laser keyboards. I think he paid $80.