Dell's Vostro 1310 keyboard putting the hurt on UK touch typists?
By Thomas Ricker 
posted May 1st 2008 5:30AM
posted May 1st 2008 5:30AM
Update: Jake's been on the horn with Dell who confirms the issue exists on all 1310s (and possibly others) in the UK. We'll update you again once Dell sorts out a fix.
Update 2: Dell issued us a statement regarding the keyboard screwiness: "A limited number of Dell Vostro 1310 and 1510 laptops in Europe have been sent out with the wrong keyboard layout. We are working diligently to offer a solution to impacted customers and correct the error before any additional units are shipped. We will be contacting impacted customers directly to both apologize and instruct them on next steps. This issue is under investigation, and we will come back with more detailed information as soon as possible. We thank you and your readers' for their comments - we agree that a mistake has been made and we will be acting as quickly as possible to find a satisfactory solution for our customers." Guess that's that!
[US model image courtesy of NotebookReview]
US layout
UK layout
Wow, that looks completely unusable. I'd be pretty mad at Dell for foisting that on me, especially when they could cut down the size of that massive Enter key and move the backslash there where it's supposed to be.
Fortunately, Dell has a 30-day return policy for its Vostro line.
Dude, all UK keyboards have that Return key layout.
That's got nothing to do with the "massive" Enter key, which is fine where it is - and as comfortable as it is.
Dell laptops have always had a "standard" (i.e. Z under A) layout, and there is simply no reason why they should change it with this model; in fact, it must be some kind of gross mistake they have made.
The Enter key on UK keyboards is my biggest gripe. After 7.5 years, I still enter a hash then return a lot as my little finger tries to hit it (keyboards in NZ have a similar layout to US keyboards, where I'm from).#
Who the fu
doesn't europe use the "ASERTY" keyboard format instead of "QWERTY"?
@hansning
Wake up dude...
hansning...there's a lot of different countries with different languages in Europe...
In the UK the layout is also QWERTY, with differences mostly in the symbols you get when you shift the number keys.
I've never once encountered a UK keyboard that had a shifted Z row though, and I spent a fair bit of time using various keyboards at hospitals, a hostel, and internet cafes over a period of a few months.
I will say that it drove me nearly insane with the symbols though...the keyboards were so similar you'd usually forget that you have to hit different keys for the symbols.
Recieved mine yesterday, and its a pain to type on.
Touch typing is a no no. Have to watch where I type on the keyboard to see where the key's are.
Apart from that it is a nice machine.
Return it.
that's what she said.
i can beleive u said that
carbonrain
a year late are we :P
It's not because it's late it's because it makes no sense whatsoever
That is flippin the dumbest idea ever! That has to be a mistake!
The Dell website appears to use the images from the US version (there's no \ key to the left of Z) on the UK site. You'd actually have little or no idea of the problem form the website.
And woah! That is quite an offset indeed! Sure, we have the \ key here on the UK to the left of Z, but it doesn't offset the rest of the keyboard. That's crazy, I'd die with a layout like that! Forever typing words wrong, like vo,e, nook, biew, emgadget...
Buy cheap.... get cheap...
obviously what happens when staff are being laid off... was probably designed by an intern who thought he did a fantastic job of saving money.
you sir are ignorant.
a laptop is by far nowhere a cheap purchase.
and even if the price is cheaper than other laptops it doesnt mean that as a consumer they are entitled to crap and horrid designs. nor does it mean they have no right to protest about it.
how does it feel to type from your 24kart gold lined keyboard? like a snob? yeah, that is what i thought.
Dells layoffs have all been in the Customer care, Sales and Production departments. No cuts in design yet. FYI, there is a huge market for 13-14 inchers with XP factory installed, and as such, this will probably be a very hot seller for the next 6-8 months.
Ne problem is that the right shift key is smaller allowing for a total of 13 keys in this row instead of the standard 12. There is an extra key not a missing key
The Problem is that the Shift Key on the left is oversized which causes the bottom row to be shifted along other tha that it is a standard UK keyboard layout
Thats how my keyboard is, and how my UK keyboards have always been. It's never been a problem
My Flickr photo with notes shows the problem best:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/jacobgordon/2455618195/
I'm utterly, utterly furious about this.
Huh? Every UK keyboard I've ever owned has always had the Z under and to the right of the A where it belongs. Also my Dell Vostro 1500 keyboard has the Z under the A too. Putting it under the S means touch typing is impossible.
You're obviously not a touch typist.
Huh... well they must teach touch typing differently in the UK than they do in the US because that lower keyboard picture would not work for me.
happypenguin: That's kind of the point...
