How the Stream Deck rose from the ashes of a legendary keyboard

Art Lebedev’s costly Optimus keyboards seemed similar a footnote successful tech blogging past until a tiny German institution saw the imaginable for a caller procreation of contented creators.

BackBack successful 2005, a tiny steadfast offered a tantalizing imaginativeness of the aboriginal of machine keyboards. 

What if your keyboard was filled with tiny screens that showed you precisely what immoderate fixed property would do, each built into a crystal-clear key? The keys would morph and displacement arsenic you needed, transforming from letters and numbers to full-color icons and app shortcuts, depending connected what you were doing.

Readers and tech bloggers adored the idea. “It’s astir clip idiosyncratic shook up this stagnant keyboard market,” declared Engadget. “The conception is fantastic,” wrote Gizmodo. Slashdot lit up.

The keyboard was conscionable a concept, dreamed up by Art Lebedev, a Russian plan firm, and it was an ambitious thought astatine that: called the Optimus Maximus, it would necessitate implicit 100 built-in screens utilizing show exertion that wasn’t readily disposable astatine the time. With each the excitement, the steadfast decided to marque it real.

Eight idiosyncratic surface keys of the squared- disconnected benignant Art Lebedev primitively imagined are seen successful 3D, pressed by an invisible force, portion displaying spinning Optimus keyboards wrong their frames. One concisely displays a Microsoft Sticky Keys prompt.

The travel to make the Optimus Maximus would instrumentality years and extremity successful aggregate commercialized failures. But Art Lebedev’s imaginativeness and the exertion created on the mode would unrecorded connected and yet find wide occurrence — a occurrence that’s been hidden wrong different fashionable product: Elgato’s Stream Deck, a tiny desktop accessory covered successful morphing, full-color keys.

By the clip Elgato came to merchandise its archetypal Stream Deck successful 2017, Art Lebedev’s Optimus keyboards had faded into history. But there’s much linking the 2 devices than a halfway idea. In fact, the Stream Deck hardware came from precisely the aforesaid institution that developed the Optimus Maximus’ keys. In a precise existent sense, Art Lebedev’s enactment laid the foundations for what Elgato would spell connected to create.

InIn 2010, Elgato was successful “crisis mode.” 

For astir a decade, the German video seizure institution had been selling its TV tuners to radical who wanted to ticker and grounds unrecorded tv via a connected computer. But by 2010, it was wide that the marketplace for specified devices was disappearing fast. On 1 side, broadcast TV was becoming progressively encrypted, limiting what Elgato’s devices could do. On the other, the streaming revolution, led by Netflix and YouTube, was cutting retired the humble TV tuner entirely.

“You’re connected a sinking ship, you’ve got to fig retired what you’re going to do,” recalls Elgato’s Julian Fest, whose parents primitively founded the institution successful 1999. 

Elgato started to instrumentality a hard look astatine its business, and it noticed 1 fig that didn’t rather marque sense. 

Elgato knew however galore TV tuners it had sold, but radical had been registering acold much copies of the company’s EyeTV signaling bundle than its ain customers would need. When it emailed those customers, it recovered retired they were utilizing a rival portion of hardware, the Hauppauge HD-PVR — and not to grounds broadcast TV. They were signaling gameplay from their PlayStations to enactment up connected YouTube. Right nether Elgato’s chemoreceptor was a caller marketplace opportunity.

Armed with implicit a decade’s worthy of video encoding cognition from its TV tuner days, a nonstop transportation to Hauppauge’s customers, and Hauppauge’s ain quarterly net reports to cognize conscionable however galore HD-PVRs it sold, Elgato decided to merchandise a rival seizure merchandise specifically tailored to gamers. The effect was the Game Capture HD, released successful 2012. 

Three years later, erstwhile Fest took implicit arsenic Elgato’s wide manager, it seemed wide that the marketplace for online gameplay videos was poised to explode. With Amazon acquiring the unrecorded streaming work Twitch for astir $1 cardinal successful 2014, Fest was connected the lookout for ways Elgato could treble down. Perhaps it could connection a mode to not conscionable seizure gameplay footage but besides to assistance Twitch streamers power their broadcasts successful the moment.

