It will have happened to all of us at least once in our lives when we have finished installing our operating system and when we are ready to work on some type of specific document, certain grammatical signs do not respond according to what the printed keys show us. This situation could be deepened in Windows 8.1, since a very special element that generally appears in versions lower than Windows 7, simply appears invisible here.
Despite the absence of this element (ES) that is generally located in the toolbar and to one side of the taskbar, the possibility of correctly configuring our keyboard in Windows 8.1 can be managed in the way conventional, that is, following the normal procedure with the Control Panel; supposing that you have already run Windows 8.1 updates, we will start from there to teach how this task should be done.
The different types of keyboard to configure in Windows 8.1
To have a better idea of what we will do next, it is necessary and necessary that we fully identify the different keyboards that we could have on the computer; for this we will propose 3 of them, which are the most popular when trying work with a Spanish or English keyboard in Windows 8.1, They have their respective variants and that it is very important to analyze before starting to configure our operating system with the correct keyboard.
The image that we have placed in the upper part corresponds to a Spanish keyboard, but with a Latin American layout; to have a better basis for differentiation, We suggest the reader to take into account the keys in the upper right part where the question marks are found. There you can admire them, both the upper and lower part of the key, which suggests that this sign will appear if we press the Shift key or not.
The 2nd type of keyboard that we have proposed and that is located at the top has a completely different key layout than the first. We also want to make a differentiation with the question marks, being able to observe that here only the one who closes the question is present, which is located in the lower right. This distribution belongs to an American, so even the letter "ñ" is not present.
A 3rd option is presented on the keyboard with a Spanish layout; here the options are present to place the question marks, but when the Shift key is pressed, they are in the same position as the first one that we proposed previously.
Configure our keyboard from the Control Panel in Windows 8.1
Once we have identified the 3 most used keyboard types, then now it is our turn to go to the place where the configuration is located, something that directly involves the Control Panel.
- We click with the right mouse button on the new Start Menu icon (alternatively we could use Win + X).
- We select the option of Control panel.
- In the area of Watch, language and region we select the option «Add a Language«. (Learn to change language in Windows 8)
- We will see the default language for Windows 8.1.
- We click on the link of the «Options«.
- In the section of "Input method»We click on«Preview«.
This is practically the most important starting point to be able to continue with the configuration process or simply, to stop there; the distribution that you can admire there is referring to a keyboard without having to press the Shift key, so we should already know whether or not we are using a configuration that goes according to what we have on the computer.
If this is not the case, then now we will have to close this window and proceed to select the link that says «Add an input method«.
From the entire list that appears there we have to choose the one that corresponds to the one we have in the team; In Windows 8.1 this task is much easier, since each of the options shown there has a link that says "Preview", which will help us to make a small comparison of a specific configuration with what we need to have in the computer to write correctly.