The UK layout as shown above is not unusual at all. I have a similar keyboard configuation for my UK 15" HP Pavilion laptop where the back slash is adjacent to the "z" key.
I agree that the UK Dell website is incorrect in showing a US laptop but in fairness to Dell they cannot be expected to get every product photo from every region correct.
Guys - you are missing the point. The problem is not the "\" key next to the "z". The problem is that the letters on the bottom row have shifted relative to the row above. "Z" longer between "A" and "S", it is now between "S" and "D".
This keyboard would be unusable to anyone who touch types.
The 'oversized' return is normal in the UK and, as pointed out by technophobe, the only difference is that the left shift key is abnormally large!
Did you even look at the pictures?
The keyboard layout on the bottomw row is one too far to the right.
The Z should sit between the A and S, the \ key goes to the left of that. UK keyboards have a smaller Shift key.
Yeah, i did, hence the comment about the abnormally large shift key? Usually it's a little smaller so that the backslash key can fit to the left of the 'z' key without shifting the keys along.
Still not as bad trying to use Windows on a UK MacBook Pro.
No Insert Key
No Delete Key
No Hash key (#)
No direct Home,End,Page Up/Page Down keys (have to use Fn+ arrow keys)
@ key in the wrong place.
Backslash key is in the wrong place.
The Fn key is the wrong place. (where the ctrl key should be)
An Enter key that's s small it may as well not be there.
aaaaah... but it looks nice and it glows in the dark.....woopee ;-)
Windows functionality must be the FIRST thing Apple look at when designing MBPs.
try http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1220
may or may not help.. some keys are just not available on apple laptop keyboards, plain and simple... ymmv
Did you actually look at the picture? This would be far worse actually.
This is what a standard UK keyboard should look like:
http://www.bsjp.co.uk/ict/keyboard1.jpg
As you can see, the only difference between it and Jake's Vostro is that they have made the left "shift" button larger, and shrunk the right "shift" button, thus moving the "zxcvbnm" keys one step to the right. Why they would do this is an absolute mystery.
That looks kind of like the layout on my Japanese laptop. Out of curiosity- In the Japanese keyboard the apostrophe and quote marks require Shift to get to because Japanese doesn't normally use those. Why does the UK layout do this?
UK users who see no problem here seem to be missing the point.
Yes, the backslash key will typically be tucked in between the shift key and the "z" on a UK keyboard, but not in such a way as to shift the entire row to the right. EG, YHN should form a "backslash diagonal", not YHB, as on this misconceived layout.
--
Chris
The Z key should be under the A key. End of story.
For some time now the extra Euro-key has been troubling keyboards on the right side of the pond.
I'd like to know which Euro-tard insisted that there by a symbol key between the left-Shift and the Z key. No one asked us! What's wrong with a larger shift key?
But what Dell has done is uses a US keyboard layout, but Euro-ized it by inserting a pointless symbol key. In the process the dork has shifted an entire row of keys to the right!
Reject it and buy a Macbook man.
My Acer cleverly uses the blank space around the up arrow for the Euro key, but they still managed to shift the Z along half a key too far, still not as extreme as this example.
Why would a faulty keyboard on one model make someone buy an entirely different OS?
How about "reject it and buy a different Dell," or "reject it and buy an Acer" or "reject it and buy any other laptop."
Why do Apple fans always jump to "Buy Apple! Buy Apple! Be like me! Think like me!" Every company has their fanatics, but Apple seems to be more.
You guys are the scientologists of computer nerds, always trying to convert people to your wacky ways. "We're all different in the same way, be like us!"
Wow, and I thought that the UK keyboard on my MacBook Pro was annoying (the mac has `,#, and \ swapped around compared to a standard PC/UNIX Kbd, and they swap " and @)
That is utterly insane though... Who on earth thought that was a good idea...
My UK Acer is the same. I think the shift on the UK picture is actually smaller, the difference is the extra key which most UK laptops have.
I am a touch typer, but I cant use the z on a keyboard properly, always had problems with it, and with the layout they have now the z is really hard to use. Luckily I rarely use it.
It's not just the Z, the whole row is shifted. That would be a nightmare to type on.
I just saw the flickr pic, and what Dell have done is stupid. I would demand my money back.
Yuck.
Must be a slow news day. That's a standard laptop layout for UK and has been for many manufactuers.
> That's a standard laptop layout for UK and has been for many manufactuers.
OK - send one photo of an existing UK keyboard that has this layout then (with the bottom row of letters shifted over).
> Must be a slow news day.
