ErgoDox - Custom split ergo keyboard.

[Glod]

Lol got my shipping notice for my round 2 ErgoDox--almost forgot i ordered a round 2 ergodox, this would be my 3rd ErgoDox. it wasnt that expensive considering i didn't get any switches or key caps this time around. I may consider selling the round 2 board someday if something, if anything, would replace my ErgoDox. For now its going in a safe.


didn't rant this last week but i recently built my second ergodox with the aluminium case and i have to say. THAT SUCKED, sanding and filing the case and PCB was freaking annoying to get the PCB to fit. The case is cool once you sand and buff it but i am glad MassDrop didn't offer it in round 2. Not only was sanding down the PCB annoying, it was also scary.

[bisl]

Out of curiosity--why on earth is anyone sanding down the PCB? Why not just sand out the inside of the second aluminum cake layer? I did two of them that way and it wasn't that bad; you just bend it first so that the outer perimeter matches adjacent layers, mount your switches to the board and solder through the PCB, and finally mount your caps and flip it upside down so that you can see which part of layer 2 is making contact the PCB. File that area layer 2, repeat.

[Glod]

1, i did a combination of filing the case and sanding the pcb, not just sanding the pcb
2. you may have been lucky not to have the case as bad as i did. it was extremely off. my right hand layer was ridiculously not the right size, no filing little areas would have worked, it would have required a complete carving out of inside of the layer (not all of it though, just enough room for the pcb but that still would be a lot)
3. i lacked the right tools and this was the safest way to go, this was the biggest reason. i have a dremel but not the right tip for the job, i tried the grinding and sanding i easily wore that **** down. i had some sort of file but even that wasn't enough. the filing only helped the corners and jacks.

[rknize]

Mine was pretty horrible too, but I took material entirely out of the case.  A large, course cross-cut file makes quick work of the insanely-bad cuts.  You'll also need a mini-file for some of the tight spots.

[daerid]

Hell yeah.. my round 2 'dox should be here tomorrow!

[CommunistWitchDr]

Hell yeah.. my round 2 'dox should be here tomorrow!

Mines comin the day after. Gonna be awesome.

Gonna have to wait for the switches/case, but still. I guess I could get the diodes on.

[Glod]

this is a question because i am right now a bit busy to do research,

does anyone know whats the exact type of screws used with the massdrop litster case?

[SubGothius]

this is a question because i am right now a bit busy to do research,

does anyone know whats the exact type of screws used with the massdrop litster case?

M3x0.5 (standard coarse thread) socket head cap screw, 22mm length. UTS (SAE) #4 thread will also fit the provided screw holes. Case is 18mm (~0.7") thick.

[lkong]

Missed the GB
Wish I could get my hands on one.
Anyone knows if there will be another GB?

[SubGothius]

Missed the GB
Wish I could get my hands on one.
Anyone knows if there will be another GB?

And now I just got to wait for a round 3 .. hopefully there will be one!

I think they ran Round 2 once the post-Round 1 Requesters count got up near 300, and post-Round 2 Requesters are now at 131, so we may be getting there...

Anyone who wants another round, be sure to click the Request button on the ErgoDox Round 2 page!

[daerid]

Quick q: I just fit together the case and switches as a dry run to make sure everything fit together, and I noticed that the bolts stick out a bit below the case. I really don't want to scratch my desk, can anybody recommend some rubber feet that can either fit around the nuts or are a bit thicker than them so that they don't touch the desk?

Hope that made sense...

[bisl]

I ended up bolting from the bottom up, so that the nut side is on the top of the keyboard; as well, I bought some little silicone friendlyfeet from Home Depot not only to protect my desk, but also to keep the boards from skating around from every little force applied to them. No complaints!

[tp4tissue]

So..... anyone know whut's the latest with the mediakeys, copy/paste, and volume control?

[SubGothius]

Nerd achievement unlocked: ErgoDox Complete.

[SubGothius]

So..... anyone know whut's the latest with the mediakeys, copy/paste, and volume control?

Last word from Jasper at Massdrop suggests he may eventually get the Configurator working with those:

we've been moving pretty quickly here at massdrop so unfortunately i haven't had much time to develop the configurator further. i have a giant list of changes i've compiled from the discussion here that i will get to...eventually.

[CommunistWitchDr]

Yay! Round 2 on Massdrop has shipped!

3) What?

I was curious as well and this is what I found:
Plover is an open-source stenography program. Essentially, it's a way for people to type really fast (well over 150 WPM). It requires NKRO as far as I know.

