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More Ergonomic Keyboards

Posted by michael on from the pounding-plastic dept.

tve writes "Back when moderators were real moderators, karma whores were real karma whores and small, furry creatures living in the mould deep down in your keyboard were real small, furry creatures living in the mould deep down in your keyboard, Slashdot ran a story about ergonomic keyboards. Popular keyboards back then appeared to be the MS Natural keyboard, the famous prehistoric IBM keyboards and for the lucky few who had their company buy it for them, the Maltron keyboard. However, times have changed, keyboards have decayed and new purchases need to be made. So I submit to the Slashdot community: what is the current holy grail of ergonomic typing pleasure, where can I get it and is it affordable for a student on a budget?" Actually we've done a couple of stories on ergonomic keyboards, but since this is asked so frequently I suppose it won't hurt to do another.

8 of 84 comments (clear)

  1. Try it for yourself by cwinters · · Score: 4, Interesting

    There's no one singular answer for this, you really need to try these things out for yourself until you find something that works. For me, the Kinesis-Ergo has been amazing. Not only can I type like a demon and avoid wrist pain, but the thumb-located Ctrl and Alt keys make (X)Emacs that much easier to work with, not to mention easier on my pinkies :-)


    --

    Chris
    M-x auto-bs-mode

  2. Old PS/2 keyboards by ka9dgx · · Score: 3, Interesting
    Go to any computer show, find an old PS/2, after making sure it includes a good keyboard, pay for both, throw away the PS/2, and be happy.

    --Mike--

  3. Never mind carpal tunnel, what about eyestrain? by unitron · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I realise my 17" monitor is kinda dinky by today's standards, but why do the keyboard makers' web sites use such small pictures of the keyboards? That old saying about a picture being worth a thousand words wasn't intended to suggest substituting one thousand words for a "big enough to get a decent look at it" picture.

    --

    I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.

  4. Typing Injury FAQ by spribyl · · Score: 3, Interesting

    The typeing injury faq has gobs of information about keyboards. It can be found here

    Personnally I use a Twiddler. Some folks don't care for them but I love mine. There is a bit of learning curve and the mouse buttons can be a bit squirlly. It has 16 keys, 4 modifyers, and a track point. You type by makeing cords. The track point moves the mouse and puts the 16 keys into mouse button mode(little squirlly).

  5. Best Keyboard Ever by Kent+Brewster · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Remember the Northgate OmniKey 802? If so, you want to take a look at the Avant Stellar, from Creative Vision Technologies, which bought Northgate's plans when they went belly-up. No fancy ergo-shapes here, just six pounds of steel, an unbelievably solid feel, infinite reprogrammability, and function keys across the top and down the left side, as God intended them to be.

  6. Best Keyboard I ever used... by martyb · · Score: 3, Interesting

    The best keyboard I have EVER used was on an IBM PS/2 Model P70. (That was a portable PS/2 with an orange-colored gas plasma display. The box had a 386 running at 20 MHz and weighed about 20 pounds!)

    The keyboard had an extremely light feel to it, with tactile feedback; it took almost no effort to type and it NEVER, EVER missed a key I typed on it. I could absolutely fly on that keyboard and at the end of the day I had no fatigue at all!

    I've been looking over the past several years for a keyboard like it and have had absolutely NO luck. If any /.'ers out there remember this wondeful keyboard, and can suggest a comparable one, I'd be forever grateful!

  7. Re:Happy Hacking Keyboard by Euphonious+Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting
    Unfortunately, the Happy Hacking keyboard, despite its nice layout, is a membrane keyboard. For good feel, you need individual keyswitches, and when I asked PFU they said they would never offer a non-membrane version.

    The nicest keyboards I know of in that line are from Lexmark. Some laptops (e.g. Dell) have keyboards with a very nice feel, and some companies repackage laptop keyboards separately. However, Dell laptop keyboards (which seem have rubber-dome switches) are very, very unreliable.

  8. Nobody mentioned the DataHand? by Usquebaugh · · Score: 2, Interesting

    http://www.datahand.com/flashsite/home.html

    At $1300 I've never used one, but it sure looks pretty :-)