Q: US keyboard and English International keyboard?

Have a look here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keyboard_layout

The only visual differences are the label on 2/3/4 keys for secondary functions .


However you can alter the layout in System preferences to suit US International or British - English if you choose

Some differences are

US Keyboard British Keyboard
alt 2 =™ alt 2 =€
alt shift 2 =€ alt shift 2 =™
alt 3=£ alt 3 =#
Shift 3 =# Shift 3=£

By the way @ is always shift 2 on the MAC and not above the shift key as on standard PC keyboards thats where you find ' (These are swapped over)

I may be wrong but i think most English qwerty keyboards sold in Europe are British layout and you do know you can also set up to have a portuguese layout as well +this adds ç as a primary key By pressing ;

Nothing is as easy to adjust the language set up as a Mac straight out of the bax.

This may be a VERY important decision, and one you may regret if you are used to a US keyboard.

Please see my recent post:
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=2332483&tstart=0

The bottom line is that on the european macbook they make room for the ` key by robbing you of half of the standard elongated shift key you get on a US keyboard. Consequently, stretching out with my little finger across this useless key has given me repetitive strain and I am one hurting unit at the moment.

What kind of idiots are these (the europeans I mean, and I am one of them!)? They put a key unused in most languages in one of the most useful locations on the keyboard, beside the 'Z'.

True the ` is near useless in english grammer however the tilde ~ (shift `) does have some purpose.

Most touch typists tend to use the right hand shift key as its much most natural for a right handers pinky !

On this page

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT2841

you can see the difference between English British, English International, and English US.

Note that US has no character key to the left of the z, and things are also slightly different on the right by the Return key. Plus what is created by a few keys on the top row.

The only visual differences are the label on 2/3/4 keys for secondary functions .

I think the choice the OP has to make is probably between ISO and ANSI keyboards, which have the additional difference of the former having one key more than the latter.