3 Types of Optical Keyboards Explained

Due to an ever-increasing demand for new technology, optical keyboards and optical mice are more popular than ever before. Strangely, the terminology isn't particularly accurate as there’s nothing optical about these keyboards at all. A better term would be wireless keyboards since this best describes their function. The big advantage to optical keyboards is that they offer freedom of movement since you’re not tied to your desk.

How Optical Keyboards Work

Optical keyboards do exactly the same as a traditional wired keyboard; the only difference is that there’s no wire, so you can sit several feet away from your computer and still type. Optical keyboards use photosensors and each of the photosensors represent an individual input for data processing, such as typing.

Infrared Keyboards

The vast majority of optical keyboards are really infrared keyboards which are similar to a television remote control. Infrared light carries the signal between the keyboard and the receiver which is plugged into the computer’s central processing unit. The receiver is usually a small USB device.

The greatest advantages of optical keyboards is that there is one less cord to become tangled behind your computer, and you can actually sit a short distance away from the computer.

If the line of sight for the infrared beam is blocked, it won’t function, regardless of how near or far away you choose to sit. In most instances, you will still need to sit close enough to be able to see the screen. If you’re making a presentation and you are standing on a podium, optical keyboards can prove very very useful, as they allow you to type and enter information without a computer close by.

Bluetooth Keyboard

Generally, a Bluetooth keyboard is one that hooks up to a mobile device, such as a cell phone, by using Bluetooth technology. There are also wireless computer keyboards that attach to the CPU via Bluetooth but usually, you’ll find these types of optical keyboards are used with mobile devices as many of the keyboards aren’t as large as regular computer keyboards.

Although Bluetooth is usually associated with wireless headsets, its rise for keyboard use has been steadily growing to the point where it’s become relatively commonplace.

Virtual Keyboards

Although they’re not strictly optical keyboards, many people class virtual keyboards as optical keyboards as well. There are several different types of virtual keyboard such those that uses laser light to project a keyboard onto a table or other hard surface. The laser detects the letters typed and projects them onto a screen.

Some computer security packages have virtual keyboards that appear on the computer screen and you type on these so the keystrokes are recorded. These are primarily used for the secure typing of passwords; if a hacker has installed a keystroke logger on your computer, it won’t see this type of data entry. Similarly, the screen keyboard on a smartphone, where users touch the letter on the screen, is another kind of virtual and optical keyboard.