Recommend me a small keyboard
Monday, September 11th, 2006 - 3:04pm
My venerable Korean made KDS short keyboard bit it today. Well, I spilt milk on it and it smells bad now.
I've had it for probably 5 years now. So long that the letters are worn off and the space bar has a deep worn spot on it.
Anyway, I need a new one and I want it to be small. The KDS didn't have the num pad, which cut down on its length significantly.
Any small keyboard lovers that can pick a good one for me?
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I use the Logitech PS2 USB keyboard for typing messages on my Xbox 360. It's fairly small and has no number pad. The photo on the product page makes it seem large, but it's at least half the size of my G15.
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Happy Hacking keyboards are great but a bit pricey.
http://www.pfu.fujitsu.com/en/hhkeyboard/
Haven't used one of these but they look cool
http://www.thinkgeek.com/computing/input/72e2/
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Those little keyboards aren't really ergonomic are they? Are you using it as your main keyboard or for some other function?
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No, they're definitely not ergonomic. I just don't have much space on my keyboard tray, and I have a large mouse pad. If I use a normal size keyboard, it inevitably ends up forcing me to type at an awkward angle to my left. Thus the small keyboard thing.
Thanks for the suggestions. Keep em coming!
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I saw a flexible plastic keyboard at compusa the other day. No hard plastic in sight. It felt kind of odd to use, but for someone with limited space maybe it'd work?
What about those little keyboards used for Palm pilots and PocketPCs? Are those USB? Those are pretty tiny.
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The nice thing about the Happy Hacking keyboards that I linked is that they are basically the same as a full size keyboard, but without the right chunk of space dedicated to the numpad, home/insert/etc. or the top chunk dedicated to F keys. As such, they aren't any less ergonomic than a standard keyboard, and they have better key feel than most. Plus they have the CTRL key in the right place and dipswitches to customize key behavior, so no windows key if you don't want it.
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Yeah, small keyboard = Happy Hacking. Accept no imations.
That Happy Hacking Lite2 is fascinating... I love small keyboards, and the extra USB ports would be handy in replacing my Apple Pro keyboard.
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ThinkGeek has a backlit one that is also very small. If you go there and look for the backlit ones you'll see it. I had it and it worked well. I got rid of it for a Z-Board MERC, though
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As for me, I'm still waiting on the new Razer keyboard. It's not tiny though
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I'm a freak, I use an MS Natural. It's huge.
They don't get much smaller.
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I'm using a Kensington Slimtype and have been for at least a year now. Its very small in comparison to the mammoth keyboards I used before that (namely some Microsoft and Logitech ones) and I love the laptop style keys. Its still got the numpad, so it may be a bit bigger than you're looking for.
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I use the AuraVision slimline... It's a full featured keyboard with the same feel as a laptop keyboard and only slightly longer because of the number pad. The only downside is the cost.