After a couple of rather painful decision-making processes, I ended up with the conclusion that I’ll get myself a Mac Mini this autumn. The event will happen in about a month, and I already have some of the money I need.
Why I ended up going for the Mac Mini instead of a MacBook is another story (price was not a factor in this case). Why I hate being a geek right now is this post’s subject.
I’ve had a lot of keyboards over the years. Actually, I kind of destroy keyboards, mainly because I hate using my mouse too much, not to mention being into both writing and programming. My first keyboard managed to take about two or three years of abuse. It was a regular, China-made, nameless keyboard which I still have because it essentially works, save for the left Ctrl (emacs biatch here) and the backspace key. It was replaced by a monster-sized keyboard which waked all my neighbors when I used it — but surprisingly enough, it still works, after about three years of abuse from myself and four other years of abuse from my father.
Right now, I’m typing from a black Logitech keyboard with a bunch of multimedia keys I don’t use (I’m just too lazy to make them work with X11). It (still!) works without any signs of significant damage, and I think it’s about the best keyboard I had, but the keys are a bit too strong and it makes noise. So the geek in me decided to change it.
Okay, so the problem is that I don’t know what to change it with. I realize most people don’t care about their keyboards, but hell, I do.
So the best bet is Apple’s keyboard, right? Not exactly. For one thing, I absolutely love the aluminum, flat look. The problem is: I don’t want a wireless keyboard (I’ve been through the wonderful event of my keyboard’s batteries failing at 3 AM with no batteries in the house and a deadline in the morning) — but I like the wireless version’s form factor. Unfortunately, as far as I can see, Apple isn’t offering a wired keyboard with the wireless one’s form factor.
On the other hand, I want an Apple keyboard — that is, one without the annoying Windows logo and one that has precisely seven special keys on the bottom row — the space bar and the pairs of Control, Option and Command. So I don’t want even something as cool as the Plycon keyboard.
To make the matter even more annoying, I like the feeling of the old Apple keyboard — the TactilePro if I remember correctly — the only thing I wish for it was a smaller for factor. I rarely use my keypad anyway.
There are a couple of alternative Apple keyboard — but none of them ship to Romania, and I doubt I’d trust the Romanian postal services anyhow.
So I guess I have about one month to decide what the heck I’ll be using to type things on my new Mac Mini. Sometimes I just hate the geek inside me 
.
Martin Dirichs a zis,
septembrie 27, 2007 la 7:50 am
Hi Alexandrulz,
you might want to check the Enermax Aurora keyboard:
http://www.enermax.com/english/product_peripherals_detail.asp?PrID=48
It’s a flat aluminum keyboard, it’s not wireless, it has no special
keys, there are only seven meta keys in the bottom row, it won’t wake
your neighbours – and it’s cool. I mean that literally, since it’s built
from solid aluminum and metal always feels cold on skin. The keys are
traditional plastic, though.
I bought it recently for myself and I am quite satisfied with it. My
keyboard wish list looked pretty much the same as yours, plus I wanted
to have a flat keyboard as I have been accustomed to notebook keyboards.
Regards,
Martin.
alexandrulz a zis,
septembrie 27, 2007 la 10:40 am
Thanks for the suggestion
but my issue with the seven keys is another one.
Apple’s keyboards look somewhat like this: http://www.iskin.com/images/xt_images/apple-keyboard.jpg . It’s seven keys including the space bar (i.e. not “text options” or however that extra key between the Ctrl and Windows key on the right side of the keyboard is called). For a few years, I didn’t even know what that key does, and right now it doesn’t do anything on my keyboard either, it just stays there and eats space.
Of course, aesthetics is not such a huge issue (hell, I use Unix after all…) and if I won’t find a good alternative, I’ll probably stick for a regular wired USB keyboard, maybe even the Enermax Aurora, which looks wonderful from the specs.
cigarettes a zis,
septembrie 27, 2007 la 3:03 pm
Very nice this blog =)
Toma Alex a zis,
octombrie 12, 2007 la 5:28 pm
Good evening.
I also live in Romania and i had a rough time finding a Mac Mini too.In the end i made a order on Apple IMC Romania http://store.apple.ro.
.
Good luck with your little Mac
alexandrulz a zis,
octombrie 12, 2007 la 5:55 pm
Hi Alex,
I’ll use the Apple store as well. They even have free delivery, w00t
.
voibraovadway a zis,
noiembrie 30, 2007 la 10:07 pm
Every day, thousands of people are turned down for finance because they have past debt settlement or no credit history.
Idetrorce a zis,
decembrie 15, 2007 la 10:51 am
very interesting, but I don’t agree with you
Idetrorce
Dan Demetriad a zis,
martie 20, 2008 la 10:36 pm
Hi,
unde ai gasit fonturi romanesti???
Ma intereseaza sa gasesc un keyboard pentru apple computers cu caractere romanesti si citeva fonturi tot pentru apple.
Multumesc anticipat.
Dan
alexandrulz a zis,
martie 22, 2008 la 12:45 pm
OS X vine cu fonturi româneşti. Nu sunt, din câte ştiu, fonturi care să respecte standardele ASRO, în sensul că sedila de sub ş şi ț nu arată cum trebuie, dar asta e o problemă împărtăşită pe toate sistemele de operare, şi nederanjantă dacă nu lucrezi în domeniul media (i.e. nu faci afişe sau bannere). În cazul ăstora, treaba se rezolvă uşor, caracterele respective există în setul Unicode, dar nu sunt mapate cele corecte. Un keyboard mapper serios, gen Ukulele, poate aranja asta.
Există tastaturi Apple româneşti, adică daptate secial pentru layout-ul RO, cu caractere româneşti în dreapta, unde se află tastele [, ], ; ,’ ,/ ş.a.m.d, şi le poția lua de la iStyle sau de la Noumax. Mie unuia mi se par foarte incomode, dar asta pentru că mă ocup cu programarea şi, implicit, 80% din timp nu am nevoie de diacritice.
Alex
Dan Demetriad a zis,
aprilie 15, 2008 la 8:10 pm
multumesc cu intirziere.
dan
alexandrulz a zis,
aprilie 15, 2008 la 8:13 pm
Cu multă plăcere
YiLhpXKVcoj a zis,
decembrie 3, 2008 la 8:33 am
4_2forpost.txt;10;15