Japanese Keyboards

The keyboard on this computer is really going to mess me up when I have a reason to start using my American laptop for more than listening to music.

The keyboard is essentially a QWERTY set-up, though smashed up because it is a laptop. I really hate laptop input devices. The keyboards are always too small, especially the spacebar and surrounding keys. The keys also don't feel right because they are flat and don't have any of what we would call "action" if this were a piano or guitar. And touchpads are simply the worst invention ever. This computer is equipped with a real mouse, at least, so I just use that. Sometimes it is fun to use the mouse and the touchpad at the same time and see which will exert more control on the cursor.

The main problem with the keyboard is that all those little punctuation keys, which seem minor until you actually get down to writing things, are in the wrong places. I know this sounds culturally insensitive, but their placement is just WRONG, not different. It really has to do with Japanese people not needing apostrophes or quotes, but it is still annoying. You get the apostrophe by hitting shift and 7, and the quotes by hitting shift and 2. For most people, I think this wouldn't be a problem, as they are too lazy to use these punctuation marks, anyway, but I hate when they aren't used (or are used incorrectly, for that matter), so I have to perform this awkward hand motion any time I want to use a possessive or contraction.

The keyboard is also a little strange by western standards because in addition to having letters on the keys, it also has Japanese characters, hiragana, on the keys, presumably for old people who can't read romaji, the characters we all know and love. There are also different "shift" options above the hiragana. The thing is, I don't know how to enable that input mode, so certain characters, such as the underscore, are inaccessible to me. Again, probably not a big deal to some people, but I think it would be nice to have the option.

Before ending this rant, I'd also like to complain that, in particular, the shift and control keys are too small. The shift button is basically the size of a normal letter key, and if I miss it, I hit the page down button, which as far as I know, is completely vestigial. The control key is really only useful to people like me, who hate switching to the mouse mid-document, but its awkward placement prevents me from doing anything like copying or pasting without stopping and taking my hands away from the keyboard.

Just minor complaints.