Have you taken a look at any of Keychron’s offerings? https://www.keychron.com/products/keychron-k3-max-qmk-via-wireless-custom-mechanical-keyboard Checks most of the boxes other than the knob.
this post was submitted on 09 May 2024
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Thanks for the recommendation. I've definitely been keeping an eye on Keychron, everyone seems to have excellent impressions of them.
NuPhy’s got some interesting options as well. https://nuphy.com/collections/keyboards/products/halo75-v2-qmk-via-wireless-custom-mechanical-keyboard
The low profile space is a little tricky. It leans into column staggered ergonomic boards really quickly. Kailh’s Choc switch is as low as you can go, but those folks get really custom really quick. They’re not big on function rows or arrow clusters, so the next step after Keychron or NuPhy would be something along the lines of the Afternoon Breeze. https://www.afternoonlabs.com/breeze/
The Nuphy's do seem a little more my speed for style and feel. I like the practical implementations of rgb on those new models you linked to. They're not much more expensive either.
I wonder why that is. Almost none of the low profile options have rotary encoders. I don't think a column staggered design would be a good fit for me right now, though I'm sure they're nice. I may just have to compromise on the encoder, or the low profile. I feel like the low profile might be less important to me.
Are you seeking just low profile keycaps, or do you want the whole thing to be particularly low profile? The former is pretty easy to retrofit to any board that you like with the Womier XVX low profile sets being pretty decent and quite cheap.
I hadn't really considered this, but I think I would want the entire thing to be low profile if I went that route. Not that it wouldn't work great or anything, but it seems like it might be odd to have low prof. caps on a full thickness board? Maybe I'm just overthinking it.
As it currently stands, I'm considering giving up the volume knob because there doesn't seem to be any models that fit all of my requirements. Currently leaning towards the Nuphy brand
If you like numpads and don't mind the slight tweaks from a 96% layout, the Keychron K17 Pro actually checks all your boxes (though QMK reprogramming usually only works on wired mode, once it's sent to the board it should be persistent).
Don't know why they haven't plopped a knob down on one of their low profile TKL's, actually. Keychron LOOOOVES new SKU's.
I didn't mention it in the description, but I think in my head I was definitely imagining a TKL form factor. Thinking about it though, I probably wouldn't mind the extra width too much. I think I could manage just fine with it, and the numberpad would be better than the one that's on my laptop currently (it's got a single-width zero key instead of double width that I'm used to...)
Yeah, I definitely found their website to be a bit overwhelming. Lol.
Thanks for finding that one for me, it's going on the list for when I'm ready to pull the trigger.