There *is* something slow around here today that's for sure.
I suppose I wouldn't be the slightest bit bothered anyway, since the first thing I'd do is rearrange it into Dvorak like it should have been in the first place!
I'm still learning and so not really any faster than I wan on qwerty but touch typing is soooo much more comfortable, it just makes so much sense this way around :)
(Anyone annoyed by this who has one and wants to keep qwerty, pop the keys off and rearrange it yourself!)
The problem is that the left shit button is too long, that cant be rearanged!
Yeah, buy a broken product, fix it and loose your waranty for doing so. :/
I use the Dvorak layout too, but those of you who are saying this Vostro 1310 layout wouldn't bother you because you use Dvorak are wrong. You couldn't use the custom Dvorak layout in Windows because that maps X to Q, but on this keyboard you would have to map Z to Q instead because the Z is located where the X would usually be.
I think the normal differences between North American and European keyboards are confusing people here. I have blogged about that at http://bitguru.wordpress.com/2008/05/23/ansi-vs-iso-keyboards/
Thatcher's Britain!
hmm, UK users are deprived of a fingerprint reader as well?
Touchtypists complaining about European notebook keyboards??? As being screwed????? What the guys are smoking?????
To the point. None of the notebooks sold in Europe are suitable for touchtyping - thanks to traditional 150-200yo (depending on country) keyboard layout.
Most touchtypists I know here go thru hurdle of importing keyboards from US - because US ANSI layout is least braindamaging and you can easily convert it to Dvorak (which is also popular). (And importing is hurdle: you can't to order US keyboard from EU.)
EU keyboards and especially notebook keyboards here is pretty much heap of useless junk - literally none of them are suited for any prolonged work, least for touchtypying.
Check them out here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keyboard_layout - and this are still OK - this are NOT notebook layouts. But screw a bit an Enter key, then make Shifts shorter, then make Win key bigger, add another useless Enter key somewhere in the middle, add NumLock somewhere along with now shorter Space key, add some multimedia keys where they are easy to hit by mistake...
Well you get the idea. EU notebook keyboards never were and never will be suitable for touchtyping. I simply can't understand the people complaining.
Man, you're thick. This is not about typing 200 words a minute. It's about finding the "Z" where you expect it to be. Have a look at the link you posted.: *every* QWERTY layout *always* has a Z under the A, and *never* a symbol.
Man.. and I thought keyboards that put the backslash between the backspace and = key are bad... every time u backspace to correct a mistake u end up typing something like tihs\\\his...
Why is the enter key so large in the first place?
In the UK the return button is ALWAYS this shape, clue up. The issue here is that manufacturers aside from Dell STILL have the Z key underneath the A and S keys, rather than under S and D.
Yea I know the return/enter key is large.. but why? What's so special about the enter key that it needs twice the height? I have a feeling this has something to do with typewriters...
If you look at the keyboard, they did actually shrink one of the shift keys to make space... the right shift key. Maybe they originally meant to put the |\ key on the right hand side with /?, but screwed up somewhere.
You cant even order them with a US keyboard in the UK which really annoys people I know who are over there on their working OE and have to order spares from dell via NZ or aussie and get someone here to ship them over and swap the keyboard themselves if they buy one there.
And yeah, the pics on their site make no mention that you wont get the internationally normal US keyboard layout if you order in the UK.
My UK laptop board has the same larger shift key on the left (which I *never* use, I got the one on the right thank you), but the backslash is on the row below, next to the Spacebar.
The Z should always be below the A and S, below the S and D is just stupid. Maybe reprogram the keys if you can as when you're touchtyping you don't need the pretty letters.
But why would Dell f*** with the layout like this? Surely the ran some kind of Q&A on this?
I agree with you, why would you even considering changing a keyboard layout? its why we still use qwerty and there is different layouts in different countries.
There are standard layouts that people are happy and comfortable with - so don't change it!
This is as much a pain as the ridiciously small enter key found on European Macbooks--which you can not get with the normal US layout in Europe either... What's wrong with these companies? Give us a normal qwerty layout, with normal sized enter keys!
This is one of the reasons I didn't replace my old laptop with a new one, but built a desktop PC--the keyboards are just too wrong to be usable. (Typeing this on an Evoluent keyboard btw, which types like a laptop keyboard and is just 7mm thick.)
Definately a dodgy move by Dell...but surely an option would be to remap the keys in whatever OS you're in? If you can touch-type, it doesn't matter whether the keycaps themselves are correct, but if you're pedantic, surely even those could be switched too?
