I'm building my own keyboard. It's as simple as that.
Why? Because I want to. And I've yet to find a keyboard that looks the way I want it to. The solution seems to be to build your own. So that's what I'm doing.
The layout is a split keyboard with the keys in a matrix. Here's a pic (v2)
Every keyboard I've tried have always forced you to put your hands inwards, in a / \ way (pretend that's your arms). But I want to be able to keep my arms like | | or even \ /. With a split keyboard where you can move each module to where you want it to be you can achive this. I think this would give you better ergonomics, but we'll see. We might be using the one-module-fits-all approach for more than just cheaper-to-produce reasons. But if you never try, you never know.
As far as I've found, the only reason we use keyboards with slanted columns is because 'it has always been like that'. Like, from the typewriter-era. And then it was for mechanical reasons. But now that we no longer have metal arms that must be physically fit into the layout, we can design it just as we want. And apparently the slanted-columns-layout is bad for you. You stretch your fingers in an un-natural way which puts strain on your limbs and increases the odds of injury. That is just bad. So I'm going for a linear matrix layout because I like my fingers. They should have the best typing experiance they can have.
Do you really use F1 so much that it needs its own dedicated key? I don't. So tucking it away under Raise+1 works well. I think. Also, doing it layered gives you way more keys than you actually have. Take module A. It has 30 keys. 2 of which are layer modifiers. This gives me 28 keys to play with, in three layers. So I actually got 28x3 keys, so thats 84 keys in total. I probably won't use that many, but it is nice to have the possibility. Mainly though, it cuts down on parts used and size, which is a big things given that 3D-printers (or at least mine) can't print super-mega-big things. Credit where it is due: The Planck keyboard has this (https://youtu.be/bEPg8kk84gw) which influenced me to have it as well.
This build is my first keyboard that I'm building from scratch. I've done a few mods, but never a complete build. To build this I'm using some mechanical switches (Black ALPS) that I 'rescued' from a to-be-thrown Dell AT101. I've got 104 keys from that old keyboard. Most of which still have the click sound. And I have the caps, ofc.
The modules cases is made to be 3D printed. I use a FlashForge Finder to print.
It's NKRO, so there is an 1N4149 diode for every switch.
The controller is an Arduino Micro (https://store.arduino.cc/arduino-micro).
Each module will be it's own keyboard. Meaning, each module will has it's own controller. So you don't need to plug in A to be able to use B and vice versa. This ofc means that, for 2 modules, you need 2 USB ports. One could build a USB hub as well to plug the modules into. Makes for a cleaner setup as you will only need 1 cable going to the computer. Might try building in retractable cables in everything if I take a stab at it, but well see how much of a pain that is.
| Todo | Doing | Done |
|---|---|---|
| Create basic working matrix | ||
| Create 3D sketches for modules | ||
| Create schematics for matrix | ||
| Get hands on a 3D printer | ||
| Get diods | ||
| Print test module | ||
| Assemble test module | ||
| Code test module | ||
| Get real controller board | ||
| Refactor | ||
| Print module A | ||
| Print module B | ||
| Assemble A | ||
| Assemble B | ||
| Code A | ||
| Code B | ||
| ??? | ||
| Refactor | ||
| Profit |