“If you looked astatine the authorities of Twitch and unrecorded streaming astatine the extremity of 2015, it was intriguing, but it was besides benignant of boring,” Fest tells The Verge. “Everybody’s watercourse was like, ‘Here’s my gameplay, here’s my webcam,’ and that’s it.” He figured that simplicity was due to the fact that of each the antithetic jobs a streamer has to grip during broadcasts: betwixt playing the game, speechmaking the chat, and entertaining an audience, it’d beryllium hard to also tally a dynamic broadcast filled with changing layouts and eye-catching transitions.

Unless, Fest thought, determination was a mode to connection precocious broadcast controls without distracting a streamer from different tasks. The institution recovered its reply successful a popular German TV show wherever the big had a alleged “nipple board” of buttons successful beforehand of him, built into a elephantine desk. “Every clip you pressed 1 of these buttons, it would play a comic clip that his squad had recovered connected TV,” Fest recalls. The squad wondered if Elgato could usage a akin array of buttons to power a livestream.

Elgato had its thought — now, it needed to find the close buttons to marque it a reality. 

ArtArt Lebedev had ne'er intended to marque a monolithic splash successful the keyboard business. Timur Burbaev, who served arsenic the keyboard’s concern designer, tells The Verge that the archetypal thought came astir soon aft helium joined successful 2003. The keyboard was conscionable meant to beryllium a concept, akin to its Lavatrix washing machine, to amusement disconnected the studio’s plan chops and drum up much concern successful the escaped clip betwixt projects.

In July 2005, the institution released a series of conception images of what it called the “Optimus keyboard.” It had the aforesaid basal layout arsenic a full-size machine keyboard but with a twist: “Every cardinal of the Optimus keyboard is simply a stand-alone show showing precisely what it is controlling astatine this precise moment,” the website inactive reads.

One representation shows however the keys could alteration to amusement an array of Photoshop tools; different shows dedicated controls for Quake. (This was 2005, aft all.) On the near borderline of the keyboard are macro keys that tin beryllium programmed to unfastened circumstantial programs, illustrated with a bid of delightfully 2005-era logos similar Internet Explorer and QuickTime. Although the images are renders alternatively than existent photographs, the close-ups marque an effort to amusement idiosyncratic pixels contiguous connected the screens of the keys, a tiny imperfection that provides a tantalizing hint of reality. Nearly 2 decades later, the imaginary instrumentality inactive looks fantastic.

It was hard to disregard the magnitude of involvement the plan was getting. The squad called an exigency gathering to discuss. “Back then, we conscionable realized that if you get specified a affirmative response, past let’s hazard it and conscionable nutrient it,” Burbaev says. It was “a wide indication” that the squad should effort and marque it for real. The agelong and hard travel of producing what would go the Optimus Maximus had begun. “No 1 imagined however overmuch clip and vigor and particularly concern it would take,” Burbaev says. 

A large aboriginal determination was moving retired what benignant of surface exertion to use. The archetypal iPod with a colour show had lone conscionable been released, and the iPhone had yet to marque its debut. Candybar-style phones similar the Nokia 1110 and Motorola C139 reigned supreme. Art Lebedev thought LCD screens of the epoch were excessively dim and offered unspeakable achromatic levels, portion E Ink screens had unspeakable effect times and nary backlighting astatine all. OLED seemed similar the champion choice.

But this was agelong earlier OLED displays were routinely shipping successful mainstream smartwatches, smartphones, and TVs. “The occupation with OLED displays was that you could perchance find specified a tiny OLED show successful 2006 but a) it would outgo you a luck and b) it would person a monolithic resolution,” Burbaev says. They were meant for subject users to amusement tactical accusation similar maps connected tiny screens, not Quake icons connected a keyboard.

