Color Blindness and HP Prime keys color choice

[jebem]

I got my HP-PRIME just one week ago, and it is really a stylish machine that is a pleasure to look at (from a distance, that is!).
For sure Marketing people knows his business.

That said, and despite I having no trouble at all to distinguish colors, even when out of focus (I am 57 yo, using glasses for myopia and astigmatism), I confess that I have some trouble to distinguish one or another orange and blue symbol over those white keys of this new HP calculator.

Why on earth they did that? To annoy as many as possible seniors HP fans from the gold HP calculators era?
I believe that most teenagers (primary marketing target...?) have no trouble to read this keyboard schema, at least I read no complaints anywhere in the forums.

When we look to a recent (2007) calculator like the HP-35S, also full of style, showing keys in dark background and light color symbols, easy to read, I wonder what have happened since then, to choose this poor color scheme for this otherwise excellent HP-PRIME product.

I believe it wasn't a direct HP fault here (but, in the end, it is HP responsibility), as HP, like any other major brand these days, subcontract large oriental manufacturers to run the batch production.
Surely something went wrong with the keys pressing/molding technique, as it was pointed out before in this thread, the symbols looks a little bit out of focus/smeared.

HP, this issue must be fixed, and new proper keys set made available for free to anyone with skills to open the machine and replace them (I know, this is not happening, ever, but it was a nice move from HP).

Have a look to my HP-25 side by side with my HP-35S in the attachment (picture taken on a Samsung ST60, natural sunlight from Lisbon, a little out of focus due to poor lightning at the time and I took the picture handling the photo machine in my hands, no image manipulation except to resize the image to fit under the 200KB file limit of this portal).
More than 30 years between then, however they show the same family look, with great keyboard readability.
Is that hard to get a new calculator right since the beginning these days?

[Rich]

Younger college student here, in reference to the post above, I have passed the calculator around at my university here in the New England area, and all 5 of us within my study group agreed that the color scheme for extended use is poor when compared to my 50G.

Also someone noted that the optimal angle to the view the screen is directly over it or holding it perpendicular to your view. As you move from this angle, the colors and contrast slightly get darker. I believe this is on most modern screens, but it was more pronounced than say, my cell phone.

I wish HP would release a new key set and mail it to all the owners, if it is replaceable in the field. If it is field replaceable, another option would be to use our school's 3D printers to make a new set, with etched labeling.

[jebem]

Hi, Rich,

Well, not sure how easy is to access the keyboard, however some folks from Omnimaga have reported that it is really easy to open the case (without breaking it...) as there are just a few screws to remove:
http://www.omnimaga.org/index.php?topic=16767.0

I am not in the mood to open my PRIME at this stage (I do not want to loose my HP warranty) , but surely someone is working on that, it is a matter of wait and see.

[debrouxl]

Quote:however some folks from Omnimaga have reported that it is really easy to open the case (without breaking it...) as there are just a few screws to remove:
http://www.omnimaga.org/index.php?topic=16767.0

That information is indeed available from Omnimaga, but as most Omnimaga news items from the same time frame, it's a cross-posting of a TI-Planet news item

[Ben Fairbank]

I, too, am slightly colorblind (deuteranomalous) and also have trouble with the keys. BUT I do not think the difficulty is entirely attributable to the colorblindness. My education included a lot of study of human vision, and one of the solidly established bedrock observations of visual researchers (specifically, sensory psychophysiology) is that for a contour to be usefully visible, there must be a brightness (or luminance) difference between visual stimuli on the two sides of the contour. A mere color (wavelength) difference is not sufficient to sustain a contour. When I look at the Prime keys in marginal lighting I have a lot of trouble with the (orange) letters on the (light gray) number keys. Why is it hard to see them? Not, I think because of my colorblindness, but because the brightness of the orange and the gray are almost the same, making it difficult for the visual system to maintain the perception of the contour and so see the letters. This is basic, level one, elementary stuff to a human factors engineer, and why HP did not run the keyboard by a human factors engineer I cannot fathom. Or maybe they did so and chose to ignore their opinion...

[Curlytop]

(03-05-2014 07:50 PM)Ben Fairbank Wrote:  My education included a lot of study of human vision, and one of the solidly established bedrock observations of visual researchers (specifically, sensory psychophysiology) is that for a contour to be usefully visible, there must be a brightness (or luminance) difference between visual stimuli on the two sides of the contour. A mere color (wavelength) difference is not sufficient to sustain a contour.

I think you`ve hit the nail on the head there. The orange ("gold") letters on a white or grey ("silver") background, violate the Rule of Tinctures which ensure good contrast in heraldry - and elsewhere e.g. road signs.

[DrDevinci]

Sent a request to HP for information on the poor color choice on the Prime keys and got this reply:

Quote:Thank you for your question.

I would try in a different lighting, not really much we can do to change the perspective view of the Prime.

Kind Regards

HP Calculator Support

Well - dim lighting is out of the question for sure, but even a bright halogen can't make up for the fuzziness and poor contrast on the keys especially the key '9' and '2' and '3'. How am I suppose to read the infinity, i and pi symbols there?

