Keyboards on Mike Bell - Blog & Stuff

My Keyboards Part 2

hello@mikebell.io (Mike Bell) — Thu, 11 Jun 2020 00:00:00 +0000

All my keyboards

Time for an update on my keyboard collection! After part 1 I’ve expanded the collection and gotten rid of a few.

Top left - YMD09 macro pad aka the zoom killer.
Top - KBD75 - Gateron Browns, I’m typing this post on it right now.
Middle - Winkeyless b.87 - Gateron Browns with Raindrop Round 2 on, this was my previous daily driver.
Bottom - Iris - Zealios 67g and Gateron Browns, this is a keyboard I really should get used to using but just can’t.
Right - Fourier - Gateron Blues, I need to put keycaps on and start using it.

I really love everything about keyboards, they’re such an important part of my daily life as a DevOps Engineer. It’s taken me a while to get used to some of the layouts.

My next build and hopefully final one is going go to be a Keeb.io Sinc, I suggest you check it out it looks awesome.

In my last blog post I mentions building a Let’s Split, I joined a group buy on Reddit which didn’t go through and we all got ripped off when the runner just disappeared with the money. It sucks but that’s the risk you take, I know only buy from suppliers that I trust 100%.

Thanks for reading via RSS!

Send me a message on Mastodon or email me

My Custom Keyboards

hello@mikebell.io (Mike Bell) — Fri, 16 Jun 2017 00:00:00 +0000

I’ve got quite an expensive hobby at the moment - keyboards.

Custom keyboards.

At the moment I have 4 keyboards in my office:

Poker 2 ISO
Ducky Shine 3 TKL ISO
NERD 60
Winkeyless B.87

Ducky Shine 3 TKL ISO (MX Brown)
#

Basically the above keyboard but without the numberpad. This is my longest serving board and up until a few weeks ago was in active service. It’s now waiting to be cleaned and pieced back together before I hand it over to my Dad.

Overall I’m really pleased with this board, it’s solid and well built, the keycaps are a bit crap but I replaced those with Raindrop (pictures further down). The LEDs on my board were fine considering Ducky had quite a few quality control issues down the line.

It has some neet features, including different LED modes (mine was the white edition), gimmicky but I liked them.

KBT Pure Pro 60% (MX Brown) (SOLD)
#

It’s a bit of a hybrid monster, a 60% but with a arrow keys, the none standard layout made it really difficult to use and in the end I sold it to a friend. I quickly learnt that having short shifts was really annoying.

Poker 2 ANSI (MX Brown)
#

I learnt my lessons with the Pro so grabbed a Poker 2, overall a solid board but the function key and arrow combition made my fingers hurt after a while so it got retired pretty quickly. The keycaps on this board are PBT which are amazing, they have a really satisfying clack to them (not pictured). Plus my version was white so they looked quite different to most boards.

This is also my first ANSI board (American), note the horizontal enter key and different size shift keys. I considered moving to ANSI for a while since keycap sets are easier to find and the boards are a bit cheaper as well. I couldn’t get used to the enter key though so I’ll be ISO for life.

NERD 60 (Gateron Brown)
#

This was my first foray into custom building. It’s GON NERD 60 shipped all the way from Korea. The PCB was pre-soldiered making things a lot easier I just had to install the Gateron Brown switches and flash the firmware.

The custom firmware made things a lot easier, having configurable layers meant that I could map CAPS to FN so I could operate the arrow keys bound to WASD with one hand.

This was the first board with LED backlighting, I have it disabled by default because I damanged one of the surface mount LEDs so it flickers which is really annoying, it’s a shame because the case is frosted acrylic so the shine-through was quite nice.

Since sourcing Cherry MX Browns is pretty much impossible I opted for Gateron Browns which are a slightly more resistant (higher actuation) clone. They’re nice switches and relatively cheap.

The stabalisers are Cherry which are frankly appaling, it’s like pressing mushy plastic. I really wish I’d modded them before adding them to the board.

Overall this board (without keycaps) cost me around £250. I have a small build log here.

Winkeyless B.87 (Gateron Brown)
#

This is my latest and greatest creation and my current daily driver. I considered this end game for me (for about a week or so). I bought the parts (fully soldiered) form Winkeyless another Korean company (they love custom keyboards!).

Again I opted for Gateron Browns since I’ve grown quite attached to them and they’re cheap. If I use them again I’m going to get some lubricant for the stems.

This keyboard has white in switch LEDs with RGB backlighting. The case is frosted acrylic so the lights shine through really well.

One of my main issues with this board is the same as the NERD60 the stabalisers are horrible, my backspace key squeeks which is horrible! Because they’re PCB mounted stabalisers removing them to mod them would mean desoldering all the LEDs and switches first, something I’m really not keen on doing because of a couple of issues I had while building the board.

This board also has customisable firmware, it’s a bit harder to use than the NERD60s since the instructions are in Korean and uses the column/row notation for keymapping. Thankfully google translate and a few other blog posts around the net have some decent instructions. I have a lot of the RGB functions bound to a second layer which is activated by CAPS key (FN in this case).

A build log for this can be found here.

Future Board - Let’s Split
#

After I reached my endgame board (cough) I decided to take a look at none standard boards, enter the Let’s Split

I started to design my own keyboard but ended up with something similar to this so I decided to order the parts for this build.

