Microsoft Natural
Ergonomic Keyboard 4000
Our wrists never had it so good!
F
inding the perfect keyboard can be tricky, especially if you prefer the split
“ergo” design to the traditional style—as the options for the former have
become increasingly limited in recent years. Fortunately, we’ve long been able
to count on Microsoft’s Natural Keyboard Pro, finding its combination of split
design, traditional key layout, and integrated USB 1.0 ports superior to all oth-
ers. Now it seems Microsoft’s Natural Ergonomic Keyboard 4000 could finally
replace the aged Natural Pro as our split-keyboard of choice.
Instead of sporting the typical, and potentially uncomfortable, upward-tilt-
ing design, the Natural 4000 tilts down, away from you. The downward action
puts your wrists above your fingers, which prevents you from contorting your
wrists into an unhealthy position. And, indeed, our sensitive wrists remained
free of irritation throughout our testing of the keyboard.
The “added features” are useful, but not revolutionary. There’s a series of
custom macro buttons above the standard keys. We immediately configured
ours to control our media player; alternatively, you could have them open spe-
cific applications or fire up certain keyboard shortcuts. A zoom toggle between
the two halves of the keyboard is nice, but we’d rather use it to scroll up and
down than to perform the default zoom/magnify function.
The 4000’s key action is soft and quiet, even compared with others of its
ilk. We personally don’t mind a keyboard with more resistance and a healthyclick, but we know some users will truly value the Natural 4000’s quietude.
Also, the keys reside in comparatively shallow pockets, making the distance of
travel for each key much shorter than that of a standard Keytronics keyboard,
and even the Natural Keyboard Pro.
Like most boards we’ve tested recently, this keyboard sports the “enhanced”
F-keys that “supplement” the default function of the F1-F12 keys. We’re not fans of
this tack. What’s the point of adding hardwired keyboard shortcuts for functions like
Print and Cut that already have perfectly serviceable keyboard shortcuts?
We miss the Natural Keyboard Pro’s integrated USB hub. But because we
haven’t been able to use the unpowered hub for USB thumb drives above
512MB, its absence on the Natural
4000 isn’t devastating.
—WILL SMITHO
ur first exposure to such grandeur was back in February 2005, with Apple’s
30-inch, 2560x1600 Cinema Display. At that time, however, the only video-
cards for the PC that supported Dual Link DVI—which the LCD’s native resolu-
tion demands—were costly, impractical workstation boards.
But times have changed, and today high-end consumer boards boast the
Dual Link spec, putting a 2560x1600 30-inch LCD monitor within reach of PC
power users. And prices have plummeted too, from Apple’s original asking price
of $3,300 to $2,200 for this Dell 3007WFP.
In action, the 3007WFP’s epic size is astounding, but also a little daunt-
ing. In practice, we were most comfortable viewing the beast from about
three feet away. At this distance, you can see, nay, behold, the numerous
documents and windows you can have open at once, and yet still read text
at a 9-point or higher.
The 3007WFP offers substantial height adjustment (3.54 inches); four
powered USB 2.0 ports; and a built-in 9-in-1 media reader. But the LCD is sadly
lacking any onscreen display adjustments—offering a pair of buttons to control
the backlight’s brightness.
Still, with the brightness all the way up, the 3007WFP turned out a very
strong performance in DisplayMate ( http://www.displaymate.com ) , revealing no flaws
in the grayscale reproduction, screen uniformity, or video bandwidth tests.
Not surprisingly, movies and digital pictures look great on the giant
screen. Gaming, however, comes with a couple compromises. It’s unlikely
you’ll run your games at the monitor’s native-res without taking a perfor-
mance hit. (It’s telling that Dell is pairing this monitor with its Renegade XPSquad-GPU gaming PC.) Quake 4 at 2560x1600 on our P4 3.4GHz/GeForce GTX
PC was unplayably slow. So we scaled the res down to 1600x900, the next
possible setting this LCD supports full-screen (unfortunately), where contrast
and detail were diminished and the picture seemed soft. Perhaps this is the
result of the 11ms response time, or that the interpolation is just much more
noticeable over such a large area. Similarly, in Need for Speed 2, interpolated
to 1024x768, the screen was less sharp than Samsung’s super-fast 940BF. It
wasn’t intolerable, and some editors felt like the sheer size of the screen makes
it a fair tradeoff; it’s just something to consider before succumbing
to the sex appeal of such a mas-
sive (and expensive) monitor.
—KATHERINE STEVENSONDell 3007WFP LCD Monitor
There’s a lot to like about this 30-inch screen, but it’s not perfect
8 MA XIMUMPC MARCH 2006
reviews TESTED. REVIEWED. VERDICTIZED
In addition to tons of screen real-estate, the 3007WFP offers
built-in USB 2.0 ports and a media reader.8
DELL 3007WFP LCD
$2,200, http://www.dell.comKEYBOARD 4000
$50, http://www.microsoft.com
MA XIMUMPC
KICKASSThe new Natural Ergonomic Keyboard 4000 tilts away from you,
making it a comfortable, safe typing surface for everyone.