Yep, one of the very very few things that can make use of over 6kro. Let's you type words/phrases at a time.

[bisl]

For anyone interested, I have performed a modern-day miracle: I performed an internet search.

http://stenoknight.com/wiki/FAQ#How_does_it_work.3F

[rsantos97]

I got mine in last week as well. Just got to find time to put it together.

[CommunistWitchDr]

Ordering a case with one size color for inner layers and a different size/color for the outer. Probably black inner and white outer.

What is the best size to use? Options are 1/8, 3/16, and 1/16.

[tp4tissue]

The ergodox fasteners are M2.5 - 0.5 x 22 yea?

[SubGothius]

The ergodox fasteners are M2.5 - 0.5 x 22 yea?

M3x0.5, 22mm long.

[SubGothius]

Ordering a case with one size color for inner layers and a different size/color for the outer. Probably black inner and white outer.

What is the best size to use? Options are 1/8, 3/16, and 1/16.

The Massdrop case uses 1/8" for the outer layers and 3/16" for the inners. Using 1/8" for the middle layer 3 (switch mounting plate) would allow room to top-mount thru-hole diodes on the PCB, but then you may need a thicker 1/4" layer 2 below that, or two 1/8" layer 2s, to allow enough room for the PCB and solder bumps.

[agodinhost]

Please, I'm looking for the ErgoDox acrylic case project files to send to an laser shop.
Anyone knows where I can get it??

By the way, I'm trying to get it's PCB too but OSH Park is kinda expensive for 3 pieces only.
I have uploaded the gerber files and got:
"Detected 2 layer board of 7.21x6.27 inches (183x159mm). $226.15 for three. "

I saw something like 160 pending orders at Massdrop but I think it will never happen (I saw somewhere that it was cancelled).
Anyone want join up a group buy?
I'm definitely interested in ...

[ic07]

http://ergodox.org/Downloads.aspx

You might try pcbwing, since that's where all the PCBs made to date, that I know of, have been printed...

The (second) Massdrop group buy just closed (or, just shipped, rather).  The first one went really well.  I'm sure the second one has been too.  There may be another, once registered interest gets high enough.

But if you wana start your own group buy go for it .  There was talk of that a while ago on DT, but it never coalesced.

[ic07]

So..... anyone know whut's the latest with the mediakeys, copy/paste, and volume control?

Last word from Jasper at Massdrop suggests he may eventually get the Configurator working with those:

we've been moving pretty quickly here at massdrop so unfortunately i haven't had much time to develop the configurator further. i have a giant list of changes i've compiled from the discussion here that i will get to...eventually.

Three media keys (play/pause, previous track, and next track) were implemented by judascleric on the rev 1 (currently 'master') branch.  Copy/paste could probably be done simply with a macro (though... i still haven't written any good examples for how to write those...).  If you have a mac, the volume control keys already work (and have all along), but I don't recall hearing whether they work on other systems.

This is all from a source code perspective though, not the configurator.  As for the UI, I have no idea what Jasper has planned...

[agodinhost]

http://ergodox.org/Downloads.aspx

You might try pcbwing, since that's where all the PCBs made to date, that I know of, have been printed...

The (second) Massdrop group buy just closed (or, just shipped, rather).  The first one went really well.  I'm sure the second one has been too.  There may be another, once registered interest gets high enough.

But if you wana start your own group buy go for it .  There was talk of that a while ago on DT, but it never coalesced.

Ohh, I've missed that - I got all other files but the dxf.
Thanks!

I would start one group buy but Brazil is not the best place to ship stuff to - it would be kinda expensive for everybody in the group.

What about one IC to count the heads interested on it?

I got one quote at PCBWing:
- 2 x 184mm x 160mm is something like US$ 123,02 (US$ 62,24 per board)
- 20 x is US$ 270,24 (US$ 13,51 per board)
I'm choosing 10 days, the tooling is US$ 106,06 for both options above.
The interesting thing is that after 17 boards the tooling is ZERO if you do the same order again (it's right? I'm not sure of it)

Not sure how much would be the shipping and it would require someone to do the proxy.
I guess that with 20 guys we could get two boards for something like US$28 + shipping + re-shiping.

Is not that hard to get 20 heads is it?

