Been thinking of doing this for over a year and finally got round to it. Found parts. Spent hours soldering, lubricating, stuffing with foam and programming QMK. So happy with the final result. It’s a joy to use.
Gateron yellow switches. YMDK PCB, backplate and case. Ali Express keycaps.
It’s a budget build and none of this is high end…but it has still worked out really well.
Wow this looks sexy af. I only have a bought one that is simply not dying on me. Seeing this beauty makes me want to do one too but damn, i dont think i am able to put in all that hard work.
If you have more money than time, then you can find hotswap PCBs and pre-lubed switches; and that will mean all you’ve got to do is press the parts together. Soldering and lubricating are the most tedious parts.
The great thing about it is you can make it whatever you want it to be. For me it is: left is backspace, middle is to access another layer (which makes left home row letters into direction buttons and right home row letters into number buttons), right button is space.
I’m not home to post a picture, but it would be clearer if I could show you a screenshot of the layout. Basically this means I only ever have to move my hands away from home row to press enter or special symbols.
I’m still figuring out QMK/Vial. What I actually want to do is use right shift as “up” is tapped and “shift” if held down. I can do that with auto hot key, but haven’t figured out how to do it yet with QMK.
If anyone is able to help ELI5 how to add tapdancing and combos to QMK vial forked firmware that would help a lot.
I switched from always using browns. Liked reds to start with but now I’m really happy with having linears with slightly more resistance. Highly recommended. Might not be the best switches out there, but they’re cheap and readily available.
Keyboards aren’t difficult to build nowadays with what’s available. Worth looking at if you’re interested.
Although it can get expensive pretty quikly and if you’re not the type to enjoy making things like this then there are a lot of good premade ones you can buy now.
Also if you find this entertaining, then you could also try going down the rabbithole of handwired keyboards.
I absolutely love tinkering, building, and fiddling with things until I get it just right. Watching scotto was like offering crack to someone who mentioned they enjoyed Ritalin once. Cheers :)
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