For what it’s worth, I’ve alternated between mechanical keyboards with and without “true” Mac layouts, and it’s sort of a wash. By “true” I mean: meta keys are

For what it’s worth, I’ve alternated between mechanical keyboards with and without “true” Mac layouts, and it’s sort of a wash. By “true” I mean: meta keys are in the right place by default, send the right signals by default (or provide a built in affordance for same), and the numeric keypad either has the same shape or doesn’t exist. Pros of “true” Mac layouts: - They really are what you expect if you’re a Mac user. No really that’s it. Cons: - The only vendor actively making them is (last I checked) Matias. - 100% of the Matias products I’ve bought have failed on me in the same way: switches get a spec of dust in them, then intermittently flip between no response and being stuck. This doesn’t matter if you’re using their custom switches or third party ones. - They’re positioned and priced as vanity products. Which would be fine if they actually worked for a reasonable period of time. I’m a Mac user after all. Pros of everything else that actually tries to support Mac users: - They mostly work according to your expectations if you know which expectations to have. - If you buy a quality keyboard and mind the reviews, you can reasonably expect it to last. - These products increasingly offer more than a keycap swap and a shrug. It’s not uncommon to find a built in switch to use macOS defaults for meta key positions. They size (more on this) meta keys to be relatively comfortable for Mac and non-Mac layouts. This is huge if you’ve developed muscle memory for the cmd key. - They don’t ship unmappable key signals like the context menu key by default. - Even if you need to swap meta keys, that’s trivial in macOS. Cons: - If you care about a number keypad, it’s probably going to be wRoNg. It sucks. I hate it every day. - No kidding the size of meta keys might throw you off. Otherwise nbd. - If you do get one with a context menu key get ready to throw your entire computer in the nearest body of water. Honorable mention: you can still get Apple Extended keyboards and ADB adapters. They’re a great middle ground! They’re much less likely to fail and much more likely to have a Mac keyboard layout you’ll benefit from. Support your local electronics recycling reseller!