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Is it possible to order a Mac Book with a "swiss" keyboard ??

I

igmolinav

macrumors 65816
Original poster
Aug 15, 2005
1,123
4
Hi,

The other day I met a guy from Switzerland. He had a Mac Book with
a "swiss" keyboard. It was a very helpful keyboard. He had all the characters that French, Italian, and German speakers (in Switzerland)
use to write.

If I want to buy a computer with a keyboard like the one of the swiss
guy, what can I do ???

is it possible to order it from Apple and how, (I am in the USA and it is
not a problem for me to wait a little longer)??

Thank you very much,

igmolinav

P.S. As if the question was not complicated enough already, what will
I need to do if in a year from today I am going to live to China and I will
need a keyboard with chinese characters.
 
2 things.

1) Unless you get the computer from a Swiss source you won't be able to get the Swiss layout. Apple configures their keyboards with the dominant languages of the country in which you're purchasing the computer (US has US English / Spanish options, UK and France have English / French options, etc).

However

2) You have the ability to access the same keyboard layout (what is activated by each key press) no matter what they keyboard actually says by going into the International System Preference Pane. You can also toggle back and forth between the different localizations (US, UK, Switzerland, China, whatever)

My recommendation, is to get the US layout if you will use it mostly under that layout. Use point 2 above to toggle locales. If it makes that big of a deal to you, I'll bet that you could pick up a USB keyboard to match the localizations you'll be using.
 
contact an apple store or apple directly, all Mac Books come out of the same factory so the only issue you may face is if Apples ordering system can handle it for you.

As an example, my Mac Book was ordered in Germany with an English OS, shipped direct from China in 5 days.

Got a dell 4 years back, again from Germany, called them and asked for English OS...no problem, they just changed the hard disk image.
 
Thank you very much for your replies : ) !!!

Anyother comments are also welcome !!!

igmolinav
 
Can be done

I was at the Apple Store in Boston last night and asked your question.
They said that if you buy a new laptop at the Apple store and say that you want a Swiss keyboard, they will give you a laptop with a US keyboard, and order a Swiss keyboard from Switzerland at the same time. It will take several weeks for the Swiss keyboard to get here. When it does, they will ask you to bring your new laptop back to the store, and they will exchange the US keyboard for the Swiss one. This will take a day. They will not charge you for this.
They will not order a Swiss keyboard for you if you don't buy a new laptop at the store.
I did not do this myself (yet).
 
Hi,

Thank you for your post : ) !!! I wonder, if one orders directly
a computer through Apple in the USA, is it possible to go to a
retail store and then do the change there ??

Thank you, kind regards,

igmolinav : ) !!!
 
igmolinav said:
Hi,

Thank you for your post : ) !!! I wonder, if one orders directly
a computer through Apple in the USA, is it possible to go to a
retail store and then do the change there ??

Thank you, kind regards,

igmolinav : ) !!!
Click to expand...

Are you serious? It's been almost FIVE YEARS, but you still haven't thought about asking Apple instead of waiting for replies here?

Waiting for "the next update" maybe? ;)
 
Yeah, WTF.

On a side note: it was nice when the mac laptops had a removable keyboard so that you could swap it for another layout. Now the keys are cutout on the aluminum body. I don't see how you could fit a swiss keyboard (ISO) into a laptop cut out for an american one (ANSI).
 
Hi,

Thank you for your comments : ) !!!

I have already bought a computer a
looong long time ago !!! Someone
had to get it for me from Switzerland,
though. It was not difficult. I had
luck, the friend of a friend brought it
to me.

Anyways, if you look at the thread,
you'll see that baziliscus was kind
enough to fill in this post with that
nice update. In his post he
comments that one can go to any
apple retail store and do the process
there. For my next computer, I would
do as baziliscus suggests, but I would
order my computer from the apple
store online.

Kind regards,

igmolinav : ) !!!
 
Swiss keyboard

I was looking for exactly this question: I've phoned the US store several times, but I'm always being told the only keyboard options would be the ones which are in the online store anyways.

Did Apple's policy change? No other keyboards? Or do any of you have tips what keyword to mention, a special phone number to call?

(BTW, I tried calling Apple store in an EU country, and they would be able to change non-standard keyboard through their After Sales dept... however, nobody in US store seems to understand what I want).

Any tips?
 
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