This M60 keyboard builds on all of that by providing a socketed microcontroller, so even if it isn't the layout I prefer, I'll still look into buying one for the sole sake of supporting this work. Open source design & easy-to-program QMK-ish firmware are also huge plusses.
I also love the fact that pictured are the new Kailh Silent Pink switches. I got a small amount a couple weeks ago and want to get more, but they've sold out at US distributors. If the M60 is ever offered as a "full kit" then I hope those switches are an option.
Hoping you will enjoy M60.
De-soldered switches are especially prone to this problem because the leftover solder on the legs makes them 1) more brittle, and 2) irregularly shaped, so switches like vintage blacks are kind of a no-go for hotswap.
Some have reported the hotswap sockets pop out when forcing switches in, which I personally haven't witnessed myself. The impact ranges from a trivial matter of needing to apply more solder to the pad, all the way up to the hot swap socket ripping off the pad itself (very difficult to repair).
Hotswap sockets are less secure than switches that are directly soldered on, which means that one typically will want to use them in combination with a switch plate. Switch plates, however, have the counter-intuitive effect of raising the pitch of your keyboard's sound profile. Most people don't realize this. By a lot of standards, a plate-less keyboard does sound better, and with hotswap all those keys will start looking slightly crooked fast.
These nitpicks are things most users will never notice, but people who have been in the hobby for a long time do notice them, and those folks happen to be very vocal and influential. Then there's also the fact that anyone who is willing to design a PCB is probably savvy enough to desolder without issues. These factors are why there appears to be a strong anti-hotswap movement.
Overall, I'd still recommend using hotswap.
Those who are confident in their switch choice will prefer less wobble, and probably have multiple keyboards anyway with different switches.
[1] https://novelkeys.xyz/products/kailh-low-profile-switches [2] https://keeb.io/collections/keyboard-pcbs/products/nyquist-k... https://www.littlekeyboards.com/collections/new-products/pro... [3] https://drop.com/buy/massdrop-x-olkb-planck-light-mechanical... https://www.keychron.com/products/keychron-k1-wireless-mecha... https://www.logitechg.com/en-us/products/gaming-keyboards/g9...
I agree. The best keyboard I have ever used was a SteelSeries-branded keyboard in a MSI GT70 Dominator Dragon laptop. The keys had great depth/travel, took a fair bit of pressure to press (only a bit annoying after super long sessions), and coupled with the pressure/feedback, the tactile feel was just amazing. I started with Cherry Reds for a number of years before I realized that the switches were the reason my typing sucked. With Cherry Blues my accuracy got much better but still not perfect, and the switches just felt cheap to press and the clicking noise also sounded cheap/plasticky. Recently I switched to Matias Alps quiet clicks which are reminiscent of that SteelSeries keyboard but still not quite as good - the keycaps don't attach perfectly to the switches so they rattle a bit, and the switches just don't feel as good. I'm going to try some low profile switches once I've convinced myself that it's worth spending another $100-150 on a keyboard which probably won't be that great... Unfortunately I've grown used to a split keyboard with my custom keymap and I love it a lot more than the normal keyboard layout so I'm stuck with shitty switches.
If you're comfortable with C (and setting up the toolchain in the right way), great.
Allowing customisation with Python is for greater accessibility.
Source: run a quantum computer on Python
from https://makerdiary.com/blogs/mechanical-keyboards/the-story-...
There are solutions out there, but they all amount to hacks; what I think I really want is for the second keyboard to not have a keymap at all, but instead to transmit unicode code points, but there isn't a standard way to do that.
Anyway, this project looks cool: I'd really like to buy a hackable keyboard that lets me work on customisation without having to deal with everything else (especially building it from components.)
This seems like it would be a great alternative where you could have a Mac configuration - with media keys - mapped pretty easily with a custom keycap set (unless I'm misunderstanding?).
All of the Mac functionality works as expected. The only exception was when I tried to get an 18 year old eMac to boot from CD-ROM (by holding down the C key at boot time), this didn’t work. I had to use an official Apple keyboard for that. Works fine once the machine is booted, so I’m guessing it is some sort of Mac openfirmware issue.
well worth it imo.
Edit: I mean, the product is presented very well. There was a clear investment in time and money. And because of that, this question was the first thing that came to my mind.
The only difference is that you can "certify with test" and "certify without test" (and price changes, starting from 5K a pop). Even evaluation boards and for prototyping, so I guess a end-user keyboard has to be certified[1].
[1] https://softwareengineering.stackexchange.com/questions/1352...
There is also the SpaceFn layout, which works with just one space, I know: https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=51069.0
but it feels like it could be a lot better with split spaces.
The PCB looks cool though, and BLE 5.0 is relatively uncommon nowadays (most keyboards rely on older, thus cheaper, Bluetooth enabled SoCs), but apart from that, I see little appeal for someone already invested in building mechanical keyboards.
To plug an NRF52840
https://makerdiary.com/collections/frontpage/products/nrf528...
"The Quality Goes In before the Name Goes On. From Zenith, the last TV manufacturer to adopt printed circuits.[1] Not a successful business strategy.
It's a bit expensive at $30 but seems a lot better than the Pro Micros normally used with QMK, and the shop has other form factors which are cheaper. With WiFi on the chip too this could potentially push forward the frontier of cool keyboards.
I wonder how hard it would be to make a split keyboard with these. Probably you could do I2C over a TRRS cable.
