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Comment by prometheus76 | Hacker News Reader

I own a DasKeyboard with MX Browns and it's my daily driver at work. I prefer MX Blue switches (or even MX Greens) because I grew up in the old buckling spring era of IBM keyboard dominance (my home keyboard is an old Model M from the late 90s). I would use a clicky keyboard at work, but my coworkers don't like it, so I stick with the browns. I HIGHLY recommend the DasKeyboard. It's hefty, and I installed a custom key set with my preferred key profile and I LOVE it.

This is the one I own and I can't recommend it highly enough: https://www.daskeyboard.com/model-s-professional/

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I used a Das Keyboard for over a decade and loved it. Now I've switched to a Drop Alt so I can hotswap "better" switches and run QMK, which I've grown completely dependent on (https://jkaptur.com/layout/).

For me, keyboards like Das Keyboard, Alt, Ctrl, etc. are the perfect satisfice: good keyboards, at a price that's not terrible, with a time & research commitment that falls below the level of "hobby". I could easily see the Logitech keyboard fitting into this niche. The only question is how big a niche it is - how many of us are out there who like a nice keyboard, but are lukewarm/meh about soldering?

What's the logic of using a tiny 40% keyboard like the guy uses in that blog post?

Just adding effort to add additional keys using capslock.

People have different preferences: https://www.reddit.com/r/MechanicalKeyboards/comments/37pw1s...

That said (author here), I actually use a 65% for daily use. The 40% was too small for me to use comfortably. I could get used to the caps lock for arrow keys and text editing stuff, but having to remember shortcuts to type a semicolon just wasn't for me.

I can understand why people use 60/70% keyboards. I personally couldn't give up the numpad, home/end/pgup/pgdown/arrow keys for it, but there's definitely something to be said for the comfort level of having the mouse less far off from the keyboard.

I think once you're into anything less than 60%, either you literally just type text and use the mouse/touchpad items instead of keyboard shortcuts, or you're more focused in the aesthetic minimalism rather than the functionality.

I've had my eye on a few 40% builds as of late, so I'll throw another option into your list here: portability. I'm looking for a keyboard that I can throw in my laptop bag that isn't miserable to type on. I had a Microsoft Designer Keyboard for a while but it's worse than my laptop keyboard, so I'm back to the drawing board, and this seems like where I'm landing.

Ah, I've got a 100% G915 and it fits in my backpack fine for a trip to the office or something.

Maybe if the bag was filled for plane travel that'd be a problem.

I use a tiling window manager, emacs+evil-mode, and firefox+vimperator with a keyboard.io atreus (44 keys ergonomic) and it's basically fine if you go "all in"? sometimes I have to struggle to find the layer with the F-keys spread out like a numpad on my right hand, but I don't really use them and have their features bound to shortcuts that are easier to find, and that's probably most of the reason.

I don't have to take my hands off the keyboard to do stuff like navigate text simply, pause/mute music (instead my pinky goes to the bottom of the keyboard and all the keys on the other hand change function), my software can all be driven from the "common" keybindings and modifiers like ctrl/alt/win are on my thumbs instead of being offset below my pinkies.

Importantly, i can throw it in my bag with my laptop and use it when i am traveling so there is very little context-switching that has to occur.

None of this really carries over when I boot in to windows, though, and I keep a ten-keyless keyboard around for playing video games.

I made a split keyboard for me (I need to write up that post at some point), and I just made holding out the tilde convert the right half (yuihjknm,) to a numpad. It works great, since I don't use any other keys while using the numpad, and I get to save all that space and switches for something I rarely use.

Having done both, "the mouse goes on the left" is a far easier change to make than learning a minimised keyboard layout.

So my mouse is _very_ right handed. I have some smaller symmetrical mice that are less comfortable. I'm curious how this change worked for you - Did you get a leftie mouse? Did you swap the buttons?

Symmetrical mouse, no button swaps. I'm currently using one of these: https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B073WGB8G6 but I first started doing it with a cheapy Microsoft wired mouse.

I used a 50% (Preonic, so 5x12 1u keys, with an option to use a 2u spacebar by sacrificing a slot on the bottom row) for a while, so:

The switches felt great to use (chosen myself), the keycaps were still easily customizable to an office-appropriate yet imo stylish theme, and the default layout was intelligently designed to where most functionality was already within reach of your fingers.

Functionality would be in 'layers'. While they're usually numbered, I think of them as 'Alternate Shift', where normal Shift is 'up 1' (CAPITALS, and !@#$%^), and other layers can be whatever you want, i.e. `Layer2 A` = "{", `Layer2 S` = "}". The layout is set by the (often customizable) firmware.

I stopped using it when I changed to a 100% remote job, but keep it as a display piece.

There are layers which can be used and the layout minimizes the need to stretch and angle fingers for keys. However I tried the Planck EZ ortholinear keyboard and it was terrible. I felt like I was huddled over the keyboard like a chipmunk eating an acorn. For me, I discovered that what I really wanted was a split keyboard and that the number of keys to reach was not my problem. The configurability of the Planck EZ was amazing, but I was really looking for comfort and ergonomics.

Second, I love this keyboard, but it isn't wireless, which I think is a fair requirement. I personally like my keyboards to be wired, but can see why someone might seek out something like the Logitech keyboard.

Even with the browns, in a quiet office full of laptop keyboard users, any mechanical keyboard is going to seem loud. Mechanical keyboards always had the multiple benefits for me of: 1) more like the thing I grew up using, 2) loud enough that maybe they'd prefer I work from home :)

> but it isn't wireless, which I think is a fair requirement

I don't see how this is a fair requirement.

Most people would rather NOT be one 0day RF side-channel attack or bluetooth link key compromise away from someone outside their house with a high-gain antenna grabbing their LUKS or ssh key passphrases.

KeySniffer II is a question of when, not if.

"Most people" don't have LUKS or SSH key passphrases.

That's not a realistic threat model for most people.

I tried a DasKeyboard and found that certain keys would "catch" against the side of other keys due to spacing issues between the keys and the angle of attack of my fingers while typing - enough that it would occasionally prevent the key from registering. Swapped it out for another keyboard of the same make/model and had the same issue with the same keys and another couple of keys. Not sure if that's an issue with my particular way of typing or the build quality, or both.

Ended up returning it and going back to my WASD Code keyboard with MX Browns and just getting a different keycap set for it. It's a similar price to the DasKeyboard (and this Logitech one), and for individually backlit keys that seems to be the common price point. Pretty easy to dismantle and clean as well, so I definitely recommend it.

Same here. I got two of the Das Keyboard 4 (one for work, one for home) over 7 years ago and they're still going strong. I like the brown switches personally.

I hadn't realized how much using membrane switch was causing RSI until I switched to mechanical keyboards.

I've owned two DasKeyboards (one with Browns, one with Blues) and they are sturdy as hell, built like a tank...but for the life of me I don't understand why their Mac models don't come with the right media key layout on the F-row. It's literally my only hangup with them.

I did have a Das Keyboard 4 Ultimate fail on me after 6 years (the switches in the F and G key started to not always register).

I'm sure someone with a steadier hand could maybe fix it with a soldering iron.

I did see some of the reviews of the newer revisions were less positive than their historical record

I had a Das keyboard and it was the best.

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