[f2015009]

Hello everyone,

• I just came across this wonderful project of yours and I was wondering if you plan any 3rd round for ErgoDox so that I could jump onto the bandwaggon, too!?
• I read in the initial posting of this thread that a price of appox 400$ was estimated but that that could be reduced a lot if enough people participate. Could anybody please tell me what the final prices had been for round 1 and round 2?
• In which country are the PCB printed and all the parts brought together and shipped from? Do those organizators of the project ship to the EU?

Thanks for any feedback & Happy hacking!

[hasu]

agodinhost,
PCBWing seems to be reasonable, though,
Try chinese cheap PCB service unless you need overly quality.
Such like elecrow.com or Fusion PCB at seeedstudio.com.
International shipping from China or Hongkong is usually very very cheap.

[SmallFry]

The ergodox fasteners are M2.5 - 0.5 x 22 yea?

I have a few spare bolts and nuts if you need a few. PM me.

[SmallFry]

.
Double post, sorry.

[SubGothius]

I got one quote at PCBWing:
- 2 x 184mm x 160mm is something like US$ 123,02 (US$ 62,24 per board)
- 20 x is US$ 270,24 (US$ 13,51 per board)
I'm choosing 10 days, the tooling is US$ 106,06 for both options above.
The interesting thing is that after 17 boards the tooling is ZERO if you do the same order again (it's right? I'm not sure of it)

You may be able to avoid the tooling cost, since PCBWing already made tooling for Massdrop's round 1 and likely reused it for round 2 and will retain it pending a probable round 3, which I'm pretty certain will happen sooner or later.

[SubGothius]

Hello everyone,

• I just came across this wonderful project of yours and I was wondering if you plan any 3rd round for ErgoDox so that I could jump onto the bandwaggon, too!?
• I read in the initial posting of this thread that a price of appox 400$ was estimated but that that could be reduced a lot if enough people participate. Could anybody please tell me what the final prices had been for round 1 and round 2?
• In which country are the PCB printed and all the parts brought together and shipped from? Do those organizators of the project ship to the EU?

Thanks for any feedback & Happy hacking!

• I expect Massdrop will run a round 3 sooner or later, just a matter of time and sufficient Requests being declared on the round 2 page to help ensure the best possible volume discount, speaking of which...
• $199 if the max. volume discount level is reached, plus shipping for non-US destinations, plus keycaps (~$35 or so at the cheapest);
• The PCBs were produced by PCBWing, which I think is in China, but Massdrop in California has been facilitating the group buys and kit fulfillment -- i.e., enrolling group buyers, taking payments, ordering all components, collating them into complete kits, and shipping them out. They do ship to the EU and other countries (IIRC, non-US shipping was ~$20?), but when they run the next round, you'd need to message them to request your country specifically.

[agodinhost]

You may be able to avoid the tooling cost, since PCBWing already made tooling for Massdrop's round 1 and likely reused it for round 2 and will retain it pending a probable round 3, which I'm pretty certain will happen sooner or later.

I'm not sure of it - we would have to use the same account/file name used by massdrop. Unless someone get this info I'm not sure if we will be able to use this "discount".

PCBWing seems to be reasonable, though,
Try chinese cheap PCB service unless you need overly quality.
Such like elecrow.com or Fusion PCB at seeedstudio.com.
International shipping from China or Hongkong is usually very very cheap.

Hi Hasu!
Yes, it's reasonable - I could afford 6 or 10 by this price.

I'll try to get one quote from these ones that you did suggested.
thanks man!

[ic07]

You may be able to avoid the tooling cost, since PCBWing already made tooling for Massdrop's round 1 and likely reused it for round 2 and will retain it pending a probable round 3, which I'm pretty certain will happen sooner or later.

I'm not sure of it - we would have to use the same account/file name used by massdrop. Unless someone get this info I'm not sure if we will be able to use this "discount".

Dunno if it makes any difference, but bpiphany did a run of these through pcbwing as well, for prototyping much earlier on.

[bpiphany]

The tooling cost at pcbwing is halved for new orders when the total board area is above 1m². Tooling cost is half on re-orders if they aren't above 1m² in which case the tooling cost is zero. Larger orders are much, much, cheaper than only 2 boards... All boards have been ordered through my account at pcbwing.

Massdrop has been doing a good job so far, no? Pushing for more people showing interest to them probably is a good way to get a third buy going.

[agodinhost]

Massdrop has been doing a good job so far, no? Pushing for more people showing interest to them probably is a good way to get a third buy going.

Never got anything at there.
I'm interested only at the PCB - it would be cheaper for me since I do already have all parts at here.

