List of laptops with 75% keyboard

It's hard to search for laptops by keyboard design. 75% happens to be my favorite, so I'd like to get a reference going. What is a 75% keyboard, you ask? Here is an article on the Deskthority wiki, and here is an image for reference:



It's not a layout, per se, at least not in the sense of ANSI or ISO. It's more about keyboard size. The 75% compact keyboards move the homerow to a column on the right. This keeps the home row easily accessible without sacrificing much key size. As a programmer, this is a godsend. Bonus points if the up-down arrows keys are not half-size.

I feel like this design is becoming less popular in recent years. It's getting harder to find laptops with this layout, thus this thread. Naturally, you can carry a keyboard with you, but that defeats the point of portability. I'll keep editing the first post with more models as I find them. Please feel free reply with your own lists, and I'll incorporate them into this post!

For the sake of sanity, I'll focus on laptops made since 2008 or so.

I'll try to keep the list sorted first by manufacturer, then roughly chronologically or by power.

HSAK = Half-Sized Arrow Keys (example)
LAKC = Lowered Arrow Key Cluster (example)

• Dell Studio 14z
• Dell Studio 15 ← family of laptops? Includes 1555 and 1557?
• Dell Studio 1555
• Dell Studio 1557
• Dell Inspiron 11z
• Dell Inspiron 14z
• Dell Inspiron 13 ← specifically 1318
• Dell Inspiron 15 ← family of laptops? Includes 1525 and 1545?
• Dell Inspiron 1525
• Dell Inspiron 1545 ← my personal favorite
• Dell Inspiron 1464
• Dell XPS 13
• Dell XPS 15
  
• Dell XPS 16
• Dell Vostro V131
  
• Dell Vostro 3400
• Dell Latitude 3330
• Dell Inspiron 14R M4110, M4040, N4050 (non-backlit)
• Dell Inspiron 15R M5040, M5050, N5040, N5050 (non-backlit)
• Dell Inspiron 15R 5520, SE 7520, 3520 (backlit)
• Alienware M11x
• Alienware M11x R2
• Alienware M11x R3 ← NBR's R3 review has wrong photos
  
• Alienware M14x
  
• Alienware M14x R2
• Alienware M14x R3
  
• Alienware M15x
• Gigabyte Aero 14
• Lenovo Ideapad 100
• Lenovo Yoga 700
• Lenovo Yoga 3 Pro
  
• Panasonic Toughbook 54 ← LAKC
• Samsung Series 9 NP900X4C ← HSAK
• Samsung Notebook 9 Pro ← HSAK
• Toshiba Portégé R835 Series ← LAKC
• HP Pavilion G6 Series ← HSAK
• Asus G46VW

I'll think of a way to consolidate this if it gets too long. Definitely a WIP.

 

Alienware 15?

 

Hmm... unfortunately, no, that's more of a 60% layout, maybe 65% due to the function key row. Here is a link to the Alienware 15 review for reference. Note how it lacks that additional column to the right of the Enter key, above the right arrow. That's typically what defines a 75% layout.

Reworded some of the first post to clarify.

The Alienware M14x and M14x R2 are the only Alienware laptops I've found with a 75% keyboard so far. It might be more common in older or smaller laptops.

Edit: The Alienware M15x qualifies.

 

Acer had quite a few (16:10), one of them is 5920G, quite upgradeable machine and I love that Gemstone design.

 

The Panasonic ToughBook 54 is the most likely of the above machines to be findable in working order and with the fewest issues. The consumer Dells and the low end Vostros and Latitude E 3000 series are less than well built. And most every other machine offered is consumer or gaming and usually not machines that aged well.

 

Out of personal interest, I looked through this list of laptops with a Thunderbolt 3 port, and to my (unsurprised) disappointment, none of them feature a 75% keyboard. Most of them also have those trendy half-sized arrow keys. It's like all the laptop keyboard designers in the world looked at the MacBook, had a collective stroke, and proceeded to jump off the bridge of practicality into the deep end of fashion.

The only "modern" laptops with a somewhat sane-looking keyboard (IMO) are the Lenovo ThinkPad P50 and P70 and the Razer Blade Pro. Neither of them are 75% of course, but they do make some interesting-yet-reasonable choices in regards to keyboard design, and I certainly cannot argue with those specs.

