My old laptop is starting to crap out (I get the BSOD on a regular basis now) and the new Logos 4 is a resource hog, so now is a good time for me to buy a new laptop.
The problem is that all laptops in Canada seem to come with these new international/bilingual/multilingual keyboards. As a touch typist, I'm used to a standard US-English keyboard layout, but the stores in Canada are filled with laptops that have the bilingual keyboards with the funny shaped ENTER key that's too far to the right, and the tiny LEFT SHIFT key that's too far to the left.
I've tried these keyboards on my friends' laptops, as well as on in-store demo models, and they are a real pain in the ass to type on. I'm forever missing the left shift key and hitting the key to the right of it by mistake, and the enter key is almost impossible to hit correctly without looking down at it.
Aside from the usual compromises made on laptop keyboards due to lack of space, there are other quirks related to the need for extra keys (mostly for accented vowels). Often they'll shift punctuation marks to a different place on the keyboard, meaning you have to hunt and peck to find them.
The thing is, I don't understand why computer companies feel the need to send laptops with these crappy keyboards to English Canada. Are they just trying to save costs by shipping the same type of keyboards to all of Canada, instead of sending separate keyboards to Quebec and the rest of Canada? Is this the result of some new law by the language police in Quebec?
Whatever the reason, it appears to have been a recent development. Last year, I can remember visiting Future Shop or Best Buy and finding plenty of laptops with the regular US keyboards. Now I can't find any.
Looks like I'll be making a trip across the border for a new laptop.
2 comments:
I very much doubt your comment about not finding a US-English keyboard a your local store, because they're everywhere. Even here, in Québec, I had to search long and hard to find a retailer had anything else, let alone the very keyboard about which you lament.
Incidentally, I, too, am a touch typist, and the invention of the Canadian multilingual keyboard was a blessing to me. It is the first one that allows me to work efficiently. Your complaints cannot be a matter of age (as in old dog / new tricks), because I am pushing 60, and I adapted in a single day. I suspect yours is more a matter of being unwilling to change old habits.
No, I'd agree with the orignal post. Go to a Best Buy or Future Shop and any consumer laptop comes with the bilingual keyboard layout. You have to get a MacBook, a business-class HP (like an HP ProBook), or some Asus laptops if you want to get a laptop with a US-style keyboard.
The bilingual keyboard certainly makes it easier to enter French-related characters. But I see no reason why the keyboard type's not an option. I too always screw up on the shift keys, etc. It's a horrible layout. There's a variation of the US keyboard called the International version that does much the same thig as the bilingual keyboard, but with the benefit of keeping the nice long Shift and Enter keys most of look for here.
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