Fusion PCB:
for 20 boards (20cm x 20cm, 2 layers) it would be US$ 190,00 (US$ 9,5 per board, without shipping and proxy).

Elecrow:
for 50 boards (20cm x 20cm, 2 layers) it would be US$ 230,00 (US$ 4,6 per board, without shipping and proxy).

Who wanna join me?
 

[tp4tissue]

Massdrop has been doing a good job so far, no? Pushing for more people showing interest to them probably is a good way to get a third buy going.

Never got anything at there.
I'm interested only at the PCB - it would be cheaper for me since I do already have all parts at here.

Fusion PCB:
for 20 boards (20cm x 20cm, 2 layers) it would be US$ 190,00 (US$ 9,5 per board, without shipping and proxy).

Elecrow:
for 50 boards (20cm x 20cm, 2 layers) it would be US$ 230,00 (US$ 4,6 per board, without shipping and proxy).

Who wanna join me?
 

I was not impressed with the ergodox board quality to be honest... It was ok... not bad for sure, but nothing to write home about.. the laminate wasn't as durable as I'd like.

Granted, I was rushing through it, building it while depressed.   

[eviltobz]

...If you have a mac, the volume control keys already work (and have all along), but I don't recall hearing whether they work on other systems...

They work fine for me in OSX, as you expect, but when I bootcamp into windows they do nothing, whereas my apple keyboard's volume buttons work fine. i'm not sure if this is some driver level thing in the bootcamp software though, whereby it recognises that it's an apple board and responds to that particular button press with magic. the default behaviour of the "fn" key to swap between function keys and media/os keys is controlled in the bootcamp software, so it wouldn't surprise me if there was trickery involved as it definitely has some hooks in.

in fact, does windows actually have a concept of volume control from the keyboard, or is it just something that always needs additional drivers? my old microsoft ergo 4000 had some such keys, but also wanted to install a bunch of custom software to control it all. We might need to make our doxen pretend to be another type of board and hijack their tools, or write some driverish code to handle it.

[hramrach]

Massdrop has been doing a good job so far, no? Pushing for more people showing interest to them probably is a good way to get a third buy going.

Since it got some keyboards shipped I guess it's good enough. It is going to save a lot on shipping costs if another batch can happen.

You can get switches all right these days and PCBs can be made with some effort. You can print out cases and order miscellaneous electronic parts. You could probably order keycaps somewhere too. Each from different shop with separate shipping, no doubt.

But where do you get those key holder plates made?

[eviltobz]

Massdrop has been doing a good job so far, no?...

Since it got some keyboards shipped I guess it's good enough...

i like to judge a company on how well it handles problems - it's nice when everything goes smoothly, but that doesn't always happen and different companies can display very different attitudes to resolution of issues - and so i'd say that they are doing an excellent job. i had a few parts missing from my order and found them extremely helpful getting things sorted out. they were excellent at communicating what was going on with acquiring my missing bits, and they shipped them over to the UK as they were available rather than waiting until they had everything together. that showed that they were more concerned with giving me good service, allowing me to get on with parts of the construction from the components i had available, than saving on the hefty international shipping bills. yeah, shipping should be at their expense as it was their mistake, but taking the extra hit was very customer focussed of them.

[thadood]

I'm perfectly ok with waiting on the Massdrop round 3 to occur. It's been about three weeks since I requested at the round 2 page and there's been about 35 people that have shown interest since then. It's slowly getting up to a large enough number.

[agodinhost]

I'm perfectly ok with waiting on the Massdrop round 3 to occur. It's been about three weeks since I requested at the round 2 page and there's been about 35 people that have shown interest since then. It's slowly getting up to a large enough number.

How much was the price of the last batch? 300 bucks?

Here there is some risk of being charged at the customs office and whenever it happens it raises up the price of the package in 60%!

For small packages the customs office is not a problem, most of the time the package passes by without calling attention but I guess that the size of the package sent by Massdrop is not small - so it would raise up the chances to end up nailed.

So, let's assume US$ 300,00
           +60% = US$ 180,00
The final price would be US$ 480,00 ...
I pass.

PCB x2                     => US$ 30,00
Cherry Switches x60  => US$ 60,00 (assuming US$ 1 per switch)
Teensy 2.0                 => US$ 30,00
I/O Expander             => US$ 03,00
Diodes                       => US$ 05,00
Case                          => US$ 50,00
Misc Parts                  => US$ 50,00
Total                         => US$ 278,00

[daerid]

I'm perfectly ok with waiting on the Massdrop round 3 to occur. It's been about three weeks since I requested at the round 2 page and there's been about 35 people that have shown interest since then. It's slowly getting up to a large enough number.

