Most of the famous and popular desktop keyboard manufacturers make full-size desktop keyboards with bad UX!
Yes, I'm talking about you: Logitech, Razer, HP, Dell, Corsair, and almost all other famous brands!
All your keyboards miss a single crucial UX thing: separate media buttons!
Instead, they provide an FN button that is actually the UX ENEMY!
Let me demonstrate this in a simple example situation:
Example 1: People tend to listen to music or podcasts using computers or laptops.
Okay, we listen to music and work or relax.
But suddenly, a phone call appeared! What do we have to do?
Yes, stop the music to answer the call!
And how can we do this with our brand-new modern FN-powered keyboards?
Yes, we have to use two fingers, or even two hands, to press a combo shortcut like "FN + F1", just to simply urgently mute the music!
Is it convenient??? Completely not!
FN-lock mode is EVIL!!!
Yes, we usually have the FN-lock mode, which can be turned on to make F1-F12 buttons act as media keys!
Is it good? Completely not!
Having FN-lock mode, before each click, users have to remember whether the FN-lock mode is turned on or off, before clicking on any dual-mode button, to understand which action will be done by the single press!
Is this convenient? Completely not!
Yes, we can enable the "FN lock" mode for the whole time, to make the media buttons work by default, without pressing FN. But they immediately lose the default button behavior, and need to press two keys to just call the default simple F1 action, and the same for all other F2-F12 keys!
So, with FN-lock modes, we will get the quick "Mute" action, but will lose the quick "F1" action! Hard choice!
In conclusion, FN key is only useful for small-sized keyboards, like in 13-14" laptops, where we really have no space for additional media keys.
And that's all!
For full-sized desktop keyboards, the FN key is the UX ENEMY!
And even for 15-17" laptops, we usually have enough space to make dedicated media and other action buttons, instead of making the users suffer with FN modes!
And one more thing: volume control!
Do you really think that tuning volume using separate Volume Up + Volume Down buttons is convenient for users?
Completely not! The convenient volume control approach is a knob! Yes, a single old-school rotary control is 100x times more convenient than two separate buttons!
Just rotate left to increase, right to decrease, press to mute - damn simple and convenient! Rotate sharply for instant change, slowly for precise control... What a convenience! Thank you, knob inventors!
And another thing: please stop inventing new layouts!
The best layout is already invented - it's the classic layout!
People love to touch type! They don't want to learn new layouts on each new keyboard!
So, please stop moving arrow keys, Print Screen key, Page Up, Page Down, Del, Ctrl, Alt, and all other crucial keys to new places!
And for F1-F12 keys - their position over the numeric (1-0) keys should be the same. So, stick to the classic layout, including button sizes and spacing between F1-F12 buttons, too!
Even a 1mm disposition of a key is already a source of missclicks!
So, the appeal to all famous brands of keyboard makers:
Please, please!!! Take into account this feedback, and understand that "combos" using FN keys are not convenient for users of full-sized keyboards at all!
And start making a really convenient keyboard for users, without any FN keys, FN-lock modes, and other tricky things, but with the strict classic layouts!
And start adding rotary control knobs for volume control, if this is not a rocket science challenge to you!
Believe us, we, real desktop keyboard users, have more than enough space on the desktops to fit additional dedicated media keys, to stop suffering from the FN button pains!
And the appeal to desktop keyboard users:
Please start submitting feedback that the FN key is not convenient, and beg the developers to stop adding FN buttons, and start adding dedicated media buttons!
And post your opinions and links to your feedback here in the comments, let's collaborate and fix this issue!
P.S. Here is an example of a really convenient keyboard with dedicated media buttons and the volume knob: CHICONY KB-0420 - my UX favorite:
Top comments (2)
My appeal to DELL: dell.com/community/en/conversation...
And my appeal to HP: h30434.www3.hp.com/t5/Desktop-Hard...