Hey comrades, I’ve found myself over the past four months or so becoming a huge mechanical keyboard nerd. It’s an expensive hobby but it’s so much fun and I want to know if anybody else here has also fallen into this money black hole.
I’m currently exploring different keyboard sizes, my new 75% is about to arrive but I think my favorite so far has been my 65%. Judging from my personal experience, I’m pretty sure I’ll be a 75% guy mostly. I have no interest in trying a 60%, because I love the convenience of having arrow keys.
I used to think I needed a numpad, but nowadays I find full-size to be way too large and unwieldy. My GMK104 is gathering dust, probably soon to be sold, and my F108 Pro (the keyboard that got me hooked on this hobby) is up for sale. My goal is to make my own keyboards, and I’m probably going to start by making a DIY numpad that I can use alongside my 65% or 75%.
I’ve been exploring switches and I find that the whole thing about thocky keyboards is way overblown. I want loud clack with a sharp bottom-out, and I can’t really make up my mind as to whether I prefer tactiles or linears. I’ve tried excellent switches of both types. I might lean a bit towards tactile, but not by much really.
Although I’m okay with burning through the disposable fraction of my income on this stuff, I’m not made of money. I won’t be trying high-end switches, or any switches that are not available with affordable shipping from Aliexpress. I’m very happy with my experience so far with affordable ones, like Akko, HMX (my favorites), MMD, KTT, Outemu and Gateron.
Regarding keyboards, I don’t see myself ever buying anything that costs more than about $60 or $70. Duty fees are extremely high in my country and my currency is very undervalued right now. I’m happy with my GMK67 and GMK87, and I have a QK81 on its way right now. I found a Loop 65 for a ridiculously low price on Aliexpress recently, so I got myself one as well, but that’s as far as I’ll go with buying keyboards. From now on all my new keyboards will be homemade!
In fact, having this goal of making my own keyboards has been incredibly rewarding and motivating. I’m currently relearning how to work with electronics a decade after dropping out of engineering school, learning how to use a CNC (I have a cheap 3018 that I’m still figuring out), refining my 3D printing and modeling skills and, since I’m a woodworker, I’m thinking my DIY keyboards will have wooden cases.
I don’t really have a community or many friends with whom I can nerd out over this kind of thing. There’s an insane amount of gatekeeping in this hobby, more so than in other hobbies I’ve explored in the past, and I think that if any of my fellow Hexbears are into this stuff, I’m sure you’d be the coolest people to talk about this stuff with!
My minimalist keyboard can also do anything I could possibly want it to do, I can remap the keys on the fly in a browser window, program hotkeys and macros to make my job easier, etc. I forget how many layers it supports, more than I’d ever need for sure. Of course there are full size keyboards with that shit too, but people like me with RSI can really benefit from a compact layout that minimizes finger reach. In my case it made a huge difference.