Laptop external keyboard?

[Hondaman]

Can I use an external keyboard with a modern (as of this post) laptop from, say, Dell?

I am worried about durability because I am a cheap, frugal person. I suspect an external keyboard would extend the life of the laptop. I have always been a desktop person, since my AMD 386DX-40, and I really don't know about laptops (though the current Dell products look like they are fanless, which eliminates a big failure point).

(Also I prefer the "clicking" "Unicomp" keyboard, which is still made an hour or two away from me in Lexington KY, using the same equipment as the original 1981 IBM keyboard, now with the same USB plug as a USB thumb drive -- Type A IIRC.)

I know things have changed over the years. The BIOS will no longer pause to let a SCSI chain deliver startup instructions (laptop BIOSes probably never had that). Booting from an optical disc (with instructions that follow the ElTorito protocol) probably died along with optical drives. UEFI and Windows 11 security certainly makes startup even more complicated.

I was thinking about going back to school for "medical coding and transcription". Many schools are online, and I don't know if my Win7 machine will satisfy security requirements, and I don't know if Linux will support the online portal for my coursework. I also do not know if I should get a webcam that supports Win7.

Can I use an external USB keyboard with a modern laptop?

[diif]

Re: Laptop external keyboard?

Yes.

[Hondaman]

Re: Laptop external keyboard?

Oh goodness. I forgot to ask the obvious question. Can I also use an external mouse?

(You can still get a WIRED mouse in the US so you don't have to worry about batteries or Linux compatibility.)

[diif]

Re: Laptop external keyboard?

Yes, you can also plug in a USB mouse.

[piernov]

Re: Laptop external keyboard?

USB HID works the same everywhere, regardless of hardware, OS or wireless/wired. The custom Christmas tree lighting stuff and the like found on some gaming devices is out of this scope though.

That said, if you're constantly using external peripherals with a laptop and your first worry is the longevity of the laptop, a laptop isn't what you need, you need a desktop.

Also, very few laptops are fanless, and they should be avoided.
Oh and UEFI in itself doesn't make the OS boot process more complicated in itself, in fact the bootloader and the OS kernel even have less work to do in theory. It's pretty different from the legacy BIOS of course since that was built with a lot of quirks that didn't make a lot of sense due to early hardware limitations.

[stj]

Re: Laptop external keyboard?

i always use an external mouse - touchpads are shit

[lti]

Re: Laptop external keyboard?

Yeah, an external mouse is almost required at this point. Those one-button clickpads are even worse than regular touchpads (at least if you keep forgetting that you can tap with two fingers to right-click like I do - it seems like most people immediately disable tap-to-click anyway, but I was told that clicking with the physical buttons made me look stupid).

I would suggest just buying a business-class laptop. They seem to have better keyboards (except for HP), and those "clicky" keyboards are probably going to annoy the rest of the class. The downside is that business-class laptops cost more. You're basically paying extra for a laptop that actually works as intended, which is sad. I'm at the point where I will never buy another consumer-grade laptop after that Toshiba Satellite L750's keyboard failed after only three months (not even one semester of college, and I didn't take any classes that required lots of typing like you're considering). I went through the rest of school typing on a Gateway Solo 2500, which never had a problem as long as I could get away with Windows 98 (from 2012 to 2015).

As Piernov said, compatibility isn't a problem at all except for the software you need to turn the stupid RGB lighting off. Avoiding RGB lighting is easier said than done at this point, but it's still possible.

[dmill89]

Re: Laptop external keyboard?

Yes.

^This, I use a circa 1991 IBM Model M (via PS2 to USB adaptor) with my work HP Z-Book studio G5 which has an absolutely garbage keyboard and trackpad.

Any USB keyboard will just plug in and work (some "gaming" keyboards with RGB and/or special buttons may require special drivers), and PS2 keyboards will generally work with an adaptor.

Also I prefer the "clicking" "Unicomp" keyboard, which is still made an hour or two away from me in Lexington KY, using the same equipment as the original 1981 IBM keyboard, now with the same USB plug as a USB thumb drive -- Type A IIRC.

The Unicomps are good keyboards, but they aren't quite as solidly built as the pre-Lexmark (1996) Model-Ms (the Unicomps are basically clones of the late Lexmark design).

I would suggest just buying a business-class laptop.

^Also this, most standard consumer-grade laptops are absolute garbage (most are so poorly built they'll visibly bend when picked up from one side), aside from some of the higher end "gaming" ones which will generally cost as much or more than a business class machine (especially with 2-3 year old business-class machines being available used fairly cheaply).

Also, very few laptops are fanless, and they should be avoided.

^and also this, for the most part fanless laptops are limited to the very low end stuff (Celeron/Pentium, etc.), and those are generally about on par with an average 10 year old laptop performance wise (though much more power efficient). Anything fanless is also going to almost instantly thermal throttle under load (though "ultra-thin" laptops with fans will often do this as well), manufactures have gotten good at hiding the vents (often venting through the gap between the base and screen, or through false "speaker grills") so some laptops may appear "fanless" even if they aren't.