Art Lebedev decided its “only option” was to dive headfirst into the OLED show business. Burbaev believes his was 1 of the archetypal companies to vessel a merchandise with these kinds of small, low-cost, low-resolution OLED screens. Doing truthful progressive placing what Burbaev describes arsenic a “very strange” bid with a Taiwanese shaper with immoderate anterior experience. He adds that 2 managers from Art Lebedev ended up surviving successful Taiwan for fractional a twelvemonth portion they were being made.

Not lone did Art Lebedev request to find screens tiny capable to acceptable nether each of its keys but it besides needed to find a mode for them to coexist with keys that you could really benignant on. The last keyboard ended up being a spot of a fudge: the screens didn’t really move. Instead, the institution built a moving integrative keycap that moved around each screen. But adjacent this solution had its challenges, Burbaev says. This integrative keycap needed to not lone beryllium transparent capable to amusement the show but besides tinted capable to not uncover the disfigured interior mechanics of each surface and durable capable to withstand scratches.

All of this meant the improvement process for the Optimus Maximus was agelong and difficult, and Wired featured the keyboard not once but twice successful its yearly vaporware roundups. Art Lebedev was unusually unfastened astir the troubled improvement process, cataloging its advancement making the keyboard on a LiveJournal blog. We’re utilized to receiving specified updates successful an epoch of Kickstarter and crowdfunding, but the attack felt caller astatine the clip — and it shows conscionable however dilatory improvement went. It took months conscionable to get connected a keycap design, studying assorted possibilities on the way. The company’s archetypal OLED shaper went bust earlier managing to present its pricy $10 keys, forcing Art Lebedev to hunt down a caller Taiwanese supplier. 

Finally, aft years of development, hundreds of preorders, and dozens upon dozens of blog posts and conception images hyping up each facet of the idea, the Optimus Maximus began shipping in February 2008.

A diagram shows however Art Lebedev’s keys comparison to mean laptop and desktop keyboard keys. The Maximus cardinal has a gem-faceted prism of a lens surrounding its screen, portion the Popularis cardinal is simply a lens.

What was this legendary keyboard really similar to use? In a word: “Terrible.”

“Let’s enactment it this way, we beryllium astir and benignant each time agelong and this happening wore america retired successful astir 30 seconds to a minute,” Engadget wrote aft its archetypal fewer weeks of testing. “The Optimus Maximus is unspeakable for touch-typing,” CNET concurred successful its July 2008 review, noting that “the tightly packed keys marque for tons of mistaken presses, and the mushy responsiveness slows down your words per minute.” In 2018, retro keyboard YouTuber Chyrosran22 called the keys “fishy fuck nuggets with a superior F” that are “extremely terrible” to benignant on. 

These are issues that would beryllium hard to forgive connected any keyboard, but the Optimus Maximus besides carried a $1,600 terms tag successful 2008 (north of $2,200 successful today’s money). At that price, it had to beryllium perfect, and the world was acold from it.

So Art Lebedev came up with another, cheaper mode to marque screen-filled keys work: 1 large screen. In 2012, it released the Optimus Popularis, a much compact keyboard that placed 1 ample LCD show nether each its transparent keys, with nary request for immoderate idiosyncratic OLED screens oregon mechanical switches underneath. Instead, you’d benignant connected lenses that would activate the keyboard’s azygous ample screen, with each lens held floating successful spot by an aluminum frame. This basal thought is the cardinal to each LCD keyboard we’ve seen since, from the Elgato Stream Deck to Razer’s discontinued Switchblade UI to the Finalmouse Centerpiece. 

Yet cardinal problems remained. Not lone was Art Lebedev’s caller keyboard lone somewhat cheaper (it inactive cost northbound of $1,000) but besides the Optimus Popularis was an implicit pig to benignant on. Art Lebedev was benignant capable to nonstop 1 to america for the purposes of this story, and we had ambitions to constitute this full portion connected the Popularis. But aft fractional an hour, we gave up. It was a conflict getting the keyboard to registry keypresses successful the archetypal place. Its abstraction bar, successful particular, is simply a nightmare that refuses to actuate unless you property it firmly capable successful precisely the close spot, which is astir intolerable if you privation to benignant astatine immoderate benignant of speed.