I can't believe people are missing the point. All 7 letters of the bottom row are in incorrect places. Let me spell it out for you:
Z is where X should be
X is where C should be
C is where V should be
V is where B should be
B is where N should be
N is where M should be
M is where comma should be
So, a touch typist who tries to enter "My keyboard is broken" will end up entering "Ny keyvoard is vrokeb".
This puts the odd position of the right shift and up cursor keys on the Eee PC into perspective. On the Eee it is only occasionally annoying and I've found it easy to train myself out of hitting up instead of shift by pressing further to the right on all keyboards I use. This, on the other hand, is so incredibly wrong that, if there were an alternative dimension where this were right, IT WOULD STILL BE WRONG. That's how wrong it is.
Somebody should email BBC Watchdog about this, and avoid typing VVX Watxhdog while they're at it.
I know how to free up some space - lose the stupid caps-lock key!
only OLD people use it when they can't handle correct capitalization - then everybody thinks they're YELLING
I only hit it by mistake, never intentionally
Actually, capslock can be really handy when you're touch-typing and there are a lot of acronyms to enter. If I want to write about MALDI mass spectrometry putting my pinkies on shift gets old fast.
Looks like people will be eBaying US keyboards for that model.
Even that wouldn't help, because the differences between the US and UK layouts would be hard for them to get used to.
DELLOL
That's nothing, you should see the crappy Toshiba keyboards in Canada. I think they tried to save a few dollars by release English machines with french keyboad options.
I bought three of them for registration machines at an IT/Technology Career Fair (so only technology people used them). It has been a nightmare... 50% of the people complain about them and the other 50% you can see had troubles. I tell them to hate Toshiba, as I asssumed they'd have a good keyboard. Everything is screwy, the key layout, special character key modes, characters hidden... hell even the "@" sign stops working after a while.
I wish I could replace the keyboards with something better.
It looks like a lot of people missed the problem because of a bad/misleading explanation from engadget.
Yeah, I was confused. I actually didn't know the UK layout was so different from the US one (you learn something new every day, I guess), so I couldn't figure out why in hell the blackslash button was on the bottom row. I also didn't understand why they called the left shift key "huge", since it was the same size as the US one. It all makes sense after seeing a standard UK layout.
Anyway, Dell better send out proper keyboards or something, because this is ridiculous. I hate when (comparatively) little things like the insert/delete/home/end/page up/page down keys are messed with, but changing the positions of letter keys? Dell has lost it.
I just got a UK vostro 1310 today, and i've got to say its a pretty awesome laptop, but, this keyboard thing is really annoying, I assume/hope/will have to get used to it I suppose.
Right, to whoever it was that said that European keyboards are useless for touch typing, well, we think the same about US keyboards, especially as they don't tend to have enough letters, as the English alphabet stops at Z while many European languages have extra letters which need extra keys. Besides, the large enter key is much better than the puny thing on US keyboards.
With regards to odd keyboard layouts, living in Taiwan is quite interesting, as I've found that just about every keyboard manufacturer here has a slightly different design, there's the standard US one with Chinese characters, but also about 3 or 4 local versions with random keys moved to various locations on the keyboards, not fun at all and very confusing.
It's just not possible to stick to one keyboard standard, but in this case, Dell really screwed up big times, as that keyboard is pretty much unusable, even for someone that isn't a touch typist, you just need to have be used to a normal keyboard layout and you'll end up doing loads of typing errors with that keyboard.
Life could be worse. You could be using a french keyboard. The french have to hold shift and press the key to get a full stop (period for you yanks). Now - that seems crazy.
Has anyone actually tried contacting Dell to see if it is an error or purposely done?
Or are people too busy freaking out because it's Dell?
Meh. Give it a week. Dell keyboards are so easy to replace that they may very well start shipping them out to people who complain. That and a redesign would take all of 5 minutes since many models use the same keyboard. *shrugs* Let the stink begin...it will over almost before it starts.
Dude, you bought a DULL. What did you expect?
A usable computer at a decent price?
This is so stupid of Dell, and people that were misled by the UK site, should return them.
Just an idea: how about removing the "\"key, moving all the keys from Z to M and the next 3 ones (, . /) one slot to the left, and inserting the "\" next to the right shift? Then all that is needed is a remapping of the keyboard. IF I had no return option, I would do that. I am sure Dell will offer this as a solution. (either DIY or service)
This is a nightmare for touch typists.
However, I have to ask: WHY is your \ key on the bottom row, UK? That plus the big Return key look to be the only major differences from US layout (aside from replacing a few shifted symbols).
