ErgoMechKeyboards

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Ergonomic, split and other weird keyboards

Rules

Keep it ergo

Posts must be of/about keyboards that have a clear delineation between the left and right halves of the keyboard, column stagger, or both. This includes one-handed (one half doesn't exist, what clearer delineation is that!?)

i.e. no regular non-split¹ row-stagger and no non-split¹ ortholinear²

¹ split meaning a separation of the halves, whether fixed in place or entirely separate, both are fine.
² ortholinear meaning keys layed out in a grid

No Spam

No excessive posting/"shilling" for commercial purposes. Vendors are permitted to promote their products/services but keep it to a minimum and use the [vendor] flair. Posts that appear to be marketing without being transparent about it will be removed.

No Buy/Sell/Trade

This subreddit is not a marketplace, please post on r/mechmarket or other relevant marketplace.

Some useful links

EMK wiki
Split keyboard compare tool
Compare keycap profiles Looking for another set of keycaps - check this site to compare the different keycap profiles https://www.keycaps.info/
Keymap database A database with all kinds of keymap layouts - some of them fits ergo keyboards - get inspired https://keymapdb.com/

founded 1 year ago

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Looking for a portable ortholinear (lemmy.sdf.org)

submitted 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) by [email protected] to c/ergomechkeyboards

17 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Hey,

I'm looking for a portable ortholinear for taking to co-working in my backpack.

For context, I'm a coder. I use neovim all day. At home I use a maltron 3d. It's a fantastic comfortable keyboard (I think kinesis nicked the design?), although it did take getting used to.

It's the only keyboard I've ever been able to touch type on.

So yeah. I'd like to find something similar that is portable. It has to have quiet switches, as it's a shared office. Any suggestions?

So far I've looked at:

Those all look nice, but are too expensive.

How does the ergodox ez hold up these days?

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 month ago

Glove80 is probably the best commercial option, but is very expensive. For the combination you are looking for, DIY might be a good solution, depending on how adventurous you want to go. Linear choc/low-profile switches are not loud, but hard to silence. If you want silent, you'll need to tape mod and lube them (search up how). That isn't difficult, but is time-consuming. If your time is too valuable, there are sites available where you can pay people to do it before sending keys to you.

I recently designed a super easy-build portable board that I put together in an hour, for $80 and only very basic soldering skills. Shipping takes a while though. The low cost comes from having few switches/keys and using a chinese microcontroller. If you aren't ready for that few keys, there are options like the kyria or Lily that are bigger.

For portability, I'm just in the final stages of completing this 3D printed case generator that holds the two halves of a split keyboard together magnetically, protects the PCB, and has quick-unfold tent legs that you can customise at design time for your desired tenting. You could use this for whatever custom PCB you chose.