I’ll be posting a full build log of this when everything arrives.

The main build points for this are:

Zealios 62g - apparently these are the most amazing switches ever so I’m looking forward to trying them out. They’re 62g tactile no click switches with supposed amazing build qualit.
No stabalisers, screw you cherry no more mushy key presses!
Split halfs so I can move them around based on my hand orientation.
Ability to “tent” the boards so they’re more ergonomic.

Needless to say I’m hoping this to be my last board for a while. If your interested in buying my NERD60 then get in touch it needs a good home.

Thanks for reading via RSS!

Send me a message on Mastodon or email me

The Drop Layout

hello@mikebell.io (Mike Bell) — Fri, 24 Oct 2014 00:00:00 +0000

Ever since I bought a Pure Pro I’ve sort of been obsessed with the world of mechanical keyboards. As a developer I want to make sure I’m happy typing on something day in day out. It’s also very important that I can type fast and accurate so I have to be 100% happy with a keyboard. I’ve recently sold my Pure Pro which I was pretty happy with as it’s just not for me. I bought a Poker 2 ANSI (American layout) as a temporary replacement to it which I’ve been more than happy with. It currently has Raindrop keys on and a Tex acrylic case, it’s the nicest keyboard I’ve ever had the pleasure of typing on.

I’ve become quite interested in building my own custom keyboard based off the Poker 2 since ISO versions are very very rare these days. I came up with the following template:

The Drop Layout - can't wait to build this in a couple of months: pic.twitter.com/bfjqaTU3CO
— Mike Bell (@mikebell_) October 22, 2014

For the board I’ve looked into 4 different possibilities:

GH60 - marred by controversy and lack of delivery
Print my own GH60 - only Rev 3 is out and it has a bug so that’s a no go
Custom wiring + Teensy 2 - I don’t have the skill to pull this off
Nerd60 - pre-soldiered, leds, just add switches!

#The Nerd 60 I’ve settled on this PCB as it supports both backlight and side LEDs which will look cool with my Tex case, I just need to wait for it to arrive from Korea when the MOQ has been met.

The controller itself is fully re-programmable and supports lots of different programming layers which is really cool.

#The layout itself I really like 60% keyboards, they’re easy to transports and have everything I need to develop on. They fall down with the placement of keys and utilities. That’s why I designed this layout.

Here are some key features:

No Caps lock key, instead it’s replaced with an additional Fn key for easy access with your little finger.
WASD arrow keys, easier access with Caps Fn key.
Media keys on left hand
Sane config of utility keys accessible via single right hand or left hand Fn and right hand.
Mac Layout-ish

I’ll be doing a full build log with pictures once I get started, there are still a few decisions I have to make with the keyboard but those are still a way off.

Thanks for reading via RSS!

Send me a message on Mastodon or email me

My Keyboards

hello@mikebell.io (Mike Bell) — Fri, 20 Jun 2014 00:00:00 +0000

I’ve gone a bit mad on keyboards recently, mostly due to geekhack and r/mechanicalkeyboards. I’ve got the following boards at the moment:

Ducky Shine 3 - ISO - Brown switches - This is a 75% keyboard, it’s missing the number pad on the right side. It’s a great gaming keyboard and the keys feel nice and solid. This has white led backlighting which is quite nice, mines currently setup to pulse when a key is pressed.

KBT Pure Pro - ISO - Brown switches - A 60% board with built in arrow keys, it’s an ok board but it’s not standard key sizes on the right hand side of the board make it a pain to get used to. Like the Ducky this has white backlight which can get really bright, no fancy display modes though.

Poker 2 - ANSI - Brown switches - Another 60% board without the physical arrow keys which means the keys have a much better layout and size. It has white thick PBT caps which make for a nice feel and quietens the keyboard down a bit as well. It doesn’t have any led lights (apart from caps lock) but you can easily fit those as a mod.

Each one has it’s pros and cons. I use the Ducky at home for gaming and the Poker 2 at work for coding.

I’m currently waiting on shipment of some LEDs for the Poker 2 and a new set of Raindrop key caps although I’m not sure which keyboard they’ll be going on yet, part of me wants to spray the Ducky white so it fits with the colour scheme.

After modding my Poker 2 with LEDs I’m going to make a GH60 which is another 60% keyboard but with multiple programmable layers and support for any layout you can think of.

Thanks for reading via RSS!

Send me a message on Mastodon or email me

Keyboards on Mike Bell - Blog & Stuff

My Keyboards Part 2

My Custom Keyboards

Ducky Shine 3 TKL ISO (MX Brown) #

KBT Pure Pro 60% (MX Brown) (SOLD) #

Poker 2 ANSI (MX Brown) #

NERD 60 (Gateron Brown) #

Winkeyless B.87 (Gateron Brown) #

Future Board - Let’s Split #

The Drop Layout

My Keyboards

Ducky Shine 3 TKL ISO (MX Brown)
#

KBT Pure Pro 60% (MX Brown) (SOLD)
#

Poker 2 ANSI (MX Brown)
#

NERD 60 (Gateron Brown)
#

Winkeyless B.87 (Gateron Brown)
#

Future Board - Let’s Split
#