How much was the price of the last batch? 300 bucks?

It was $199 USD. If you wanted to add the blank black PBT DSA caps that added another $37 USD. So a total out-of-the-box complete kit ran $236 USD.

[agodinhost]

It was $199 USD. If you wanted to add the blank black PBT DSA caps that added another $37 USD. So a total out-of-the-box complete kit ran $236 USD.

Awesome price indeed!

[Tarzan]

I'm perfectly ok with waiting on the Massdrop round 3 to occur. It's been about three weeks since I requested at the round 2 page and there's been about 35 people that have shown interest since then. It's slowly getting up to a large enough number.

How much was the price of the last batch? 300 bucks?

It was $199 USD. If you wanted to add the blank black PBT DSA caps that added another $37 USD. So a total out-of-the-box complete kit ran $236 USD.

Was that with switches, or just the PCB+case?

[cpf]

I'm perfectly ok with waiting on the Massdrop round 3 to occur. It's been about three weeks since I requested at the round 2 page and there's been about 35 people that have shown interest since then. It's slowly getting up to a large enough number.

How much was the price of the last batch? 300 bucks?

It was $199 USD. If you wanted to add the blank black PBT DSA caps that added another $37 USD. So a total out-of-the-box complete kit ran $236 USD.

Was that with switches, or just the PCB+case?

Switches were included, though you could opt out for a discount.

[ic07]

Case                          => US$ 50,00

If you can get a case for $50, that's a really good deal (Massdrop was selling cases separately for a while after the first run for about $80, and the 3D printed case costs about $200 IIRC to get printed online).  And if you just want certain parts (everything but the case?) in a configuration not available through the order page, Massdrop would probably be willing to  give you a special order at a fair price.  They were *super* accommodating with that the first run - though I suppose it'd be safer to ask them, and make sure they didn't have to cut back on special orders on the second

Edit: To clarify what I was referring to

[agodinhost]

Also, if you can get a case for $50, that's a really good deal.  And if you just want certain parts (everything but the case?) in a configuration not available through the order page, Massdrop would probably be willing to  give you a special order at a fair price.  They were *super* accommodating with that the first run - though I suppose it'd be safer to ask them, and make sure they didn't have to cut back on special orders on the second

As I said before - I never bought anything on this site.
I'll keep an eye open there to see if I can get a decent deal.
Just in case, who knows?

[ic07]

...If you have a mac, the volume control keys already work (and have all along), but I don't recall hearing whether they work on other systems...

They work fine for me in OSX, as you expect, but when I bootcamp into windows they do nothing, whereas my apple keyboard's volume buttons work fine. i'm not sure if this is some driver level thing in the bootcamp software though, whereby it recognises that it's an apple board and responds to that particular button press with magic. the default behaviour of the "fn" key to swap between function keys and media/os keys is controlled in the bootcamp software, so it wouldn't surprise me if there was trickery involved as it definitely has some hooks in.

in fact, does windows actually have a concept of volume control from the keyboard, or is it just something that always needs additional drivers? my old microsoft ergo 4000 had some such keys, but also wanted to install a bunch of custom software to control it all. We might need to make our doxen pretend to be another type of board and hijack their tools, or write some driverish code to handle it.

Hmm... I'm pretty sure windows has the concept of volume keys (without extra drivers)... But I have no idea what kind of sneakiness is going on behind what you're observing.  Maybe with windows one has to send volume +/- as consumer keys - and maybe those keys work on macs too, in addition to the "regular" keys we're currently using. Lol, I don't really have a copy of windows I can test anything with though, and consumer key support isn't yet in rev-2.

[SubGothius]

Massdrop has been doing a good job so far, no? Pushing for more people showing interest to them probably is a good way to get a third buy going.

Never got anything at there.
I'm interested only at the PCB - it would be cheaper for me since I do already have all parts at here.

They did run a separate PCB-only group buy at least during round 1, not sure if they did it again for round 2, but when they finally run a round 3, you could prolly contact them to request a PCB-only set (or several) if they don't happen to run a separate buy for them at that time.

(BTW, I'm typing this on my new ErgoDox, was a bit slow going at first but rapidly getting up to speed, definitely liking it already... )