An earlier post said to go to the pc control panel and select pinyin as an additional input language. However, pinyin was not one of the options under the list of languages. Any other ideas? (Is it listed under the east asian language listings, for which I need to hunt down some disks that came with our computer umpteen years ago?? If so, wish me lotsa luck locating the disk!) I have made a list of "ALT + number" codes to produce the various vowels with diacritical marks to indicate the 4 tones. For example, ALT160 produces á and ALT141 is ì I learned to do this with Spanish and French, which was faster for me to code into my brain than trying to relearn a new keyboard layout. But is there something faster/simpler for pinyin? BTW having a mark over the letter is much easier for me to decipher than reading a word with a tone number at the end. Maybe that's just me. I have used NJSTAR to convert pinyin to characters. Is there something more convenient available?

Hi there, I suggested to go to the control panel, select regional and language options, select add langugages "Chinese PRC" instead of pinyin. Once the input method is addded, you can do the pinyin input through the soft keyboard. Let us know how you get on.

I like Google Pinyin myself. You can use the period and comma keys to scroll through the various characters instead of having to move your hand to the arrow keys.

Panda52: Hello again one year later haha. Now I have moved onto the Sogou pinyin software, and it allows me to use Lin's suggestion but now you can access the pinyin soft keyboard with a shortcut (ctrl+shift+k) and it's a little more convenient than having to click thru a few menus to pull up. Only hitch is that Sogou pinyin's website, installation and menus are all in full on chinese.... I know enough I can manage but if you don't know any at all then maybe you shouldn't use it quite yet!!! ^_^

i do use mostly lexilogos keyboards online http://www.lexilogos.com/keyboard/index.htm

I have been using Pinyinput. It is so easy and simple to use. Just by typing the Pinyin Ni2 hit space bar or enter = Ní. Typing hao3 hit space bar orenter = hǎo. Ní Hǎo It can be used in most, if not all types of writing programs, E-mails, Instant messengers, Facebook etc.(I have not found one it does not work in.) You can use this link to go to the page to download. http://pinyinjoe.com There are instructions for each version of Microsoft windows and for Mac. Be sure to load it into the English keyboard on the language options. It works much better. I hope this is helpful and save you some time and wear and tear on your fingers. Note** This is not a Language converter.