Notebook Keyboard

The keyboards that notebook computers have! Their range of motion is something like a quarter-inch or less; they jam easily; they are difficult to clean; they are even more difficult to replace; they never have the modifier keys nor the backslash in the right places (whatever an individual typist might consider those to be, which is another problem entirely); the keys are too close together; they're "soft" rather than "clicky", but not too good even at that; in particular they seem to have lots of trouble with a spacebar that is reliably pressable; ...

You should mention the FN key. Oh god, the FN key. Whenever I do a CokeBottle? combination I always hit FN instead of Control, with amusingly annoying results. Especially under Emacs.

Well, of course not all of those are true of all of them.

What are people's experiences? Everyone's taste in keyboards differs, of course, but have there been notebook keyboards which you really loved or loathed? Somebody once told me she expected she'd find it impossible to use a notebook, because she preferred the monitor off to one side; anyone else think that's an issue? (Placement of the monitor too close to the keyboard certainly is; well, that sort of thing is to be expected.) Share your musings!

--DanielKnapp

Computer keyboards are not all that easy to use anyway--it seems like about half of the keystrokes I make are with my little finger. Notebook keyboards exacerbate the problem by making those keys even smaller, and by squeezing in cursor keys and Fn keys. And every once in a while, I wish I had a numeric keypad. But aside from that, I prefer the soft feel and quietness over the average desktop keyboard. --KrisJohnson

Myself, I've grown quite fond of the light touch of my laptop keyboard. Such that, with it currently broken, my hands are getting sore using a normal keyboard in the same desk position (including height)... the extra finger movement is killing me (to say nothing of my quadra piece-per-minute speed). I'm seriously looking into trying out one of those touch sensitive pad-keyboards that I've read about... have to see if one can be found in Saskatoon. --WilliamUnderwood

KinesisKeyboard minimizes finger motion. There's also a reseller / refurbisher out in Saskatchewan I think.

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My first laptop had all 4 cursor keys in a straight row (unfortunately *not* in the same order as the ViEditor).

I made sure that my next laptop had the 4 arrow keys in a "proper" inverted T:

       up
 left down right

( My 2013 Dell Keyboard has this arrangement: )

                         Clear /    *    -
 Insert   Home   Pgup     7    8    9    +
 Delete   Fnd    Pgdn     4    5    6    +
                          1    2    3   Enter
          Up              0    0    .   Enter
  Left    Right   Right   0    0    .   Enter

Widescreen laptops allowed wider keyboards, so they've sprouted full keypads and cursor blocks

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See NotebookComputer, BadKeyboards, CategoryKeyboard.