As far back as our reports from CES , we have been following the development of the Zboard. Recently, during our coverage of the 2003 Game Developers Conference , we had a first person opportunity to speak with Oren Kramer from Ideazon. During our discussion with Oren, he spent a great deal of time walking us through the design and features of the Zboard.

Even after this in-depth discussion with Oren, however, we were still somewhat skeptical of the entire concept of the Zboard. Would the Zboard really help gamers to improve their gaming performance? Would their game scores increase, and would they find the Zboard a viable and more comfortable alternative to a typical keyboard?

Based on past experience with products that have attempted to "remake" the computer keyboard in the past, we felt that we earned the right to be a little skeptical. Let's face it: keyboard overlays and the like have never been a real success in the gaming market. Sure, they can help you to learn the game a little faster, and in many cases they prove to be a help. However, we couldn't quite get past the time warp of the era of Mattel Intellivision and Atari 5200 (as examples) that featured overlays that had to be inserted into the joystick/keypad combo. These overlays were always missing and couldn't be located, and this made using the buttons on the keypad more difficult in many cases. Zboard promised to be different in this area by introducing technology that allows the user to replace the entire keyboard - a great concept, assuming that it works.

We invited Oren to send the Zboard to THG for review and allow us the chance to put the Zboard to the test. Before we get started with our review of the Zboard, it is important to note that the Zboard is a new product that just had its first trial production run in mid-November 2002. Mass production just started in January 2003 and the first retail shipments of the Zboard are only recently headed to retail stores; in short - it is a very new product, but it should be found on your local retailer's shelves soon. In the meantime, we give you a sneak preview of the Zboard.