I love this. I type with one hand, & I find mechanical keyboards with lots of travel very difficult because of the speed I type at and the depth that you need to make the key activate. It's a shame about the lack of fingerprint sensor - I wonder if there's any projects out there where you could rescue one from a donor keyboard & just put that in a small profile case nearby?
Show HN: I spent 2 years designing a mechanical Magic Keyboard
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Re: Show HN: I spent 2 years designing a mechanical Magic Keyboard
#12I’m assuming it’s not possible for it to include a fingerprint sensor? As much as I’d like a mechanical keyboard for my Mac that’s always the part that gets me. I end up using the one my Magic Keyboard 20+ times per workday. Otherwise it looks beautiful.
Yes, agreed. Beautiful keyboard, but when I heard "magic" I hoped to find a touch ID. That sensor so useful that even though I use a mechanical keyboard, I keep an apple magic keyboard off to the side of my desk just for the touch ID sensor.
What I'd love to have is a standalone touch ID sensor that I could attach anywhere -- mechanical keyboard, side of the monitor, under my desk, etc. I guess this is bottlenecked by Apple's IP on the device, so I've considered just hacking one together by deconstructing and extracting an Apple keyboard...
Re: Show HN: I spent 2 years designing a mechanical Magic Keyboard
#13What does it feel like to type on?
Re: Show HN: I spent 2 years designing a mechanical Magic Keyboard
#14Looks beautiful, congrats on the launch! I've been looking for a replacement for my Apple Magic keyboard. I would love to buy one, but ISO layout is a must for me, also would like blank or swappable keycaps.
Re: Show HN: I spent 2 years designing a mechanical Magic Keyboard
#15I’m assuming it’s not possible for it to include a fingerprint sensor? As much as I’d like a mechanical keyboard for my Mac that’s always the part that gets me. I end up using the one my Magic Keyboard 20+ times per workday. Otherwise it looks beautiful.
Unfortunately not possible, at least not securely, and not in a way that users would expect. I really tried.
We could include _a_ fingerprint sensor, and even include a special secure/tamper-proof chip, but it would never be able to work with things like Apple Pay. It would probably be able to do some things like log you in to your Mac by spoofing itself as a card reader or secure key. But because we can’t communicate with Apple’s Secure Enclave it would never be a seamless experience.
Maybe someday Apple could open up Touch ID like they do with Find My. But for now it’s pretty much a non-starter.
Re: Show HN: I spent 2 years designing a mechanical Magic Keyboard
#16dang, this seems really amazing
Re: Show HN: I spent 2 years designing a mechanical Magic Keyboard
#17This looks great. Never liked the idea of having to add wrist rests to all these tall bulky mechanical keyboards.
Does it support the globe key without having to use karabiner?
Re: Show HN: I spent 2 years designing a mechanical Magic Keyboard
#18Nice!
The devil is in the details.
Do you have a french version? ...
Re: Show HN: I spent 2 years designing a mechanical Magic Keyboard
#19Looks beautiful and great presentation of your efforts. Hope it lives up to its expectations. All the best
Re: Show HN: I spent 2 years designing a mechanical Magic Keyboard
#20Lovely engineering; if you bring it to market(?) I suggest offering if not full customization a range of aesthetics.
Black/red is a hard no for me. Something fitting with the existing aesthetic (let's call it "Scandanavian milled", subtle frosting, white text) or warmer ("natural", off-white, orange LEDs) etc etc.
One other question: waterproof? I assume that's not possible. Would be a decision maker for me personally probably.