Microsoft Comfort Curve 2000 review

Spilling a cup of coffee over a conventional PC keyboard is usually its death knell (we should know - there's a pile of dead ones in the corner), but not with the new Comfort Curve 2000.

Like a small number of rivals, it has rubber-sealed keys and water outlets on its base. It's unusual for other reasons, though. The 'Curve' refers to the arrangement of the keys, which you can see for yourself in the picture. It's intended to make touch typing easier. Admittedly we're devotees of the John Prescott school of typing (two fingers), but we found the increased the range of movement needed didn't necessarily make typing more comfortable. We also found ourselves looking down at the keyboard to find the right keys, which is surely the opposite of what was intended. The keys do have a pleasant feel, though; the action is soft and provides just the right amount of feedback. With a short travel, they make very little noise.

We wasted no time in 'accidentally' tipping a glass of water over the Comfort Curve. As intended, the liquid was channelled out through the base, leaving the internals unmolested. After a bit of drying up, the keyboard worked perfectly.

Like most keyboards these days, the Comfort Curve has a USB connection rather than PS/2, so it'll connect just as easily to a laptop. Despite its low profile, we found it very sturdy to type on, and its rubber feet ensured it didn't slide around.

Unfortunately, the shape and layout of the keys won't appeal to everyone, especially those with large hands. Some of the most important keys, including Enter and Control, are small and irregularly shaped. There are also quick access buttons for the forward and back functions of your web browser, volume control and track skipping, and three program shortcut keys as well as a calculator button. We liked the fact that these worked straight away, but would have liked software included to customise them.

This is an interesting evolution of the standard PC keyboard, and a spill-proof model at a low price is welcome, but it does take some getting used to.