this post was submitted on 15 Jun 2023
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Mechanical Keyboards

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Ordered a Keychron K2 which should be arriving next week, but I wasn't really feeling any of the keycap selections on their website

where do y'all buy keycaps?

I'd prefer to get some with MacOS style media keys, but not a deal-breaker

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[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago

Nigel from Flashquark here!
I don't think we have any keycaps with Mac icons on them at this time, but we do have keycaps in general that you might be interested in:
Flashquark.com

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago
[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

For in-stock keycaps that aren't too expensive, try Cannonkeys, or Novelkeys when they have a sale. You can also check thocstock. Drop is also an option, although nobody likes Drop.

The coolest keycaps are generally sold as group buys run by dozens of different vendors around the globe. You can check mechgroupbuys or keycaplendar for info on those. (Or browse geekhack)

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

Why does nobody like Drop?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

Aliexpress is also out there, though quality will be inconsistent and there won't be two day delivery.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Aliexpress is good for clone caps. Clone caps are a bit of a touchy subject in the community, but if you realistically weren't going to drop $200+ on GMK caps anyway you can probably live with yourself. Drop also has a lot of sets in their MT3 profile, KBDFans has the PBTFans brand which has some cool sets. For other retailers that sell caps you have:

  • Cannon Keys
  • Divinikey
  • Kono Store
  • KPRepublic
  • Mekibo
  • Novelkeys
  • Vala Supply

Probably more I'm forgetting. For cheap sets that aren't specifically clones Amazon is probably easiest, but make sure to double check the layout compatibility.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I wouldn’t recommend kprepublic, i’ve had nothing but bad experiences with them. +1 to Divinikey and NovelKeys though.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

kprepublic sent me a shipping notification with a fake tracking number (so I couldn't cancel my order anymore) and then waited until I emailed them to tell me the stuff I ordered was out of stock and wouldn't ship for 2-3 months. I ended up having to file a chargeback.

I've had better luck with KBDFans for cheapie keycaps.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

As a fellow Mac user, I think you’re in for a challenge finding Mac media keys from anyone but Keychron, at least from my observations. Unfortunately most keycap sets don’t even include Command or Option keys. I own one Akko ASA profile set which does include those. I’ve also seen that PBTFans sets generally include Cmd/Opt, but I don’t personally own one. Best of luck!

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

yeah that's what I'm noticing, pretty much everything is just the standard F1-F12

I did stumble upon a few sellers on Etsy who appear to sell Mac keycaps though so I may just have to dig around for some of the more obscure keys

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

Sorry I didn't see this sooner. I just did the same hunt, and came to the same conclusion.

I ended up getting the PBTfans Dolch set from Divinikey which comes with a decent number of relegendable caps: I figured that way if I missed them I could make my own media keys. But I'm getting along fine without them – I've been on the Mac long enough that I'm pretty well drilled on the ones I use.

Very happy both with the caps and with Divinikeys' service. I ordered a couple of other things from them – some new switches and a better switch puller – and both orders went smoothly.

The other solution I looked at for a while was WASD Keyboards printed custom keycaps. Someone uploaded their layout for Mac keyboards to GitHub and WASD also has a comprehensive layout guide if you want to make your own. I decided against it because I wanted Cherry profile caps, ideally doubleshot rather than printed, to last longer.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

Sites I like to rec would include:
Vala Supply, Kinetic Labs, NovelKeys, The Key Company, and Osume

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

I'm a little bit of an outlier because I pretty much only like uniform keycap profiles, but I've been really happy with my Akko doubleshot PBT keycaps. I'm using Akko ASA low profile keycaps on both my work and home boards and they're great. The profile is very similar to XDA.

Akko definitely makes some sets with mac mod keys, tho I think not all of them.

I just got mine off Amazon because I was lazy and wanted fast shipping. :P

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

wow a lot of different sites out there, thanks for the recommendations!

I got some browsin' to do

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