Hmm, keyboard with witch type keycaps.
this post was submitted on 05 Jul 2023
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It’s a lot of personal preference. I really love xda, but I very much doubt there are downsides to anything besides very very sculpted old school key caps.
I use XDA and I find them a bit flat, but that's preference. DSA and KAM are a bit more sculpted, so I'd recommend picking one of the three based on how much sculpting you want.
I don't think there are really any major downsides to uniform profile keycaps, it's ultimately mostly preference. The only thing that might cause issues could be the homing j and f keys if you only get a set that supports QWERTY. But that's a much smaller problem than not being able to rearrange the caps at all due to a sculpted profile. Blanks are a good option, and forces you to learn your new layout without looking at the keyboard, but I understand the appeal of having that available to speed up the learning process and commit it to muscle memory.
Therefore should I be looking for flat profile caps like XDA, DSA and KAM or are there any big downsides to them?
Keycap profile choice is basically preference, so unfortunately, you kind of have to try a few to know what you prefer. Many love DSA, but I can barely type on it. I do better with uniform SA R3 (SA, but flat) but I prefer sculpted sets generally.
In theory, people with smaller fingers would benefit from keycaps with a strong sculpt because they wouldn't have to reach as far between rows. In practice, I don't that generalization actually works out.
How about using blanks? This way you don't have to move them around that much and it could make switching layout quicker for your brain, as it won't associate a symbol (on a key) to a position on the board.
I think in the beginning it would help to see the legend on the key you are pressing. On the other side, you wouldn‘t learn touch typing by looking at the keyboard…
To counter that, put a print out of your keymap on the side of your monitor. That way if you don't know where something is, you can find it there, then try and hit the keys without looking at the board. If you do that, it doesn't really matter what your legends are.
Just switched from OEM to DSA on my lily. It's taking a bit of getting used to but I like it a lot. Can't speak to other uniform profiles tho