Improve upon perfection? "Impossible," you say. Well, guess again. ThinkOutside has done it with their ultra portable "Stowaway" Keyboard for the Palm m500 Series, which is distributed by Palm, Inc. as the Palm Portable Keyboard.

By this time, you must be living in a cave to have not read about and/or seen ThinkOutside's unique engineering marvel in its portable keyboard. As a refresher, the keyboard is a full sized QWERTY keyboard which, when folded up, is not much larger than the size of your PDA (See Figure 1). ThinkOutside also makes versions of the keyboard for the Handspring Visor, the Sony Clié, and Pocket PC PDAs. The keyboard is responsive and its functionality is indistinguishable from your familiar desktop computer's keyboard. Therefore, the transition time to the ThinkOutside keyboard is zero. (see Figure 2)

	Figure 1. Like its predecessors, when folded up, the Palm Portable Keyboard for the Palm m500 series from ThinkOutside is barely larger than the Palm m505 itself.

	Figure 2. Unfolded, the PPK is a fully sized QWERTY keyboard, allowing for fast and accurate data entry.

The keys are responsive with a comfortable travel and, significantly, they are silent so as not to disturb the boss at your next meeting. Or in my case, the Judge while banging out a letter or two in court while waiting for my case to be called.

So far, I have described everything you would reasonably expect from any iteration of the ThinkOutside keyboard. So, how is the m500 series keyboard an improvement over the prior versions? The answer is in the PDA support arm integrated in the m500 version. In previous versions, the support arm slid out of the back edge of the keyboard and hinged up from the keyboard's edge forming an incline on which the PDA would rest. The inclined arm was hinged to the keyboard along the back edge of the keyboard, therefore, in the rare (but real) circumstances where the inclined PDA support portion of the apparatus slides off the edge of your desk (or whatever surface you are using - I frequently use a legal pad on my lap) the hinge folds down and so comes your PDA. No longer. In the m500 series version of the keyboard, the PDA support mechanism has been redesigned so that it no longer hinges from the edge of the keyboard. The result is that the PDA support mechanism can hang over the edge of your surface without causing the PDA to fold down and collapse. (see Figure 3). A wonderful improvement from prior keyboard versions.

	Figure 3. The newly designed support arm for the PDA provides horizontal support of the device from the bottom, allowing the PDA to hang over the edge of your surface without collapsing. A great improvement on the original design.

I should add that some have noted a minor criticism of the keyboard that, once unfolded, the keyboard is hinged down the center along the "Y," "H," and "N" keys causing the keyboard to fold down the center when not placed on a flat surface, such as directly on your knee. While that condition remains in the m500 series keyboard, I have never personally found it to be an issue in my previous and extensive use of my Palm V series or III series ThinkOutisde keyboards; nor has it been an issue for me with the new m500 series model.

In the final analysis, you would be hard pressed to find a reason not to absolutely love this essential Palm accessory, which, for me, has transitioned my Palm into a laptop, allowing me to leave my 6 plus pound laptop at home. If you listen closely, you can still hear my chiropractor screaming in frustration as he cancels his plans for that summer home on the Cape he was going to finance on my dime.

Reviewed by Scott R. Almas