Even successful 2024, successful an epoch of phones that are not conscionable astute but that tin literally fold successful half, we inactive find ourselves wishing Art Lebedev had been capable to present connected its 2005 conception images. It’s a truly beauteous thought with immense amounts of promise. But adjacent if Art Lebedev ne'er genuinely delivered, it did a batch of the captious iteration to get there.

But for Taiwanese shaper iDisplay, the Infinitton was acold from a disappointment — it was a decade-old thought yet paying off. 

That’s due to the fact that iDisplay was the company that built those OLED and LCD keys for Art Lebedev each those years ago, the Russian plan steadfast and Elgato some confirmed to The Verge. It ne'er stopped moving connected them. “The occurrence of Optimus Maximus kept maine funny to proceed the probe and improvement of the built-in surface keys,” iDisplay cofounder Jen Wen Sun tells america via translated email. By 2017, he’d racked up implicit a twelve patents connected the tech and says helium sold the screens into broadcast equipment, airplanes, and cars on the way.

The institution was primitively formed successful 1998 and worked connected buttons for the gambling industry, helium tells us, surviving disconnected small-scale R&D projects portion helium kept trying to merchantability casinos connected his push-button screens. Casino proprietor Bally’s was erstwhile interested, helium says, but a woody ne'er panned out.

Back successful Germany, the Infinitton caught the attraction of Elgato’s Julian Fest, who was researching however to crook his screen-equipped streaming controller thought into a reality. “As we’re reasoning astir this controller, this crowdfunding run comes retired and we’re looking astatine this container and we’re similar ‘Oh, this is perfect. We request to speech to these guys,’” Fest recalls. 

By the clip Elgato started talking to iDisplay, the Taiwanese institution had already solved galore of the hardware challenges needed to crook a 1000 dollar-plus keyboard into a comparatively affordable $149 machine accessory. It could usage tiny off-the-shelf screens akin to what you mightiness find successful a car’s infotainment system. And iDisplay had a simpler occupation connected its hands crafting the Stream Deck’s bubble wrap-esque fastener feel due to the fact that it didn’t person to interest astir radical needing to benignant astatine 50-plus words per minute. That consciousness had been crafted earlier Elgato ever touched it.

Elgato fundamentally turned the Infinitton into the Stream Deck. That archetypal Stream Deck, Fest says, “was truly conscionable connected a hardware level an iteration of what these guys did.” Look astatine the archetypal Stream Deck adjacent to the Infinitton, and the resemblance is clear; it’s the aforesaid three-by-five grid of buttons turned connected its broadside and with a caller housing. “We tried to support it arsenic elemental arsenic possible,” Fest says. 

The mode Fest describes it, the main happening Elgato brought to the array erstwhile it started moving with iDisplay was focus. In its Kickstarter run for the Infinitton, iDisplay pitched the accessory to anyone and everyone. It was for designers, traders, and musicians. It was for architects, engineers, and programmers. It was for video designers and photographers and concern professionals. 

In contrast, Elgato knew precisely who it wanted its Stream Deck to beryllium for: streamers. It held a six-month backstage beta to cod feedback from its intended users, and it poured a batch of effort into making definite the instrumentality integrated nicely with OBS, the industry-standard streaming software. “The large caller constituent past was gathering bundle that was tailor made for unrecorded streamers,” Fest says. “What we did is we took thing existing and conscionable repositioned it for an assemblage that really understood and appreciated what this happening could do.”

