Studio 15 Media Buttons....

is there a way to get them to do the exact opposite...instead of being off and lighting up when you touch can they be lit up and then go dark when you touch?....what would be really nice is if you could make them light up when you light your keyboard up and not light up when your keyboard isnt lit....can someone make this happen

 

I think this is on the Dell wishlist site where the media buttons are backlit like the keyboard. It would be nice because they are hard to see in the dark.

 

I have a Studio 17 and even in the daytime the media controls are hard to see.
It would be nice if Dell could do a Bios update and make it so they could light up with the keyboard, or better yet have a seperate hot key to turn on just the media controls when you need them.

 

It'd be great if they would light up with the keyboard, atm i'm just tapping the general area till something lights up, then take it from there.

 

I'm on board with this idea. They are hard to see even with good lighting. A lot of people are having a hard time finding the eject button for the CD/DVD/BRD drives because the eject button is also on this media button bar without a backlight.

 

http://www.ideastorm.com/article/sh...Buttons_on_Studio_15_laptop_should_be_backlit

Issue has already has been brought to Dell's attention...

 

^^^Yes, I did that but it needs more people to promote it before someone in Dell actually notices it....so guys go over and hit promote

 

Done and bump.

 

Just wanted to tell you how i vastly improved my media button user experience. Personally, I very much prefer buttons which have a tactile feedback - i.e., i know that i am pressing them without looking. So, over each of the touch sensitive media buttons, i put a small round transparent plastic sticker, the 3-d kind. It's small enough so that the screen closes just fine, the touch buttons still work, there is tactile feedback, and the buttons are a lot more noticeable too, even in the dark.

 

i've done a couple online text chats with dell techs and i've always made a point to ask about this. most of the time, they say they will look into it or pass it along.

i got one guy who said they can't leave them on because the computer can't tell when the lid is closed and the lights would stay on and drain the battery. when challenged on this (which lets admit, is pretty dumb) his response was dell was concerned that it would shorten battery life and would rather keep them off. /shrug

random tech guy, 50/50 chance if he knew what he was talking about. but ya, wtb always on media buttons. HP has it. =(

 

Don't think he had any clue what he was talking about. Of course the Studio can tell whether the lid is closed (even the low-level parts of it which is why the keyboard backlight switches off) and what's so hard with linking the media button lights to the keyboard backlight (if present): It can be switched off, it switches off itself after a certain amount of idle time and if you can afford the power consumption of a whole brightly lit keyboard, why should some more keys bother you?

Anyway, the link to the Dell site doesn't work anymore, it's http://www.ideastorm.com/ideaView?id=087700000000BhqAAE now and http://www.ideastorm.com/ideaView?id=087700000000EANAA2 is a new thread that has less votes yet but is in the right category. There's also a reply by someone who claims to have seen the feature already but I don't exactly get what he's talking about.

 

I'm pretty sure Staples (and Canadian Tire for Canadians) sell those little rubber feet with the sticky side that you can put on the bottom of items. They sell some REALLY small, rounded, clear ones too.

I figure if I stick one of those tiny little rounded clear ones above each button (not right on top of the button though) it would at least let me easily find the button I want at first glance.

Mute, Volume up, and Volume down are 3 buttons close together and the ones I use the most so 3 little rubber feet above each might be enough. Maybe another for the Eject button.

They're shallow enough that they shouldn't make contact with the screen itself. Any sort of tiny sticker would do though, doesn't have to be a rubber foot like I plan to try.