Amazon Has The Best Low-Cost Keyboard In A While

[synaptix]

Terrible keyboard. Absolutely terrible. Would not buy even if they paid me to.

[allquixotic]

Why, oh why, do mfr's still include a numpad? For a non-gamer it's pretty useless and just takes up desktop space and pushes the mouse farther to the right. Any good USB keyboards out there *with* the arrow and home|end|pgup|pgdn islands but *without* the numpad section?

Not particularly cheap, but the ThinkPad USB Keyboard with Trackpoint is a wired keyboard with the tactile feel of, and key layout of, a Lenovo ThinkPad, with a design from approximately the era of the X61 / T61, if that means anything to you (it is notably NOT anything like the currently awful keyboards on the T530, etc).

[belal1]

I have this keyboard

I have this keyboard though it's not from Amazon. It came with one of my Gateway Computers which I purchased from Costco. I can tell you from experience that this keyboard may not be the best keyboard for gamers, but it is definitely a nice and soft keyboard. Infact, I wouldn't mind replacing one of my other PCs logitech keyboard with this AmazonBasics' one.


-belal1

[uid313]

Also, I don't know what specific professional use you mean; probably this ones aren't suitable for professional typing, but I use common keyboards for programming and they never got in my way. I can see the benefit, after reading a bit about them, but ultimately it doesn't seem as a "must" to me.

If you work professionally as a programmer, then at home you sit in front of the computer too.
Then you might be using your computer for over 12 hours a day.
Then you should definitely consider getting a real keyboard.

Code all day, everyday, year in, year out. Millions, maybe billions of keystrokes.
You should get a real keyboard.

[uid313]

Many of these cheaper keyboards use robber dome technology and feels mushy to type on, compared to keyboard with mechanical switches.

Non-geeks do fine with these cheap keyboards, they just watch kittens on teh interwebs and write "omg lol wtf bbq".
But for geeks like programmers who write millions of lines of code, you should get a real keyboard.

[t.s.]

Many of these cheaper keyboards use robber dome technology and feels mushy to type on, compared to keyboard with mechanical switches.

Non-geeks do fine with these cheap keyboards, they just watch kittens on teh interwebs and write "omg lol wtf bbq".
But for geeks like programmers who write millions of lines of code, you should get a real keyboard.

I do programming with cheap keyboards, and I'm not so troubled with it.

[Kivada]

Meh, would rather have a Tux key https://zareason.com/shop/Lighted-Tux-Keyboard.html

[uid313]

I do programming with cheap keyboards, and I'm not so troubled with it.

Sure you can do programming on cheap keyboards too.
But if you spend a lot of time programming, you really ought to get a decent keyboard (and chair, and desk).

[araxth]

I got my Genius SlimStar 120 with less than 10 Euro (that would mean roughly about 10 or 12 USD) in Bucharest and i am totally happy with it. It works out of the box with my OpenSUSE 12.2 and, after checking the website it appears that Genius is maintaining a linux branch of drivers for their equipment too (i didnt check throughly the ammount of support they offer but at least Linux is part of the dropdown list in their searching filters. If amazon provides specific support for Linux too I would suggest they worth a try in the end.

[DanLamb]

I agree. I use Amazon Basic keyboards and mice. They are a great combination of simple, nice, and cheap. I also like Amazon Basics for USB ports and cables.