New Keyboard! Logitech S530

Dria and I have been griping about our keyboards lately. Call me a sucker, but I’ve been suffering with the Apple Keyboards for awhile now, often to the detriment of my typing/spelling. As nice as they are to look at (when new) and compact for a full-size keyboard, they have a fairly awful typing feel to them. Worse, the bluetooth version which I’ve been using has an annoying habit of dropping keystrokes, usually when typing fast, or for the first time after a pause. This has the natural effect of Slowing Me Down.

So we did some shopping. I’m loathe to use a Windows keyboard on my Mac, despite there being better options for them readily-available. My PC’s BenQ keyboard, which I bought for the low-low price of 20 bucks has a fantastic, short-throw key-feel to it. Unfortunately, it’s got a cable and no eject button and the alt and command (or in this case WINDOWS) keys are in the wrong places. Still, I considered it and I think that’s what dria ended-up using for the short-term. She’s on a different quest.

Enter the Logitech S530! It’s slimmer than the Apple keyboards but this is offset by the extra depth and width for the largely superfluous application keys on the sides. Keyfeel so far is what I would term decent; probably somewhere between the clicky goodness of the BenQ and squishy imprecision of the Apple ‘boards. They have a shorter throw though and I think overall, it’ll feel pretty good. I haven’t used the mouse yet, and doubt I will, preferring to stick with my Logitech MX1000. My Apple BT Mighty Mouse is for travel.

But why not Bluetooth? This is yet another product that Logitech is shipping that requires a dongle. I find this especially weird as this is targeted at Mac users who probably have the largest uptake of bluetooth technology in personal computering – though not for long. It’s especially weird considering the diNovo keyboards which are available in bluetooth (and look pretty awesome to boot).

Some final first thoughts: they pageup/down, home/end and delete keys are arranged a little oddly but save a bit of width (which, was then used up by the media/app keys on the edge). Since I’m using a Logitech mouse already, I had the latest version of Logitech’s Control Center installed so all the media buttons worked as soon as I plugged it in. Unfortunately, when I went in to remap the “cruise” buttons on the left, the app crashed as it often does when making changes. It’s ridiculously fragile software. The “Home” button opened Safari for me, ignoring my preferences to use Firefox. Hitting the Help button on the Logitech Control Center panel brought up their help page … in Safari. The metallic trim on the palm rest area is probably going to disintegrate after some use.

Typing this has been fun. It’s an improvement.

(I also got a new chair)

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