Amazon Fire Max 11 Keyboard Case

It's really sad. The Fire Max 11 with this keyboard/case would have so nice if the designers thought more about how people use a keyboard with their tablets and laptops. Yes, the cover is sleek and fits very well, the keyboard keys are all comfortably spaced and have a great tactile feel for such a thin keyboard, but it's layout is missing two important function keys and places a third in an unusual spot that will drive touch typists crazy..There are volume up and down keys, but no is no mute button.There is no escape key.And the CTRL-Control key is not located on the bottom left corner where almost all laptops and desktops place it. That's where the FN-Function key is. CTRL is one key over to the right . . . where most keyboards put the Fn key!Yea, three keys. But I had everyone who's reading this review at No Mute Button. Come on guys. Really? A keyboard with Play/Stop, Backup, Skip Forward, Volume Down, Volume Up, but no mute button? Isn't that kind of like a mouse with no scroll wheel or right-click?After all, loud, noisy video overlays and ad content has become the norm on many websites, and there's no easily-accessible Mute control on the page. A mute button on the keyboard is really handy feature. At the very least Amazon's design team should have ditched the WWW button near the upper right corner of the keyboard and put a Mute key next to the volume controls instead.And why no ESCape key? That's really useful at times, like when the user wants to interrupt a page from being loaded or to tell Facebook they really don't want to post that thing they wrote.Locating the CTRL (control) key where touch typists expect to find it is really handy when using a word processor to bold, italicize, or underline text.These are features many non-Fintie keyboards support. If these features are important to you I suggest you look at the iClever folding Bluetooth keyboards. They have all these features . . . One of them even has a trackpad, but lacks a dedicated "Back" button. (You can use ALT-BackArrow to go back a page.)My only other complaint about the keyboard is it doesn't automatically shut the touchpad down when I'm typing, as many laptop touchpads do. So I'll be merrily typing away and -- BOOP -- all of a sudden I'm inserting text in the middle of another sentence somewhere because I brushed the touchpad somewhere. At least there's a Fn-Tab keystroke combination that turns the touchpad off to prevent this.My last comment is about the cover-stand. It's kind of a compromise. It's very nice as long as the tablet is being used in landscape orientation, but there are apps and web pages that only work in portrait mode. (Some NYTimes Puzzle pages and language learning apps come to mind.) This keyboard/case/stand can't support portrait mode. At least the keyboard snaps on and off easily, so it's easy to just hold the tablet in any orientation that makes sense, but the keybaord doesn't work when its disconnected.Pros:* Nice keyboard cover that's both lightweight and protects the tablet well. It almost makes the Fite Max 11 into a viable laptop for travel and going to a coffee shop.When folded closed, the cloth case covering is easy to hold.The keyboard can be folded all the way backto lie flat behind the tablet screen and, when in that position, the keyboard turns off. That's a common 2-in-1 laptop feature that stops the user form hitting text keys while holding the device in one's hands like a regular tablet.The keyboard is easily detachable and is held in place with magnets. That makes it very easy to remove the keyboard and just want to use it like a traditional tablet. And it's very nice to be able to take the keyboard off and still have the stand when watching a movie or presenting a slide show.The backside stand folds out and allows the user to easily adjust the portrait-mode screen angle for comfortable viewing.Cons:The keyboard has an unconventional layout, doesn't have a mute or escape key, and the CTRL-control key isn't in the lower-left corner where touch typists expect it to be.The back-cover stand works very well when using the tablet in landscape orientation, but doesn't work at all well for portrait-mode use. At least it's easy to just pickup the tablet, fold the keyboard back or remove it, then hold it in portrait orientation.* Good keyboard feel for such a thin, lightweight keyboard. Good key travel and feedback, and it's almost full-sized and very comfortable for people who touch-type.* The trackpad doesn't automatically shutdown the trackpad when the user is typing, but does have a keystroke setting (Fn-Tab) to turn the trackpad off.* The trackpad is functional, but smaller than most.