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I spent a year designing a low profile, minimal mechanical keyboard

electronicmaterialsoffice.com

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Re: I spent a year designing a low profile, minimal mechanical keyboard

#391

Post by drw85 »

lloeki wrote: post #315
birdman3131 wrote: post #288

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Its designed for apple and not windows. Note the presence of a command key. Apple calls the backspace key a delete key even though its not. (It may do delete as a shift option.)

> Apple calls the backspace key a delete key even though its not Historically the backspace key is literally that, moving the typewriter's carriage back (when the space key moves it forward). On current computers the space key now inserts a "space" character instead of simply moving the cursor a step right. Backspace isn't symmetric to that anymore, as it doesn't even insert a space back but deletes backwards, so it…

Isn't this kind of a "point of view" thing? Backspace does add a space backwards. If there was a character there, it gets replaced with a space. :D

Re: I spent a year designing a low profile, minimal mechanical keyboard

#392

Post by Larrikin »

Am I weird in not understanding the reason someone would dedicate the space on their desk for a full size keyboard and be against the extra few inches for the numpad and the navigation keys?

They've been missing from laptops for a while now, but the absence at least makes sense there.

I see a lot of cool designs for keyboards (like this one), but they are usually Windows only and then also chop off the numpad and navigation keys.

Re: I spent a year designing a low profile, minimal mechanical keyboard

#394

Post by crote »

varispeed wrote: post #216
leohonexus wrote: post #68

Beautiful, but it’ll be a pain to find contract manufacturers willing to do that keycap design. From the render I can already count 8 different injection molds required, which doesn’t sound feasible for a low-volume production run. You'd either have to price it very aggressively or be advised by your manufacturers during DFM to use standard low-profile keycaps instead. For folks curious about keyboard manufacturing,…

Is it known why the molds have not gone down in price? Or is it another chicken and egg problem? (customers don't order molds because it is expensive and look for off the shelf components, companies don't invest in making molding more affordable, because there is not enough customers...)

Because you are designing and producing a one-off items. Basically, you are engineering a tool which allows you to shoot molten plastic at high pressure into tiny cavities, with tolerances smaller than a tenth of a millimeter for the end product. That's not at all trivial and therefore unaffordable, unless you are building molds which will be used to create tens, if not hundreds of thousands of copies.

The cheap option is to reuse an existing mold, mostly by asking a manufacturer to create keycaps in an existing profile, but in a color of your choice. That's what almost everyone in the keyboard industry does.

I agree with the OP. Either they have to sell tens of thousands of this keyboard, or it is going to be priced in the high-hundreds or even low thousands of $.

Re: I spent a year designing a low profile, minimal mechanical keyboard

#395

Post by ThrowawayR2 »

paledot wrote: post #338

I want to hear more about what you expect the rotary encoder to be used for. You clearly put a lot of thought into making it happen, so - why? I feel like there must be some interesting use cases, but I'm drawing a blank.

A rotary encoder can be mapped to the mouse wheel for scrolling documents, reducing the need to move the hand to the mouse to perform that.

As an aside, if that sounds interesting, you can do this with some of the cheap USB volume knobs available from Amazon, etc. that have a configuration menu, e.g. https://hackaday.com/2022/01/20/setup-menu-uses-text-editor-...

Re: I spent a year designing a low profile, minimal mechanical keyboard

#396

Post by nine_k »

minimaul wrote: post #256
smeej wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The font thing is bigger than people might think. As soon as I saw the number row, I had such an immediate and harsh reaction to it that it surprised me. I almost couldn't believe that was the cause, but when I waited for the device to turn around again, that was definitely it. I don't even have to look at my fingers often, but I wouldn't be able to stand walking by those numbers on a regular basis. I don't think I'v…

I agree - for me I like the keyboard as a whole, but the bits that bug me are: - the rotary encoder. I don't see what the aim of this is - what's the intended usecase? - the font on the numbers. I feel like it should match the font used on the other keys instead, which I think I like but it's hard to tell because there's no good actual picture of the keyboard as a whole - drop the model name on the right. I get that…

One typical use for a rotary encoder is volume control.

The sticking-upwards knob makes the keyboard harder to transport though. It definitely risks to be broken off when put into a backpack.

Re: I spent a year designing a low profile, minimal mechanical keyboard

#397

Post by jsperx »

I have never owned a mechanical keyboard but have been curious —- this design looks very sharp. I like the sleek heft of my MX Keys, this seems like it would be an upgrade. I do have a small quibble about the website though: the use of “Kailh©” with the copyright symbol. The name is trademarked, so could be written KAILH or Kailh® but never the ©.

Re: I spent a year designing a low profile, minimal mechanical keyboard

#398

Post by UncleEntity »

ebastler wrote: post #223
lpasselin wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How much does a pcb like this cost for a small prototyping batch of 1 or 5 for example?

Depends a lot. If you want it fully assembled, you have to go to larger fab houses like PCBway, and spend a few hundred bucks on a 5pc batch. If you can hand-solder some parts (in this case, the Bluetooth module and the USB connector) and design the rest around jlcpcbs libraries, you can get away with 20-30USD per unit (MOQ of 5) plus shipping/customs. Then add another 10USD for the bluetooth module and USB connector…

> Hope this doesn't sound like an ad…

It is actually very informative, I was very surprised to learn that one could get fully assembled prototypes for a few hundred bucks.

Re: I spent a year designing a low profile, minimal mechanical keyboard

#399

Post by crote »

ebastler wrote: post #223
lpasselin wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How much does a pcb like this cost for a small prototyping batch of 1 or 5 for example?

Depends a lot. If you want it fully assembled, you have to go to larger fab houses like PCBway, and spend a few hundred bucks on a 5pc batch. If you can hand-solder some parts (in this case, the Bluetooth module and the USB connector) and design the rest around jlcpcbs libraries, you can get away with 20-30USD per unit (MOQ of 5) plus shipping/customs. Then add another 10USD for the bluetooth module and USB connector…

Seconding this. At the top end of the range, about $150 / each if you buy 15 of them at a reputable factory. Half of that is components, a tenth is the PCB, rest is assembly.

If you are going to hand-assemble a macropad or something, you end up paying more in shipping than you pay for a set of 5 PCBs.

Also, most factories allow you to calculate the price on their website! Look for PCBway, Elecrow, JLCPCB, OSH Park, or a dozen others.

Re: I spent a year designing a low profile, minimal mechanical keyboard

#400

Post by grishka »

seanbarry wrote: post #229

There's a lot of criticism in the comments here, some of it feels very negative. I can imagine reading it as the OP is quite demoralising. Personally I think what the OP has achieved is very impressive. The design looks beautiful, and there's a very "Apple-esque" feel to the website. I love that sustainability has been made a requirement as part of the design. I think some of the other comments give good feedback abo…

It looks really nice, but it's not for me — I won't be able to use any non-100% keyboard 100% comfortably due to my stupid habits that refuse to change — and that's fine.

The OP did an extremely impressive job, and that's what matters in the end. I can totally see them selling a lot of these.

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