By Gareth Butterfield

Copyright northernirelandworld

If you were to examine the new Logitech Slim Solar+ K980 without having had its features explained, you might be a bit flummoxed. Because it doesn’t have a USB socket.

That’s right, it’s a wireless keyboard that you can’t charge up. You might then wonder how long the battery will last. How about 10 years? Would that be enough?

The trick is in a solar panel mounted above the top row of keys. And solar panels aren’t unusual in keyboards, even for Logitech, but they’re so confident this new solar technology is capable of charging your keyboard in any lighting conditions that they haven’t bothered to fit a charger.

The real magic behind this keyboard, the reason it’s making waves at the moment, is the fact it can charge up from artificial light.

So if you work in a big office or in an internal room, it’s fine. It doesn’t need natural light to power its internal battery, just the normal light of your office space will do.

Truth be told, the keyboard itself is relatively uninspiring. The membrane keys are nicely weighted, as they are on any membrane keyboard from Logitech, and there’s a generous array of up-to-date shortcuts, as you’d expect from a Logitech keyboard.

It’s also very customisable, as with any Logitech product. It’s just not a high-end experience overall. There’s nothing to dazzle you about it. It’s just quite good.

But then you remind yourself, you’re using a wireless keyboard you’ll never have to charge, and you start to think of the possibilities.

I’d be staggered if Logitech doesn’t start applying this technology to all of their devices, from the top-spec gaming keyboards, to the plush mechanical keyboards, and that’s when it gets exciting.

The £99.99 Slim Solar+ K980 has been aimed at the business market, with IT staff’s sanity at the forefront of the solar innovation. No more swapping batteries, no more lost charging leads, just a simple, reliable product that can keep an employee tapping away all day for up to 10 years. Pop it on the desk, set it up, and you won’t have to touch it again. It’s genius.

The solar panel is incredibly effective in practice, too. I’ve tried it in a variety of scenarios, from my reasonably well-lit office to our internal and deliberately dimly-lit dining room. And it’s usually able to charge, even under weak bulbs.

The excellent Logi Options+ app will give you a live indication of whether there’s sufficient light and, even if there isn’t, you should have charge to last for four months. Mind you, if there isn’t enough light for the keyboard, you probably won’t be doing your eyes a lot of good anyway.

It’s a shame the keyboard doesn’t have any pop-out feet to support it and lift it up a bit at the back, that feels like an important omission, but Logitech points out this is meant to feel like a “laptop-style” keyboard, and it makes me wonder where this technology will find itself next.

Because, if it were to be applied to one of its high-end keyboards, and I can’t think of any reason why it can’t be, it could be an absolute game-changer. It’s a fantastic innovation.