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Sunday, January 30, 2011

Apple Keyboard review

So, I picked up my new, maxed-out Apple MacBook Pro laptop at the shop a few days ago; the whole thing cost a bit over $4,600.  I had a bit of extra cash to spend, so I decided to buy myself a matching Apple keyboard and trackpad.

My preferences in keyboard design lean decidedly towards old-fashioned mechanical keyboards with keys that click (such as the Unicomp Model M, which I'll be reviewing later).  Basically, I can't stand to type on the so-called 'standard' desktop rubber dome keyboards, because after little over three months of heavy use, they turn mushy and painful to type on.

With that expectation in mind, I figured I'd hate typing on the new Apple Keyboard; I assumed it was a rubber dome keyboard, just like most other keyboards made today, including the old Apple Keyboard.  I needed a new 'throwaway' keyboard for my Cray CX1 machine (which I use as a web, e-mail, and file server, so I don't type on it much), so I gave in and spent the $50.

For those of you that don't know, the new Apple keyboard looks like it was ripped straight out of a laptop. Laptop keyboards are notorious for varying wildly in their quality; you can have something that has all the tactile feedback of butter, like most Dell keyboards, or you can have something that rivals the Model M in quality, like ThinkPad boards.

The build quality seems pretty solid: a sheet of aluminium forms the top of the keyboard, while the main body (a.k.a. the underside) is made of Apple's trademark white plastic.  The keys are of the 'chiclet' variety: flat and square, like MacBook keys, not pyramidal with a cylindrical top like most other laptops.

So, without any further ado: the review.  Unboxing was pretty standard.  Like most Apple products, the aluminium Apple keyboard comes in a box which is very nice and almost a shame to throw out.  I bought the wired version of the keyboard, which happens to have a very short cable (it was made for the iMac, which was made to sit on a desk).  Thoughtfully, Apple included an extension cable in the box.

Now, this keyboard was made for Macs (specifically the iMac, as I said above), but it works just as well on    PC's and Cray mainframes, as long as you don't mind certain quirks:

1. There is no Print Screen key.  Instead of a Print Screen key, there is an F13 key; this does absolutely nothing on Windows or Linux.  To make the F13 key work as PrtScn, you have to use a special driver that isn't even possible to download by itself; even then, it only works with Windows.

2. The Alt and Meta (Apple or Windows) keys are switched.  There's an easier way to fix this, but even that is troublesome.

3.  I dislike the fact that non-PC names are used on the keys.  Instead of "meta" or the Windows logo, the meta key says "command" on it.  Same for the Alt key, which has the word "option" printed on it.

A good thing about this keyboard is that, because of the 'chiclet' style keys, there's not a lot that can fall into the cracks.  This is good for the messier eaters; all you have to do to clean up the keyboard is turn it over and give it a wipe down with an alcohol towel.  However, the keys are white, which does little to hide smudges and stains from dirty fingers.

On to typing feel.  I plugged the board into the Cray server; Windows recognised the keyboard instantly.  +1 for ease of installation.  Opening up a Word document, I typed this review into it.  The feel is, unexpectedly, pretty awesome, rivalling the ThinkPad keyboard.  There is a decidedly tactile feel; the resistance offered by the scissor switch and rubber cone beneath the keys offer much-needed resistance on the way down.  What this means is basically that, as the key goes down, it gets more and more difficult to press; when a certain point is reached (i.e. when the keypress registers in the computer) the resistance disappears.  This makes typing less error-prone, because one knows exactly whether a key has been properly pressed or not.

To understand why this is an issue, you've got to know why other keyboards do not offer this: most desktop keyboards use "rubber dome" technology, which is why a new desktop keyboard doesn't feel the same as an older, well-used one.  Pressing a key pushes down a silicone rubber dome; these domes are part of a single sheet of rubber placed on top of a membrane sheet with traces that don't touch each other. When you push the dome downwards, the black pad underneath it touches both contacts and closes the circuit. One of the major weaknesses of rubber domes is this contact pad. It has a graphite coating (the conductive part) that wears out over time; you'll slowly find yourself having to press harder and harder to create that electrical contact, and eventually it will just stop altogether.

There are some desktop keyboards that don't have this problem; most notably, the Unicomp Model M doesn't suffer from this, because it uses metal springs instead of a rubber sheet, but that'll be another review.

So, in conclusion:

Pros - Scissor switch technology, nice to type on, cheap, slim, good-looking, easy to clean.

Cons - Cable is too short, white keys show dirt easily, keyboard legends are wrong for Windows, PrtScn doesn't work

Rating - 9/10