geekhack
geekhack Community => Ergonomics => Topic started by: Gerk on Thu, 19 July 2018, 19:27:21
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So I got a Kinesis Freestyle Pro keyboard today (with browns, that's seeming the only option for them but that's fine as it is what I would have got anyway), so far it's not too bad. It has a bit too much ping for me already though. The palm wrests and the cheesy stick-on pads for them are a big disappointment. For a board at this price point I expected a little bit better than poorly cut (and I mean really poorly cut, it looks like the die wasn't setup right) sick-on foam bits ...
And the mac layout that's supposed to be pre-loaded in it (that move the modifier keys) don't seem to work. The firmware that it came with seems quite old (from almost a year ago) and I can't find a place that has any support files for this board. The main kinesis site has nothing but picture of it, and the gaming site has nothing but stuff for the edge. The firmware is at version 1.0.66 but the latest edge beta firmware is 1.0.340 ... so I'm thinking that a firmware update might help things out a bit.
I did manage to tuck more of the silly connecting wire into the compartment so now there's only a couple of inches of it out (yay) so at least there's that. I think I still have a full spare set of O-rings that I'm going to install now, because otherwise this ping is going to make me nutso. From all the reviews I read and watched online they talked about how there was no ping and that the keys were pretty quiet ... this board is quite the opposite!
One more thing to note ... is that these browns feel very funny, they almost feel like reds. Almost but not quite. They don't feel like browns either ... something sort of in between.
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To get macOS style modifiers, if you just edit the text file layout text file you want and add this:
[lwin]>[lalt]
fn [lwin]>[lalt]
[lalt]>[lwin]
fn [lalt]>[lwin]
[ralt]>[rwin]
fn [ralt]>[rwin]
[rctrl]>[ralt]
fn [rctrl]>[ralt]
I asked support and they don't have the equivalent beta that they have for the edge yet but it is apparently being worked on. The main difference being the significantly higher number of macros allowed in the newer version.