Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

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

electronicmaterialsoffice.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

481–490 of 688 posts

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

#481

Post by Fetiorin »

ponyous wrote: post #390
inciampati wrote: post #80

All that effort, the modern components, the slim design, the monobody, the Bluetooth, the rotary encoder. Beautiful. And it isn't ortholinear. The layout is designed to 1880s specifications. Will you share plans for self fab with an alternative key organization?

Just wondering, but is ortholinear actually better? It's not like my fingers are 4 parallel lines. And I don't have hands perfectly straight on the keyboard either - hands come in at an angle.

Note that on normal keyboard all alpha keys are staggered to the left. For both hands. So, this stagger is not helping you to keep your left hand at correct angle.

"Grid" ortholinear is not an ultimate solution either, but it is more comfy (from personal experience).

There is a short video about ortho vs stagger https://youtu.be/Ho_CFfdsmc8

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

#482

Post by barrenko »

flkiwi wrote: post #454
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…

Echoing this in full. Except the whole site was screaming THINKPAD! at the top of its lungs at me. Which, again, isn't a bad thing. I'm typing on a thinkpad and have a mbp right next to me. It's a lovely design.

Thinkapple:).

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

#483

Post by Tsiklon »

z9znz wrote: post #444
aemerson_ wrote: post #387

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks, I'm so happy you — and lots of others — like what I've been working on. It means a lot, it's very fulfilling. I don't find the criticism demoralising. Quite the opposite, it means people are engaged, which I love. I tried to create a product with a strong design and as a result it's quite divisive. That's okay. Good, even. I put this thing up on the internet and asked for peoples opinions... and that's what I…

I love it, from what I see. I will definitely be an early buyer (US version...). I wish we could all have a real conversation about key layouts, though. The layout with the less reachable left shift and right enter/return is just dumb. It's like putting the door lock control on the outside of your car door so you have to roll the window down to reach out and unlock the door. In place of where the door lock belongs, t…

Like you I have issues with the iso layout, my dislike comes from the enter key. It’s a fundamental layout issue that trips me every time. Especially on Apple products, where the right side of the keyboard is brought in by .25/.5U, so that the descending portion of the enter key is stupidly narrow

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

#485

Post by opan »

interleave wrote: post #423

This looks fantastic! A thought-experiment that may interest you coming from someone (me) who already has happily spent several hundreds of dollars on mechanical keyboards and uses them every single day: Let's imagine the keyboard could be bought today as-is with a simple "Buy Now" button and price was no concern. The two main reasons I would _still_ hesitate to hit that button are: 1. I absolutely and undoubtedly ne…

Looks like the switches are chocs. You can get blank caps from mkultra.click.

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

#486

Post by interleave »

freedomben wrote: post #449
interleave wrote: post #423

This looks fantastic! A thought-experiment that may interest you coming from someone (me) who already has happily spent several hundreds of dollars on mechanical keyboards and uses them every single day: Let's imagine the keyboard could be bought today as-is with a simple "Buy Now" button and price was no concern. The two main reasons I would _still_ hesitate to hit that button are: 1. I absolutely and undoubtedly ne…

> 2. I wish there was a 'blank' version with zero typography anywhere. Just all black. I touch-type and have not looked at my keyboard in 15 years. If you don't look at it, why do you care if it has typography? (that's an honest question, not a rhetorical point dressed up as a question)

Good question. I honestly don't know.

First, John Maeda had written about this idea of a computer keyboard being more like a (musical) instrument than a tool.[^1] That always stuck with me.

Second, in itself, a keyboard is a complex object residing in my space. To me, the letters add visual noise. It's just a low hum, not a loud screech. But I would buy the blank version.

[^1]: https://johnmaeda.medium.com/thoughts-on-leading-a-remote-de...

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

#487

Post by [deleted] »

bravoetch wrote: post #442
interleave wrote: post #423

This looks fantastic! A thought-experiment that may interest you coming from someone (me) who already has happily spent several hundreds of dollars on mechanical keyboards and uses them every single day: Let's imagine the keyboard could be bought today as-is with a simple "Buy Now" button and price was no concern. The two main reasons I would _still_ hesitate to hit that button are: 1. I absolutely and undoubtedly ne…

The site describes the switches as similar to reds. Linear, no tactile bump, silent.

[deleted]

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

#488

Post by aendruk »

freedomben wrote: post #449
interleave wrote: post #423

This looks fantastic! A thought-experiment that may interest you coming from someone (me) who already has happily spent several hundreds of dollars on mechanical keyboards and uses them every single day: Let's imagine the keyboard could be bought today as-is with a simple "Buy Now" button and price was no concern. The two main reasons I would _still_ hesitate to hit that button are: 1. I absolutely and undoubtedly ne…

> 2. I wish there was a 'blank' version with zero typography anywhere. Just all black. I touch-type and have not looked at my keyboard in 15 years. If you don't look at it, why do you care if it has typography? (that's an honest question, not a rhetorical point dressed up as a question)

For me it’s unsettling to have the keys mislabeled. The options are:

- Correctly labeled keys: convenient (positive), but unachievable in practice due to occasional changes to the layout

- Blank keys: no problem (neutral)

- Mislabeled keys: something is wrong (negative)

If I’m spending $$$ on something I want at least the neutral option.

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

#489

Post by seltzered_ »

ebiester wrote: post #472
devmor wrote: post #330

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you are misunderstanding their use of the word ergonomic. They're using it in the literal sense, not the colloquial sense of gimmicky layout keyboards. All keyboards should be ergonomic in the literal sense.

You say gimmicky, I say life-changing. Now, some of them are certainly gimmicks, but split keyboards make it so much more comfortable to type that for trips of more than a day or two where I think I might have to type, I have brought my keyboard with me. (And I'd love a low profile travel version of the Kenesis Freestyle Edge, for those keyboard types who are looking for differentiating features.)

Yep. Ive spent a lot of time looking at the keyboard space and part of the reason i started the subreddit was that there werent many projects, let alone things I could just buy off the shelf, that were fairly portable and ergonomic.

Theres already a number of travel-friendly high end standard layout keyboards (Ive used the Nuphy f1 for the past year which is nice (and was essential to my portable raised tablet setup), but I miss my Kinesis Freestyle split keyboard that was great but impractical to travel with)

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

#490

Post by interleave »

barrenko wrote: post #479
interleave wrote: post #423

This looks fantastic! A thought-experiment that may interest you coming from someone (me) who already has happily spent several hundreds of dollars on mechanical keyboards and uses them every single day: Let's imagine the keyboard could be bought today as-is with a simple "Buy Now" button and price was no concern. The two main reasons I would _still_ hesitate to hit that button are: 1. I absolutely and undoubtedly ne…

I hate to tell you - and this is a common "theme" on HN - but you are probably not the target audience.

Oh, interesting! You might totally be right.

I honestly thought I was the target audience, given I have bought mech keyboards, use them all day and want to buy more. So, in my book, I'm a real prospect but, yeah, maybe there's an even smaller niche.

Post reply on HN