14 DAY TRIAL // Windows 7 is less than two months away from its official debut, but the Redmond, Washington-based Microsoft still has a couple of products that need to be announced before this year's holiday shopping season. Such is the case with the new Bluetooth Mobile Keyboard 6000, designed to work exclusively with Bluetooth-enabled notebook and desktop computer systems. According to Microsoft, the new keyboard, which has been designed to address the consumers' demand for a comfortable and portable accessory, ships as its thinnest keyboard ever, being just a few millimeters thicker than an AAA battery.
“The design tenets of compact, clean and refined really set the stage for the success of the keyboard,” Chris Kujawski, industrial designer for Microsoft Hardware, said. “There is nothing extraneous about the design. We removed everything that didn't fit with those ideas and ended up with something we're really proud of – a compact, sophisticated keyboard that pairs perfectly with Bluetooth computers.”
The keyboard has been designed with Microsoft's Comfort Curve layout to provide users with a comfortable typing experience. In addition, the Bluetooth Mobile Keyboard 6000 is accompanied by the Bluetooth Number Pad, providing users with a fully featured keyboard.
The two solutions are built to provide an alternative typing experience to notebook and netbook users, with an extended layout, when compared with that of traditional notebooks or netbooks. Taking advantage of Microsoft's Comfort Curve layout, the two Bluetooth keyboards should become a choice for current and future users of portable computer systems.
As far as pricing and availability go, the Bluetooth Mobile Keyboard 6000 and the Bluetooth Number Pad are expected to become available sometime in October, likely around the same time as the much-anticipated launch of Microsoft's Windows 7. The two will be available for an estimated retail price of US$89.95 and US$44.95, respectively.