BTC 9019URF Wireless Keyboard Review Comments thread

[rampy]

Just posted the
BTC 9019URF Wireless Keyboard Review in the BYOPVR review section

feel free to post any comments, questions or uh.. comments in this thread.

Also of interest is the BTC 9019URF keyboards that we are giving away each week till the start of may 05 

For comparison's sake... see Tom's Hardware Review of the BTC

rampy

[bouchecl]

Rampy,

It looks like it is an interesting product.

Have you had a chance to test it on a MythTV box, by any chance?

[rampy]

No, not yet... good question!

According to PCA's 9019URF product listing:

Compatible with all Windows operating systems with USB support, and has been informally tested to work on Linux and Mac OS X (not all of the multimedia keys are be available on platforms other than Windows)

I'll dig up or reburn a knoppix CD and boot one of my boxes to double check later tonight if that helps you... when I installed it on windows initially I didn't bother with the software and it pretty much recognized it as a usb keyboard/mouse right away (but I didn't have any joystick action and only some of the multimedia buttons would do anything). 

Side note I meant to mention in the review... once I installed the included driver the multimedia buttons mapped without any tweaking (coincidently) to control SageTV functions nicely (like stop/RW/FF) although the play/pause buttons launches windows media player by default...  I was able to change it to any keystroke I want to (CTRL+D for play in SageTV) so it's pretty customizable.

rampy

BTW idmar moved your post and my reply to the giveaway thread, fyi

[bouchecl]

No, not yet... good question!

According to PCA's 9019URF product listing:

Compatible with all Windows operating systems with USB support, and has been informally tested to work on Linux and Mac OS X (not all of the multimedia keys are be available on platforms other than Windows)

I'll dig up or reburn a knoppix CD and boot one of my boxes to double check later tonight if that helps you... when I installed it on windows initially I didn't bother with the software and it pretty much recognized it as a usb keyboard/mouse right away (but I didn't have any joystick action and only some of the multimedia buttons would do anything). 

Thanks a million Rampy. Keep me posted.

PS: I'm not eligible for this nice giveaway  I live north of the 45th parallel.

[rampy]

sorry man... (That you aren't eligible this time...)

my knoppix iso download is at like 65% so I probably won't get to the KDE mouse test tonight...

rampy

[rampy]

Rampy,

It looks like it is an interesting product.

Have you had a chance to test it on a MythTV box, by any chance?

Well the knoppix 4.7 test didn't go so well... right from bootup the keyboard functions were present and accounted for.  Once in Xwindows/KDE I had mouse movement functionality ... what I didn't have was mouse button functionality!!

I tried in both 2.4 and 2.6 kernel... I'm not savvy enough to try much else (unless there are suggestions from the peanut gallery) It look like in the boot process for 2.6 it identified the BTC wireless keyboard (or btc something keyboard... it scrolled off screen by the time I got the camera...)

*sigh* so I don't know what to tell you... it *almost* works completely *almost*  but not quite...

might it work with a different distro?  *shrug* maybe ... I've got a FC2 installed on that same machine BUT it's a server xwindows-less install.

rampy

[bouchecl]

Well the knoppix 4.7 test didn't go so well... right from bootup the keyboard functions were present and accounted for.  Once in Xwindows/KDE I had mouse movement functionality ... what I didn't have was mouse button functionality!!

I tried in both 2.4 and 2.6 kernel... I'm not savvy enough to try much else (unless there are suggestions from the peanut gallery) It look like in the boot process for 2.6 it identified the BTC wireless keyboard (or btc something keyboard... it scrolled off screen by the time I got the camera...)

*sigh* so I don't know what to tell you... it *almost* works completely *almost*  but not quite...

Keyboard is good. Mouse... hmmmmmm. Thanks for the test. I'm not Mr. super-linux-hacker (yet) so I won't be able to make it work right out of the box. OK, then my next free dollars will go to a second capture card instead.

PS: My new Myth box is up and running (still ironing out some nagging bugs). Just wanted to let you know and thank you Rampy, because your excellent posts helped me a lot in sorting out the do's and don't of a good BYOPVR

[Smul]

I have the keyboard at home and am trying to install it on linux as well, same experience:

keyboard works (multimedia buttons also give keycodes so can be mapped to something useful)
mouse moves but has left, right or middle click (scroll buttons do work, but that doesn't really help)

I sent an email to BTC and am awaiting answer...

[zoogz]

Were any of you successful in getting the mouse buttons to work?

[shplad]

rampy:

Thanks once more for a very useful review. I have a Gyration wireless mouse, and don't have the matching keyboard, so I was considering this. It sounds like it could be a good thing for me.

Another helpful gem.


shplad

[KyleY]

I'm curious if any of you have had problems with this keyboard/mouse?  It worked great for me after I installed it and connected the receiver with the keyboard.  However, after periods of inactivity, the keyboard / mouse will not function at all.  Even if I press connect on the receiver, then connect on the keyboard, it still won't work.  The only way I can get it to work is if I remove the batteries from the keyboard, then press connect on the receiver, then press connect on the keyboard.  I don't want to do this everytime I need to use the keyboard/mouse!    Any ideas?  I haven't upgraded to the newest drivers yet (I will tonight), but since the keyboard should work even without drivers installed, it sounds like that's not the problem. 

I'm using Windows XP SP2, the drivers that came with the keyboard (2.1.1-87AU MUL), and I've been able to repeat the problem above over and over again.  The keyboard sits about 7 feet away from the receiver (however, the keyboard works well when it's more than 20 feet away from the receiver).  TTYL,
--Kyle

[rampy]

That's odd kyle... if I let it sit for a long period of time sometimes it needs a second/keyrpress to "wake up" up.. but none of the shennanigans you're describing.

is it so long a period of time the PC is going to sleep?  or perhaps putting the driver into paged/virtual memory (I'm grasping at straws here with that thought)  What do your power management settings look like on that machine?

rampy

[kyley]

Hey Rampy, cool to see you're online...  I posted that as a guest not realizing it would include my email addy...  Could you possibly remove that (or remove the post and I'll re-add it)?  I've since signed up as kyley (obviously).

Anyway, I have absolutely no power management options turned on right now (no sleep, suspend, or even power off the monitor / screen saver). 

I do have the issue of needing a second keypress / mouse movement to "wake up" sometimes, but if it's been especially long between uses, it quits working altogether   

I haven't done anything to put the driver into virtual mem, but I have 512 MB RAM (not a lot, but enough that that shouldn't be happening - I wouldn't think...).  Any other ideas?  For those of you not having this problem, could you try leaving your keyboard about 10 feet away (near the edge of the range I know, but maybe that can narrow down the issue) for an hour or so, then see if you can start using it.  Thanks again,
--Kyle

[rampy]

I mangled the email addy... although it should only show up for registered users that are logged in. 

You can also choose whether or not to display your email in the profile/preferences for your user account.

small clarification: I meant second as the unit of time, not 2nd as additional keypress... although I guess that sorta applies... my keyboard has been sitting for quite a few days... beyondTV is in screensaver mode lets see what happens....  ...  I touched the mouse joystick and it moved the cursor *shrug*

I dunno...

rampy

[kyley]

Rampy, when your keyboard isn't being used, is it stored very close to your receiver?  I'm just wondering if the 7 feet away distance might be part of my issue.  I think I just need more time to test!    Thanks for fixing the email addy.  TTYL,
--Kyle