Reviews for Apple Keyboard with Numeric Keypad - English (USA)

I recently bought several Mac Pros for my lab which unfortunately came with this horrible keyboard. Yes, it does look great - but that is all. After just 2 days of typing on it, my finger joints started aching. After 5 days my entire hand and wrist became stiff, the pain turned unbearable and I had to stop typing on these keyboards. Switching back to a conventional keyboard alleviated the problem completely. In short: The keys on this keyboard are so hard, it is essentially like typing on a rock hard surface. Apple unfortunately has increasingly put Ergonomics by the wayside for the mediocre benefit of looks and design in recent years, and this is the culmination. Plain awful and - darn, it hurts. I wonder whether Apple has suicidal intentions with this - I foresee a flood of liability lawsuits from customers who develop arthritis or destroy their hands otherwise using an Apple keyboard. A company that sells technically high-end equipment should make Ergonomics a top priority. Instead, Apple sells displays that are not hight adjustable, and keyboards that are just plain joint destroyers. Shame on you, Steve!

I tried to be patient and get used to it. I had an under-the desk tray installed, and tried some more. Today was the first day I actually tried typing on it much... and my wrist started hurting a lot. If you have any question about your wrists, I'd say avoid this one!

I am not pleased with the fact that I have to purchase 10.5 for this keyboard to function properly. I am not one to purchase the latest technology. I enjoyed apple products because of their longevity. I should not have to spend $129.00 on a new operating system. When upgrades are made to hardware such as a keyboard, it would be nice if the F11 and F12 did not eject the cd player when they should be adjusting the volume of the audio.

I use MAC OS 10.3.9 and have no need to upgrade at this time. I guess this forces my hand...I have to spend $129.00....NOT GOOD Apple...NOT GOOD.

ANGRY CUSTOMER

The combination of short key travel and low resistance makes mistyping far too easy.

After using this newer board for just a few days, I decided to buy the old style wireless that Apple made prior to this cool looking new board. I found one from an Authorized reseller that stocked the old style. First, why everyone is so happy about this board's layout (or its wireless version) can only be related to its beauty. I'll give it that...it's a work of art. However, since I've typed for over 25 years, I can honestly say that if you know how to type fast and learned how to type on a traditional keyboard, you will be frustrated by this redesigned one. I suppose that if you want to look 'cool' then have the new board on display for guests to see. But if you really know how to type with both hands and need to type in a straightforward manner without necessarily having to adapt your fingering or typing skills (why would ANYONE do this?), I would suggest that you find yourself the older wireless version of the board that is still sold by some Apple resellers. If Apple really wanted to impress me, they would do what Texas Instruments has done with their new TI-Nspire calculators: Have interchangeable keyboards. Then, the beautiful board can be on display when you like, but allow real typists to switch to the older (more practical) keyboard.

Just got this for my Mac mini and after 2 days I swapped it out for a different keyboard. The keys are so close together it's difficult to use if you have big hands.

I want to preface this by stating I normally love all of apple's products, their great keyboards and mice especially. However this thing really put its form over function. I got this keyboard with high hopes but it is really terrible to use. It is in no way adjustable in any way. The keys are totally smooth top with no curve for your fingers, so I found myself sliding off the keys a lot while typing. I easily type 100wpm on a good keyboard and I found this one very hard to use without looking at it all the time to make sure my fingers were where they should be. There is very little travel on the keys themselves, you don't push down on a key, you just touch it and it types a letter. It's like using a bad laptop keyboard, I found myself hitting the keys and just getting a thud way too soon. I know many people like that, but those people that love full travel keys will hate this keyboard. The best apple keyboard in my opinion is the old black key pro keyboard they shipped with G4 Powermacs, I still use that to this day on all my macs after trying this new one out.

The lack of any adjustments, no curve on the keys for your fingers, and the small travel of the key mimicking a laptop keyboard are 3 issues that can't be overlooked if you do a lot of typing daily. Find yourself an old apple keyboard or go with a different brand.

I ordered one of these so I could have a full sized keyboard layout for use with 3D modeling software but when I received it, installed the required software update and tryed to use it my computer had a kernel panic and needed to be rebooted before doing anything else. Once rebooted the keyboard either wouldn't register keystrokes or would just act as though I were holding down a key until I unplugged the USB cable. Plugging the keyboard back in would then cause another kernel panic and reboot.

Apple Support walked me through clearing the battery cache and several other vague attempts before giving up and trying to ship me a new one. They claimed it was a hardware conflict and a new one would solve the problem. The problem with that is they don't know the Product Number as their internal numbering system doesn't match any numbers on the keyboard or packaging. Finally they gave up on a normal exchange and just ordered me a new one from the Apple Store.

I received the replacement the very next day and have the SAME EXACT ISSUES. There is apparently no way to get this keyboard to work with my year old Macbook Pro.

First of all, this keyboard looks and feels great. However, I will be returning it because it doesn't work with my Iogear KVM switch, which I need to use to access multiple computers. There are multiple posts about this in the support forum, and it seems the keyboard doesn't work with ANY KVM switch, so if that's a requirement, get a different keyboard.

Wish I hadn't bought it. 1 week old and already the caps lock is dodgy - and it's the only key that lights up. I can see lots of dirt getting into the keys - gaps too big. Spend more money on practicalities and less on making it shiny. When are you going to make an ergonomic keyboard? What about adding ambient light to the keys? Oh, one other thing, you have to download the keyboard software to make the function keys work and if you have a powerbook like me the volume keys etc.. don't work any more. Great