Unicomp Keyboards

[StuKeith]

Ive just ordered my 3rd one of these!

Natrual 4000

great keyboards, and I use all the buttons. I'm on the 3rd as they don't seem to stand up to kids pouring drinks over them too well! Very comfortable and nice to use.

I'm using an old usb acer one atm, and i find it hard to type as the keys are close together and I find im getting cramp again!

I can however type well on my laptop???

[Stephen Coates]

Hmmm. I'm glad you like the keyboard then. There's no way I could be getting on with having the keys in those awkward positions and having all the extra function keys at the top. I would find that rather annoying.

[Harrison]

Because of design packages I have to use a traditional shaped keyboard, instead of a curved one. And also they are no good for gaming. For design packages such as everything from Adobe I mostly use keyboard shortcuts for everything instead of the mouse. It speeds things up 100 fold, but with this split of curved designs it wouldn't work.

[Stephen Coates]

Why wouldn't a curved keyboard work for the shortcuts? Would it just be awkward to find the right key to press?

Does anyone know if if keyboard shortcuts are quite popular amongst people that are new to using computers? I have noticed that things seem to be more graphical all the time, and some of the beginers books that I have looked at havn't said much about keyboard shortcuts. I wondered because my grandparents recently got a computer, and we were sorting through some photographs that someone had given them on a CD. I copied them onto the HD, nd then we were deleting the ones they didn't want using IrfanView, and they seemed to find it easier using the left and right arrow keys to move between photos, the delete key to delete the photo and the return key to confirm the delete. Seemed a bit easier than moving the mouse between the toolbar buttons.

[Harrison]

Keyboard short cuts tend to be used my by advanced users. But when I ever show anyone a keyboard shortcut they instantly think how useful it is and then continue using it themselves.

As for shortcuts for something like Photoshop, the reason is because you use a lot of key combinations for many shortcuts. Such as using the Alt, Ctrl and Shift keys in combination with letters or numbers. And normally it is faster because you leave one hand hovering over the left-hand corner of the keyboard, and the other on the mouse. Those split keyboards would be annoying too because the 1-0 keys are used for opacity shortcuts.

[Stephen Coates]

Why is it that some keyboards, have keys such as Shift, control and return, all in a brown colour, rather than beige, which the rest of the keys are? Is this to make them easier to see? I have noticed that alot of newer keyboard that are black or grey or silver, don't have these keys in a different colour.

[Harrison]

Umm... keyboards haven't had different colours for many years Steve! You are definitely living in a parallel retro world somewhere it seems. I do however remember that in the 80's and early 90's a lot of PC keyboard did have different colours keys, as did the lovely coloured Amstrad CPC range.

Not really sure of the real point other than to distinguish the keys from the rest.