deskthority

Can someone familiar with the QuickFire TK help me out with a few questions? I used to think you'd just hit the Num Lock button to swap between using numbers vs using the navigation keys.

But then I read this from Miko in another thread: "Numlock can be deactivated by pressing shift (with the left hand). so during entry one can switch really quickly between those two."

And I read elswhere that the Fn key is invovled... or at least it can be.

• Is it true that Num Lock switches between the two modes as the sticky modifier you'd expect, like Caps Lock?
• Is it true that Left Shift can be used to shift the numpad temporarily back to navigation mode?
• If you press Fn for 3 seconds to lock one way vs the other does it only affect the function keys or does it affect the numpad or other keys?
• Is there anything about this numpad that I haven't covered in these questions?

I forgot to add that I don't own one and I've found something online that CM called a "manual" but it did not answer these questions

Oh and I was also wondering if there are other keyboards with the same physical layout. .. what do you even call it? TK?

Yep Num Lock switches between the two modes, and is sticky.

Shift (either left or right) can be used to get navigational function when Num Lock is toggled, however the layout of the shift layer is the same as the shift layer on a regular numpad, the positions of the navigational keys when Num Lock is toggled on and Shift is pressed is not the same as when Num Lock is toggled off.

The Fn lock does not affect the numpad, only the function row. One minor annoyance with the Fn lock is when it's on you can't press Fn+F5 to get F5, you have to toggle Fn lock off to get the regular function keys.

There's also a bug with the '00' key of the numpad, if you press it too soon after another pressing another key it will repeat the other key (for example '5005', 'f00f'). It's just a fraction of a second of wait to avoid it, but it's enough for me to not use the key.

That said I like the board a lot!

(If you plan on swapping the keycaps, beware of the 6.5x space bar, it's nigh impossible to find a space bar that size)

Thanks for the info. One extra question occurred to me -- When NumLock is on and you're using Shift to temporarily get navigational function, how would you select a bunch of cells in a spreadsheet since Shift is already in use? Would you instead just hit NumLock to exit and then use Shift plus the arrow keys to select?

allthumbs wrote: ↑Thanks for the info. One extra question occurred to me -- When NumLock is on and you're using Shift to temporarily get navigational function, how would you select a bunch of cells in a spreadsheet since Shift is already in use? Would you instead just hit NumLock to exit and then use Shift plus the arrow keys to select?

If you do lots of work in Excel or other numbers-entry-intensive programs you may consider a "TKL-size non-TKL" keyboard, like Plum MX 96 ... and I'm pretty sure there are other more easily available brands with the same features that I haven't seen. You can see bellow that when "Num Mode" (top right corner) button is pressed it enables the dedicated numpad ... anyways just an idea for people who do lots of numbers ...

zts wrote: ↑]If you do lots of work in Excel or other numbers-entry-intensive programs you may consider a "TKL-size non-TKL" keyboard, like Plum MX 96 ...

Or, almost but not entirely unlike the QuickFire TK, a Cherry G86-61400 or G86-62410 -- the latter currently available with Cherry MX switches here.

There's also the option of a separate number keypad, which start around $5.

Mal-2 wrote: ↑

zts wrote: ↑]If you do lots of work in Excel or other numbers-entry-intensive programs you may consider a "TKL-size non-TKL" keyboard, like Plum MX 96 ...

Or, almost but not entirely unlike the QuickFire TK, a Cherry G86-61400 or G86-62410 -- the latter currently available with Cherry MX switches here.

There's also the option of a separate number keypad, which start around $5.

I know I was impressed by Tesoro Tizona separate number keypad, not so much by the numpad itself but by its flexibility in terms of attaching itself to either (left or right) side of the keyboard ... but they are more expensive.