I’ve been using ergonomic keyboards from Microsoft, on and off, for around 10 years now. I originally started because I’m on a computer all day long and I started to get sore wrists. Stop sniggering at the back there.
My first ergonomic keyboard was the Microsoft Natural Ergonomic Keyboard 4000. I loved that thing. I bought one with my own money and made three consecutive employers buy one for me for my work computers as well. Then I was stupid enough to buy a Sculpt Ergonomic Desktop because I wanted a wireless keyboard and chiclet style keys. That was a mistake, battery life on that thing was about a week per pair of AAAs and the numpad was a separate device. Plus it was awful to type on but unfortunately for me, I persevered with the thing for far too long and ended up getting rid of my old 4000 as it took up too much room.
After my son was born, it got to the point where I barely using my personal devices any more. At work, I found an Apple wireless keyboard in a cupboard, paired it to my laptop and started using it more and more. I ended up getting used to it so when I replaced the MacBook I was using with a Dell laptop, I ordered a very similar looking Dell keyboard to go with it. I’ve been using that for about two or three years but now it’s starting to wear out. I decided I wanted to go back to an Ergonomic keyboard and went to see what was on the market.
To my massive disappointment, I found that the Microsoft Natural Ergonomic Keyboard 4000 has been discontinued; I could only find second hand examples on eBay for far too much money. Plus, who wants a second hand keyboard? Yuck. Logitech make a ergonomic keyboard which looks like it’s pretty good but it’s hideously expensive. There are various off-brand ones on Amazon but they all looked plasticky, unpleasant, are tenkeyless or have strange layouts. The Sculpt is still a thing but I didn’t want another one. Microsoft do the Surface Ergonomic Keyboard which appears to address a lot of the shortcomings I found with the Sculpt but that’s also in “You want how much???” territory.
So in the end, I went with the LXM-00004 (Hmm, catchy name) as it appears to be the closest thing that Microsoft do to the 4000. It was on sale during Amazon’s Prime Day sale for less than £30 so I ordered one. This is what I’ve found.
The one that I bought looks much like this:
The one that I’ve got has a British ISO 105 key layout rather than the American one pictured above, so it has the Enter key shaped correctly.
First impressions: It’s a bit smaller and lighter than I remember the Ergonomic 4000 keyboard being. It’s uses a standard USB connection but it doesn’t have a USB hub. The USB cable is captive and about a metre long. It still has the padded palm rest with the soft touch material which is nice. The keyboard comes with the palm rest lift, which you can clip underneath the front of the keyboard to tip it back. What it doesn’t have are tilt stand legs at the back of the keyboard, which I don’t like.
In terms of layout, the bottom row of keys has been switched about a bit, there are two keys between CTRL and ALT on both sides of the keyboard. The context menu key, which is usually between Alt-Gr and the CTRL key on the right side of the keyboard has been moved immediately to the right of the left CTRL key, and the Winkey is to the right of that. On the right side of the keyboard is a button that opens an Edge app which takes you to the Microsoft 365 portal (Why?) and a button which opens an Emoji panel which is useful if you like that kind of thing I guess. Along the top of the keyboard are a series of keys. The ones on the left are programmable to do what you want, but that requires installation of a Microsoft app. The ones in the middle control the playback of media and adjust the sound volume. On the right, you’ve got a calculator key, one that brings up the screenshot tool (equivalent to pressing SHIFT+WINKEY+S), a key which brings up the task switcher and one which locks the computer. Above the Pause key is a button which brings up Search on a Windows 11 box, and probably Cortana on Windows 10.
Underneath all of those are the ESC and Function (F1 to F12) keys. The keyboard differs a little to the norm here as it’s move PrtScn right next to F12 and put in an additional Delete key. Moving along, Scroll Lock and Pause have been moved one key to the left and the Num Lock has been put into that cluster of three there. Above the tenkey, there is an additional row of keys which has is a Clear key who’s only use I’ve found so far is with the Calculator app, open and closed parentheses and an additional backspace key. Directly underneath the clear button is an = key, where usually the Num Lock key would live and the /, * and – keys are in their usual places.
There’s usually a bit of a gap between the function keys and the first row of keys with the numbers on but on this keyboard, there isn’t. I’m finding that’s taking a bit of getting used to as I’m so used to having that gap there and I keep on hitting function keys instead of numbers when I want them. But aside from all of that, the layout of the keyboard is fairly standard. I’ve seen worse, anyway.
In terms of feel, it’s a standard membrane keyboard. It feels like most other Microsoft keyboards I’ve used. There’s a decent amount of key travel, it’s not too noisy and it’s not hard to type on. It’s better than ultra cheap keyboards that you’d get with a computer but it’s no mechanical keyboard. It does feel nicer to type on than the KM717 I was using before though, in my opinion at least. One thing that is annoying me about it is that I’m finding that I’m leaning fairly hard on the wrist rest, but when I do so it tips the entire keyboard forward. Clipping the palm rest lift underneath the keyboard stops that, but I’m not sure I like the keyboard like that. The keyboard itself also doesn’t seem to be that rigid compared to its immediate predecessor, when you press in the middle of the keyboard there is a lot of flex there.
So, the question is, with that all in mind do I like the keyboard? Let’s go through the points:
Good:
- Good ergonomic layout, it doesn’t compromise the ISO 105 layout to be ergonomic like some keyboards do
- Standard cursor key and mostly standard numpad layout
- Good feeling keys for a membrane keyboard
- Mostly useful additional keys
- Not expensive for what it is
Bad:
- Some bizarre alterations to the keyboard’s layout: no gap between the function keys and the first row of the keyboard, Num Lock moved to an usual place
- Feels more flimsy than the product it’s replaced
- No tilt feet at the back
- Does a keyboard really need to have a key dedicated to opening Office?
Overall, it’s mostly positive but I wish it was a Natural Ergonomic Keyboard 4000. Oh well.
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