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
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.