Is there a purpose to having the key in a different place than standard QWERTY layouts? Is there a benefit to having the extra-large Return key?
I recall my old ROYAL Typewriter having the same size return carriage key, but why would that carry over to computers for the UK?
I have in front of me (and under my fingers) a North American keyboard. Next to my left elbow I have a UK Compaq (OK, it's a couple of years old!) keyboard. Behind me I have a UK Hi-Grade keyboard.
As the people with IQs above 80 have pointed out, the issue is the bottom row layout. My UK keyboards have a double-height Enter key so the \ key has been displaced. It's been moved to between left-shift and Z.
BUT BUT BUT... on a proper UK keyboard this is done by shrinking the left-shift key. I can't imagine how stupid someone must have been to decide to move the entire bottom row across.
My assumption is that this is a funny Photoshop job. Nobody's that stupid.
Oh I wish this were true!!! I truly do. Unfortunately though, yes, they are this stupid.
There is absolutely no way I could type on that keyboard. I feel for them, I really do!
Woah! What the hell were they thinking, messing with QWERTY? So wrong.
Anyways, while this certainly sucks for people who bought this in the UK, a decent typist will probably get used to it in a couple of weeks.
Every laptop I've ever used has had the UK keyboard style. How on Earth is that configuration a bad thing?
What's much much more amusing than the layout is the number of people that can't actually see a problem.
There ought to be a line drawn below which you aren't considered intelligent enough to own a computer.
...I think we may have found that line
Why are we still using QWERTY keyboards? These keyboards were design to slow down typest because early typewriters can't handle fast typing.
For me, it's a bit of both. The applications in my area of interest are much better on the Mac than on either Windows or Linux.
It's also the consistent and polished user interface. You are mistaken that Linux can "clone" the MacOS experience. Sure, you could put a MacOS "skin" on it to make it look similar, but it would not work similarly at all. Again, it's the consistency. There are also some very different UI paradigms - for example the "single menubar" approach that applies across the OS and applications, rather than the "menu in windows" approach employed in Linux and Windows.
This level of consistency is really where Windows and Linux fail. The applications and OS form a seamless whole. Generally, applications written for the Mac adhere much more closely to design and interface principles. While on the other platforms, interface conventions differ wildly between different applications, and between the applications and the OS.
Sure, there are "non-standard" and "renegade" Mac applications - but they tend to be much rarer and less egregious than on the other platforms. And they usually don't get popular among the community of users, who expects applications to work in consistently "mac-like" manner.
it's strange hearing non-Mac users talk about "look and feel" because you tend to talk about things like "eye candy" or "toys" when you speak of interface design. For me (and most experienced Mac users, our enjoyment of the system has almost nothing to do with these things. "Design" and "user interface" are all about usability and functionality - not superficial appearance. This is a mistake made by many companies, who think that competing with Apple is just about changing "style" or being fashionable, or slapping on some pretty widgets. They totally miss the point.
Check out the original "Apple Human Interface Guidelines" sometime. They are a seminal work of computer interface engineering and design. They really put a lot of thought into how the user interacts - which is an afterthought for most people and companies.
Hi Thomas / All - Following up with an update from Dell as we start to contact customers to offer replacement keyboards today.
For some Vostro 1310 and 1510 customers in Europe, we shipped keyboards with a non-standard layout. We apologize the error and for the inconvenience to affected customers. We are contacting all those customers and offering them a replacement keyboard at no cost.
Further details, pictures of the replacement keyboard and Dell email addresses for those who do not want to wait to be contacted, can be found on our Direct2Dell Small Business blog. http://direct2dell.com/smallbusiness/archive/2008/05/08/europe-vostro-keyboard-issue-what-we-re-doing.aspx
Thomas and Engadget: Time for another update.
Here's what we're going to do for affected customers in Europe, the Middle East and Africa: http://direct2dell.com/smallbusiness/archive/2008/05/08/europe-vostro-keyboard-issue-what-we-re-doing.aspx
It seems to me there must be an interesting story here. How could this have happened? I'd like to see the people responsible for this snafu interviewed. Many people at Dell must surely have seen this useless keyboard before the laptops were released for sale. Almost seems like some key people at Dell really screwed up. (LOL... get it?... "Key People"... LOL)
good to see that they are on top of the problem! it wouldnt matter to me much if i got one like that, i use Dvorak. =)
I... can't see the problem. It's identical to my IBM ThinkPad's keyboard layout, and that's wonderful to type on. Hell, it's the same as every keyboard I own except my Apple Wireless Keyboard which has a US layout and is the only one I have the slightest trouble typing on.