A few transparent stickers help a bit (see before and after / left and right photos below) - and allows for labeling the limited "Undo" function in RPN mode on the Shift+Ans key (returns last two elements on stack, undoing the latest operator).

Been using the Prime sporadically for a few weeks now and it seems like great hardware but half-baked OS. Room for improvement. The latest pinch-to-zoom feature really kicks some gluteus-maximus compared to the TI nSpire. High-school kid in the family is envious of that feature ;-)


   

[Didier Lachieze]

(06-10-2014 06:41 PM)DrDevinci Wrote:  A few transparent stickers help a bit (see before and after / left and right photos below) - and allows for labeling the limited "Undo" function in RPN mode on the Shift+Ans key (returns last two elements on stack, undoing the latest operator).

That's interesting, the difference seems to be significant. Can you provide more details about these transparent stickers? Did you print them yourself?

[CR Haeger]

(06-10-2014 07:12 PM)Didier Lachieze Wrote:  

(06-10-2014 06:41 PM)DrDevinci Wrote:  A few transparent stickers help a bit (see before and after / left and right photos below) - and allows for labeling the limited "Undo" function in RPN mode on the Shift+Ans key (returns last two elements on stack, undoing the latest operator).

That's interesting, the difference seems to be significant. Can you provide more details about these transparent stickers? Did you print them yourself?

Yeah - those are magic enhancing stickers all right! Tell us more. Note that another recent WP34S thread was looking at clear nail polish or modelers clear-coat to protect vinyl key labels. I wonder if that would help here?

In the meantime, the ~9 months of mis-keying shift/alpha keys on the Prime is starting to force me to memorize where the key combinations are anyway...

[DrDevinci]

Nothing magic about the stickers. Just transparent labels printed on a color wax printer (gives a nice smooth feel to the ink).
Text layover created in a pain full Photoshop document with various typefaces and some times pure graphics to match the original shapes.
   
Print fits within a mm on a 6.7cm label. - Avery 08620.
I cut the sheet under 10x magnification microscope and applied to all grey and white keys.
Not a perfect match but it really makes a different, even in low light. (would be great if the printer would accept fluorescent ink).

Not sure on the longevity of the print either or if the labels will collect dirt along the edges and look ugly. I tried to make the cuts exactly the size of the front beveled edge of the keys but it didn't work for all of them.

[Steve Simpkin]

I think Eric may have another set of labels he can create and sell. HP Prime re-purposed to a "readable" HP Prime

[toml_12953]

(06-10-2014 08:45 PM)Steve Simpkin Wrote:  I think Eric may have another set of labels he can create and sell. HP Prime re-purposed to a "readable" HP Prime

I'd buy a set!

[alexzkter]

I don't think they need to be transparent stickers.
Matte white vinyl could we used and printed with the colours you think are most legible, I'd try keys as in the picture below.
Even make some of the shift-keys slightly bigger....if you have a special printer to do so. My parents do. It's an Epson surecolor sc-30600, but I'm unsure it can print things this little with the required resolution haha



Black vinyl over white keys would probably look cheap and non genuine...

maybe just matching the gray buttons to the white ones and of course making the 895623 shift-keys symbols bigger could be enough...

[Kevin Ouellet]

Just making the orange and cyan brown and dark blue respectively would already help. Maybe we can hope for a color darkening in revision C?

[HP67]

(06-12-2014 05:54 PM)Kevin Ouellet Wrote:  Just making the orange and cyan brown and dark blue respectively would already help. Maybe we can hope for a color darkening in revision C?

Or just go back to the 42S / 48SX color scheme and move the ENTER key to the left

[Tim Wessman]

>move the ENTER key to the left

Why? The right is the correct spot for it.

[HP67]

(06-12-2014 06:13 PM)Tim Wessman Wrote:  >move the ENTER key to the left

Why? The right is the correct spot for it.

No, it's not. A calculator keyboard is not a PC keyboard.

But this is not a new discussion!

[alexzkter]

(06-12-2014 06:15 PM)HP67 Wrote:  

(06-12-2014 06:13 PM)Tim Wessman Wrote:  >move the ENTER key to the left

Why? The right is the correct spot for it.

No, it's not. A calculator keyboard is not a PC keyboard.

But this is not a new discussion!

What do we have here? A left handed person? Haha

[Wiz]

Let's face it the color scheme is Slightly better than leaving the keys blank.

HP should fire who ever made this decision.

The blue is not readable it really (expletive deleted).

Wiz

[HP67]

(06-16-2014 11:23 AM)Wiz Wrote:  Let's face it the color scheme is Slightly better than leaving the keys blank.

That's debatable.

(06-16-2014 11:23 AM)Wiz Wrote:  HP should fire who ever made this decision.

Agreed, but only if they fire the guy who made the Blue 50g first.

(06-16-2014 11:23 AM)Wiz Wrote:  The blue is not readable it really (expletive deleted).

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