Is there any type of work that is NOT suitable on these keyboards? I feel that the UP and DOWN keys are kind of strain at least in the beginning.
edit Holy just checked the price and it's above $200. Why is it so expensive? It's almost at par with my second-hand laptop. I guess it's fancy but do you feel the price is justified?
Is the price justified? It is because it is a small run. If Logitech did it, it could have been much cheaper because of economizes of scale, but Logitech doesn't make it. Is it for yourself? That's your choice, try it if you can, and then check your budget.
Personally, I got my current keyboard, a $200+ Topre RealForce after trying a bunch of keyboard in a specialized shop. I didn't look at the price, and unfortunately, I preferred the most expensive. I didn't buy it outright, because I too thought that $200 is way too much for a keyboard, but I came back later, and bought it. I have been using it for 8 years and I see no reason to change, and not once I have regretted my purchase.
The most joyful keyboard I’ve ever had is a modified HHKB with a logic board that can run QMK
It’s both a nicer object than all my homebrew boards and it has the same customization potential
I had to intentionally practice for a couple of weeks before I felt really comfortable typing. When it came to typing symbols I've always been a cheater, so the shift+numrow symbols were the hardest for me to remember.
Replacing the modifier switches with loud and clicky ones helped me get the feedback needed to allow me to type combinations quickly (and ZSA optionally sells a secondary pack of ten with your purchase, just enough for the mods/space/enter/esc).
The arrow keys should be familiar to anyone seriously using vim / vim bindings, as they're in the same hjkl configuration.
The thing made hardest with this keyboard is actually video games. There are fewer buttons in the range of one hand, so I often end up remapping some buttons to my mouse if I have to. The ctrl/z/x/c keys are all pretty hard to press when your hand is on w/a/s/d. For games that fully utilize a keyboard (Space Engineers, GMod, etc) you will find yourself making layers specific to those games.
This all being said, I don't have the largest hands and I enjoy that my wrists basically don't have to move around. The customization is a treat. I actually take it with me to work and back home, because it's so small and easy to move that I don't mind it. Also I made a numpad layer that I'm really happy with, and that only works on an ortholinear.
The price tag is serious, but the keyboard is hand assembled by well paid workers in Taiwan. For the amount of time I spend typing on my keyboard (at least 8 hours a day, every day) I'm perfectly happy to dispense with some money for a solid product.
A couple of weeks sound fine. I'm a very light Vim user but I do find the arrow key setup familiar.
I agree that video games are hard to play with these keyboards. I'll think about it as I do play some games.
I'd say situations where you need more discrete buttons that are easily accessible. Gaming comes to mind as a big one where the lack of physical keys in a situation where you need immediate access is going to be difficult. This is of course game dependent and some games can be easily accommodated. Tasks that aren't as latency-dependent will be mostly fine.
> edit Holy just checked the price and it's above $200. Why is it so expensive? It's almost at par with my second-hand laptop. I guess it's fancy but do you feel the price is justified?
Manufacturing relatively low volume products with injection molded parts and the need to hand assemble the keyboards is pretty expensive. You can find planck kits for cheap and if you know how to solder you could build one for under 100 dollars probably. DIY kits will usually use stacked laser-cut acrylic or 3d printed cases. The price is justified if you want one that is well made and prebuilt.
Not so long for typing out letters if your fingers are disciplined to stick to each column. e.g. it didn't take me long to switch my Dvorak skills to use it.
Getting comfortable with typing symbols took more time, since there's more flexibility about where you put the symbols on the keyboard.
> Is there any type of work that is NOT suitable on these keyboards?
I'd say the reduced-size layouts don't lose much when you can keep both hands on the keyboard. (e.g. using Emacs or Vim in a terminal).
e.g. they're especially difficult to use for FPS games; or for (say) Blender or using KiCad where moving your hand all-over the keyboard. (It's possible to an extent to customise the layout to work with various use-cases, though).
> Price
ZSA's keyboards come with warranty, etc.
I got a BM40 (sold on AliExpress) for about $100. Expensive, but high quality.
There are ways to assemble niche keyboards for a lower budget, but it won't be as nice a quality.
I found it unsuitable for gaming, since my layout was programming-related. I'm sure I could have configured it for gaming, but I found it easier to just switch to a regular keyboard.
It's also not totally suitable for writing in other than English. If you have other characters, like accents, I found it difficult to program the keyboard properly.
Otherwise, the sky's the limit.