geekhack
geekhack Community => Keyboards => Topic started by: smilr on Mon, 16 April 2012, 03:14:24
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I'm back with some long winded commentary regarding my recent purchase of a rosewill RK-9000 (Cherry MX Browns).
Original post (http://geekhack.org/showthread.php?29058-newbie-looking-for-tenkey-no-arrow-home-etc-island) for my ramblings about my old keyboard.
I was able to successfully replace my crappy desk's keyboard tray (well, flat piece of fiberboard) with a new custom cut peice of plywood so that it fits both the new keyboard and my trackball. As the old "tray" wasn't secured to the desk (makes a nifty lap board when I wanted to lean back in the chair this way), I ended up knocking it to the floor quite regularly. The new one has features that prevent this thankfully. If nothing else this purchase has forced me to improve this horrible desk.
I like this keyboard. Browns are perhaps a little light after my worn out ~140cn activation / 75cn holding force of the old frankenboard. I think something like a tactile black (swap black springs into a brown?) would have been a more comfortable fit and shallower learning curve for me.
It's very nice having a functional indicator light for caps-lock (my push to talk button for voice-chat during online gaming, long since dead on frankenboard).
The thread title's nitpick: the left alt and space bar are stupidly placed. I grew up on Macs, and prefer them when not gaming. Apple keyboards (at least since y2k) all basically align the right edge of the left Cmd key with the right edge of the X key. This means I had a shorter distance for my thumb to travel to the cmd key with frankenboard than to the alt key of the Rosewill.
On the Rosewill the alt key's right edge is about centered below the X key, while the narrowing of the key bottom to top pushes the top face of the Alt key closer to the 1/3 mark of the X key. My muscle-memory sends my thumb to directly below the X key when I want alt / cmd. On the Rosewill that corresponds precisely with the gap between alt and space >.<
A few quick google searches make me believe this is common on pc keyboards. WTF. The space key does NOT need to extend beyond the left of C and the right of M in my biased opinion.
About that keycap narrowing: while the base of these keycaps are roughly the same size as on frankenboard, the top faces are significantly smaller. This I can forgive - it was weird at first but I've learned to be more precise in finger position when typing. The Alt key being too far to the left IS a hassle however.
SIGH - time to research more mechanical keyboards with this new nugget of decision making information in mind. Although I'm tempted to rip the keys / controller out of this keyboard and make a custom one someday to not have to mess with finding the Right Keyboard (tm).
For now - it works. I doubt I could consider going back to non mechanical keys any time soon. Nitpicks aside this thing is rather fun for typing / gaming.
ALSO: My apologies for the thread name. I just watched Buckaroo Bonzai for the first time at a coworkers insistence and now have several choice quotes bouncing around in my head ;-)
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Wait … did you say 140 cN? Seriously? Were these like ridiculously clipped nickels or something?
I would have thought that the hard landing of Cherry MX switches, coupled with the urge to smack the keys into oblivion to get them to register, would make for a pretty painful experience. It took me ages to un-learn the need to be heavy handed after moving from a stock Dell rubberdome to MX browns, but 170 cN is insane ...
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You need to relearn how to type, just like how they retrain people in physical therapy..
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A few quick google searches make me believe this is common on pc keyboards. WTF. The space key does NOT need to extend beyond the left of C and the right of M in my biased opinion.
Maybe you should look at some historical PC KB pictures and be glad that the PC spacebar has gotten as SMALL as it has. the 6.5x of many modern PC keyboards is far smaller than it used to be. 10x spacebar anyone? I know I've seen them out there.
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Split spacebar might make more sense. Does anyone hit the spacebar in the center? If so, split three ways, otherwise, split two ways. Map the half of spacebar that you don't use, to something else – could use a DIP switch (e.g. space on left, Fn on right, or vice versa) or make the unused half firmware programmable.
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It's "Big Boo-tay" monkeyboy
I am accustomed to the ANSI keyboard layout and will probably never give it up (although I do look wistfully at Colemak from time to time ..... )
I use both thumbs on the spacebar, and my technique is probably not proper.
On the left side of the bar, I could give up a half a key width or more, but I like it long on the right side, since I use that thumb more often, and spend a fair amount of time over on the arrow keys and home cluster.
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Split spacebar might make more sense. Does anyone hit the spacebar in the center? If so, split three ways, otherwise, split two ways. Map the half of spacebar that you don't use, to something else – could use a DIP switch (e.g. space on left, Fn on right, or vice versa) or make the unused half firmware programmable.
I think the spacebar split into four keys on the 7bit Phantom makes sense. Or at least, I hope it will make sense.
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The 104 key Unicomp boards might be a bit more like what you are used to. Your muscle memory will adjust if you give it a chance.
Wrt browns bring too light, you might like clears better. They have the same springs as blacks.
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hey have the same springs as blacks.
They don't.