Personally, I've been looking into laptop keyboard modding. Learned a thing or two about keyboard controller chips, currently working on an N5050 backlight mod for fun, which I'll share here if successful. Given that most keyboards operate on a row-column matrix to detect keystrokes, I suspect that it wouldn't be too hard to adapt an older 75% keyboard to a newer laptop, so long as the actual physical dimensions are compatible. Just musing at this point, though, don't hold me to that.

I've updated the list with some new models.

 

Does the Samsung Notebook 9 Pro meet your criteria?

The old Samsung NP900X4C (which I have owned) also has your 75% keyboard. I agree that it's a sensible layout with the column of navigation keys and it is unfortunate that Dell didn't use that layout in the Precision M5510 (my current notebook) but it's still better than including a numpad which pushes the whole keyboard off to the left.

John

 

It does! Shame about the tiny arrow keys, but that's a separate matter. (More of a pet peeve, really.) I added both of the laptops you mentioned to the list. Thank you for your contribution!

Added tags to indicate half-sized arrow keys (HSAK) and lowered arrow key cluster (LAKC).

 

Many HP business laptops (particularly older ones) also have 75% keyboard layout, here are the models that I know:

• Compaq 320/321
• HP 420
• HP 620
• HP 430 (half-sized up/down keys)
• HP 630 (half-sized up/down keys)
• HP Compaq 6530b (LAKC)
• HP Compaq 6730b (LAKC)
  
• HP Compaq 6730s
  
• HP Compaq 6735b (LAKC)
  
• HP EliteBook 6930p (LAKC)
  
• HP EliteBook 8440p (LAKC)
• HP EliteBook 8460p (half-sized up/down keys)
  
• HP EliteBook 8470p (half-sized up/down keys)
  
• HP ProBook 430 G1 (half-sized up/down keys)
  
• HP ProBook 430 G2 (half-sized up/down keys)
  
• HP ProBook 430 G3 (half-sized up/down keys)
  
• HP ProBook 430 G4 (half-sized up/down keys)
• HP ProBook 440 (half-sized up/down keys) (also known as HP ProBook 440 G0)
  
• HP ProBook 440 G1 (half-sized up/down keys)
• HP ProBook 440 G2 (half-sized up/down keys)
• HP ProBook 440 G3 (half-sized up/down keys)
• HP ProBook 440 G4 (half-sized up/down keys)
• HP ProBook 445 G1 (half-sized up/down keys)
• HP ProBook 445 G2 (half-sized up/down keys)
• HP ProBook 640 G1 (half-sized up/down keys)
• HP ProBook 640 G2 (half-sized up/down keys)
• HP ProBook 645 G1 (half-sized up/down keys)
• HP ProBook 645 G2 (half-sized up/down keys)
• HP ProBook 4310s (HSAK)
• HP ProBook 4320s (HSAK)
  
• HP ProBook 4325s (HSAK)
• HP ProBook 4320t (HSAK) (mobile thin client, basically 4320s with Celeron processor)
  
• HP ProBook 4330s (half-sized up/down keys)
  
• HP ProBook 4340s (half-sized up/down keys)
• HP ProBook 4410s (HSAK)
• HP ProBook 4415s (HSAK)
  
• HP ProBook 4420s (HSAK)
• HP ProBook 4425s (HSAK)
  
• HP ProBook 4430s (half-sized up/down keys)
• HP ProBook 4435s (half-sized up/down keys)
  
• HP ProBook 4440s (half-sized up/down keys)
• HP ProBook 4445s (half-sized up/down keys)
  
• HP ProBook 5310m (HSAK)
  
• HP ProBook 5320m (HSAK)
  
• HP ProBook 5330m (half-sized up/down keys)
  
• HP ProBook 6360b (half-sized up/down keys)
• HP ProBook 6440b (LAKC)
• HP ProBook 6445b (LAKC)
• HP ProBook 6450b (LAKC)
  
• HP ProBook 6455b (LAKC)
  
• HP ProBook 6460b (half-sized up/down keys)
  
• HP ProBook 6465b (half-sized up/down keys)
  
• HP ProBook 6470b (half-sized up/down keys)
  
• HP ProBook 6475b (half-sized up/down keys)

Feel free to help me double check

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HP_ProBook

P.S. Some Santa Rosa (GL960/GM965/PM965) HP laptops also have such KB layout, like HP 530, HP Compaq 6510b, 6710b, 6720s, 6910p.