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Here are six reasons why you should skip the Logitech MX Keys Mini Keyboard
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This comes from a bunch of questions I've received and the first question is, does the black MX Keys Mini Windows version work on a Mac
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Well, yes and no. As a keyboard it does function, but not all of the keys are remappable like some
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of the command control option buttons that you would want to remap so that the layout is similar
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to a Mac. Well, you can only remap a couple of those. So you're going to end up getting stuck
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with a layout that just isn't going to be the same as your MacBook Pro and that is one of the
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reasons why I ended up returning the black version as nice as it looked and ended up getting a Mac
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specific version of this keyboard which solved the problem, but really would have liked to have
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something closer to space gray. Problem number two is going to be the unifying receiver. Can
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you use a unifying receiver with the MX Keys keyboard? And the answer to that is maybe
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If you already have a unifying receiver then it's probably not going to work because the
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only receivers that work with this MX Keys Mini is the newer Logitech Bolt receiver. It does not
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come with the keyboard so if you want to do that instead of Bluetooth you're going to end up having
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to go out and buy a receiver. Just make sure it's the Bolt version. The next problem is that the new
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keys, as cool as they are, they are only cool when they work. After upgrading to the latest version
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of Logitech options, the microphone mute key now works for me reliably and I really like the
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emoji key. It is super useful when I'm trying to fill out comments on YouTube videos and things
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like that and I want some emojis, but I have noticed that it can be hit or miss. There are
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times where you will hit the key and nothing happens and if you click away from where you're
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at and then back into the text field then the menu will pop up so there's a bug somewhere. Then
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there's the voice to text dictation button. Now this is cool in concept. It isn't something that
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I normally would use, but I have not been able to get that to work on a MacBook Pro and that
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goes for both the Intel MacBook Pro and a M1 version of the MacBook Pro. So this is not just
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an M1 thing, there's actually a problem here. It doesn't look like the Logitech options software is
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even trying to add it to the permissions. I went through a whole ton of settings looking for ways
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to enable this so that you could control the voice to text through the keyboard and I just could not
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do that. Now there is a setting in the accessibility settings that will let you turn on voice to text
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so that could be a workaround for you and if you turn that on then anytime you have the cursor
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inside of a text field and you end up speaking it's going to populate that with text but the
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problem there is going to be that that is always on. It's not tied to the key so you can't just
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toggle it on and off. And I'm not sure if this is just my version of the MX Keys Mini, but I have
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noticed that it is incredibly sluggish when I am switching between devices and that's when I'm
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comparing it to the full-size MX Keys keyboard which felt much faster. Some of you probably
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like to use the Home, End, Page Up, Page Down, and Right Delete keys and if that is you then this
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is going to be a problem just like the Apple Magic Keyboard because those keys are not on here
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However, you can get around that because if you use the Function key along with the arrows you can
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do the same stuff as like the Home, End, Page Up, Page Down or if you do Function Delete then you
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can do a Delete Right. So it's not a huge deal for me. But if you are someone who likes to use
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your keyboards wired then this is going to completely be a no-go for you because the USB-C
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port on this keyboard is only for charging. You cannot use it as a wired keyboard. Despite all
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these problems with the MX Keys Mini, it has been my main keyboard now as a programmer for a while
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and I do really like it. I like the ability to be able to switch between three different devices
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and to have the keyboard layout be very similar both in size and placement of the keys to my
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MacBook Pro so that it reduces context switching
