In high school (when the typewriter had just been invented), I hit 90 and was the fastest in my class. I just took joyfulgirl’s test and got a net 110, which got a dry “you type fairly well”.
I guess I can’t expect to get my gratification from java applets.
Fastest I’ve personally seen: 120wpm on a manual by a fellow (femlow) high school student.
Slowest I’ve ever seen: Driver’s license examiner using two fingers on a maual. He was a study in slow motion. I figured he must of been queer 'cause he was a hunt ‘n’ pecker.
Now my speed with the obligatory personal account. I typed 40wpm coming out of the high school class. Sometime later when the skill actually came in handy using teletype machines my speed was 20wpm. Decided to buy a new fangled 386 computer, get books on WordPerfect, Lotus 1-2-3, and dBase III, some typing software, and study for a career in data entry. Studied a chapter in each book every night. Had my typing speed up to 50wpm.
Now the kicker, after interviewing for a job where I had to show the tester how to access the computer testing program, and passing with flying colors, I was told, “We don’t hire men for secretary jobs.”
47 wpm with 90% acuracy. I never took a typing class so I guess that’s about as good as I can expect. <shrug> At least I rarely have to look at the keyboard!
That’s why I have 2 original IBM PS/2 keyboards. These are the large ones that have 102 keys with keycovers that come off so you can clean them, or rearrange them into other keyboard configurations. Plus these keyboards are practicallly indestructible.
Me, I used to type upwards of 80-90 WPM when I was working at the call center, but it has probably come down to about 65 WPM now. Still pretty good for somone who got a C- in typing class in High School. (25 WPM back then… Hey, I was a slow learner!)
Typing teacher: Donkeyoatey! Your work has certainly improved. There are only ten mistakes here.
Donkeyoatey: Oh good!
Teacher: Now let’s look at the second line, shall we?
I just keep my left elbow on the space bar and use my right one to type. I get 800 wpm, and take the next 29 minutes to clean it up a little.
55WPM, officially; I needed to be certified for at least 40 for my previous position. My certification was on an actual electric typewriter at a DC government office, I imagine on a keyboard I’m closer to 80. I tried Joyfulgirl’s link but it doen’t want to work for me.
Using the test Joyfulgirl posted, 126 WPM with 98% accuracy. It seems that the rate measured by different programs/applets vary widely; I got around 90 WPM on Brainbench and 100 with gtypist the last time I used them. Cyn, I’m using a QWERTY keyboard; I tried the Dvorak mapping once, and I got up to about 30 WPM, but my QWERTY performance dropped to something like 20 WPM when I had to use the keyboards at work or school.
I probably type over 100wpm if I’m just chatting or sending a quick e-mail. That falls to about 75-80wpm if I’m copying from text using only words and standard punctuation. Using the top-row numbers slows me down to… I’d guess about 40-50wpm (depending on how many 4,5,6, and 7s there are;)). As for using the top-row punctuation, forget about it. I can’t even touch-type those.