That’s not to accidental Elgato didn’t person immoderate challenges to flooded portion processing the Stream Deck with iDisplay. Fest says a large 1 was ensuring that the Stream Deck could not lone nonstop accusation to a machine but besides person it backmost and amusement it to the user. Without being capable to enactment successful sync similar this, the Stream Deck risked being the glorified macro pad that critics claimed it was. “If you occurrence disconnected a hotkey, you don’t cognize if that enactment succeeded,” Fest says. “What we wanted to guarantee is that if you alteration a country successful OBS you tin intelligibly spot connected your instrumentality [that] that country is present progressive and the different 1 is not. Or if you mute yourself, you’re muted, and we tin warrant that you’re muted due to the fact that we’re talking natively to OBS.”

The attack worked. iDisplay had sold conscionable a fewer 100 units of its Infinitton via its crowdfunding campaigns, but the Stream Deck rapidly became a staple of the Twitch streamer’s toolkit after its merchandise successful 2017. A twelvemonth later, Corsair acquired Elgato for an undisclosed sum — and successful 2022, it bought iDisplay, locking down its LCD keys.

Other companies person taken notice. In 2022, Razer introduced the Stream Controller, and a twelvemonth aft that, competing PC accessory shaper Logitech snatched up Loupedeck, which had worked with Razer connected the rival streaming accessory. 

Much similar erstwhile it morphed its TV tuner into a crippled recorder, Elgato developed an assemblage for a exertion alternatively than the different mode around. It had been the missing portion of the puzzle since the beginning. But ironically, the assemblage for the Stream Deck has since expanded astir arsenic wide arsenic the 1 iDisplay hoped would clasp the Infinitton. 

Fest says helium knows of Stream Decks being utilized successful the hundreds by organizations ranging from telephone centers to constabulary dispatcher services. The UK’s Virgin Atlantic hose uses dozens of Stream Decks to simplify communications with pilots and aerial postulation controllers. Even SpaceX was an aboriginal customer, Fest says. (SpaceX did not respond to The Verge’s petition for comment.) The elemental genius of the Stream Deck is that it made LCD keys peripheral, utile for thing wherever you request a fastener that dynamically advertises what it’s doing.

In this 3D animation, the archetypal Optimus keyboard conception and the Stream Deck play a crippled of integer ping-pong crossed the entirety of their key-covered screens.

ArtArt Lebedev was close astir 1 thing: determination was so a marketplace of radical prepared to wage apical dollar for premium-quality keyboards. But successful retrospect, the Russian plan workplace stake that the marketplace would spell successful the other absorption of the 1 it really went in. Instead of a software-based aboriginal filled with screens, keyboards embraced hardware, rediscovering mechanical cardinal switches that had been astir since the ’80s. Users began fixating connected typing feel, seeking retired tactile switches and clacky keycaps. The galore compromises of LCD keys mightiness person been excessively overmuch to ask.

But Elgato didn’t request to find a equilibrium betwixt typing consciousness and surface due to the fact that its Stream Deck aimed to complement a accepted keyboard, alternatively than regenerate it. “Everybody has opinions connected however Stream Deck’s keys feel. Some perfectly emotion it. Some accidental it’s mode excessively mushy. But for everybody, it’s usable,” Fest says. You tin forgive a cardinal that feels mushy if you lone request to property it to mute yourself portion streaming.

Which is not to accidental there’s nary abstraction for the benignant of screen-based plan that Art Lebedev and iDisplay worked to create. The gaming accessories institution Finalmouse appears to beryllium banking connected precisely that with its forthcoming Centerpiece keyboard, which draws connected the single-screen attack of the Popularis but combines it with a acceptable of existent mechanical switches — translucent ones — to clasp the consciousness of a mechanical keyboard. 

Like the Optimus Maximus, the Centerpiece has already blown past its archetypal promised vessel dates and is entering the vaporware realm. But if it does arrive, possibly relation and signifier volition yet beryllium aligned.

As for Art Lebedev, it doesn’t see the Optimus keyboard a failure. “You could reason however palmy the task was successful presumption of instrumentality connected investment,” Burbaev says, telling america however overmuch concern it drummed up for the workplace adjacent a decennary later. Sometimes a caller lawsuit would admit that they, too, were fixated by those conception images backmost erstwhile they were a kid. Esc