[xradionut]

Have you met the author? Peter is opinionated, but most of the time he has a valid reason for it. As a writer and a programmer, a good keyboard is a necessity for his work. (I'd bet he's typed as many or more lines of code than a good number of folks here at HN.)

At work we have have folks that order and try out several different keyboards before settling on one that meets their needs. When a programmer makes 80K, a few extra hundred dollars at the extreme to make them efficient and happy is noise in the budget. Even our interns get their choice.

[keithpeter]

I take your point, but the OA was reviewing a laptop. No choice of keyboard, and perhaps need to mode shift between non-standard and standard key positions.

I attempt to play piano. Any clever redesigns of that 88 key layout are not going to work.

[xradionut]

I chose my laptop mainly on the quality and layout of the keyboard. Unlike the OP, I don't travel as much so I had more choices due to the fact I have 17.3" laptop.