Canada Woes. Elite Keyboards? Amazon? Screw it I'm buying from Armygroup.

[TurboDance]

So I posted a thread earlier about my woes trying to figure out what mechanical keyboard to buy, and my mental health has been taking a sharp turn for the worse from all of this stress. Dear god I am weak. I want a Filco and I can't buy one! What about Amazon right? They won't ship to Canada! What about elitekeyboards? Their Leopold's are going up for a good price, but in recent research I can see that there have been reports of defects, NKRO not performing properly, and additionally the rounded looks of the board somehow make it look a whole lot duller than the Filco.

So I am going to take the plunge internationally and buy a tenkeyless Cherry brown Filco from Armygroup!

Obviously the potential downside is getting a board that has basically no warranty. Am I taking a big risk doing this? Do Filco's have many DOA's or improperly working boards on arrival? Somebody stop me now if ever because I am about to place my order. The wait is killllingg me while typing on this POS Microsoft mushpad I have always hated.

If I buy, I will try to post a nice little review of my experience with Armygroup, the board, and mainly a comparison of the true differences experienced from my 20 dollar microsoft keyboard to this widely heralded keyboard masterpiece I am so looking forward to.

I'm going to buy in the next hour, so somebody post something to stop me if there are new or important facts that I am not considering.

Thank you, and god speed little Filco!

[Fuel]

Well I ordered mine about 4 weeks ago from armygroup. It was a wednesday and I got it on the following monday so very fast shipping for united states. My Filco was almost perfect with the right shift key being a little misaligned  but other then that its amazing. It was about $157 dollars for mine but it was worth it. I agree with you about the leopolds the Filcos do look better.

[Exoverture]

Yes. Go for it.

I'm in Canada, BC.

Exact same situation as the above poster. Ordered it on a Wednesday (actually.. might as well have been Thursday as it was 12:04am at night on Wednesday)... and it arrived on Monday!

It was actually in Vancouver by Saturday morning surprisingly.. a whopping two days. Customs only took over the weekend to clear and I had it. No customs or fees.

it's a great board - if I had to nitpick i'd say the case creaks a bit, kinda my pet peeve of plastic in general. Some tape in the inside can fix this! . But really, you won't be touching the case. And the creak is minimal.

I say go for it 100%.

[Armando Penblade]

Generally people here seem to have a very good experience with PCHome and ArmyGroup and I don't see a lot of DOA complaints about the Filcos vs. cheaper models like Adessos and iOnes. Of course, part of that rock-solid reliability supposedly stemmed from EliteKeyboards' staff hand-picking the best keyboards they received from Taiwan to sell to their NA customers. Hopefully things have maintained from there.

I was too paranoid to go for it, but the sudden arrival of Filcos on Amazon were the thing that pushed me away from Asian sites completely. Lacking that, I can't think of a great reason not to go for it. . .

. . . all that said, have you looked at http://www.keyboardco.com/index.asp ? They ship to Canada, albeit not cheaply. But they do have an English-language return process, on the other hand

[TurboDance]

Okay guys, it's a race. I just placed my order with Armygroup, and all is a go. I'm rooting for a Monday arrival as well! Go for 3 for 3 Armygroup! Go go!

Also, I'm gonna have to see about any kind of duct tape style modifications. Maybe mine will come perfecto? I'm only saying that because I'm still scared as **** that it will end up being DOA.

[majestouch]

NKRO problems with Leopold?

[TurboDance]

NKRO problems with Leopold?

I can't remember where I saw it, but apparently there were tests done that saw performance of NKRO not quite being up to snuff with the Filco's. As a distributor, obviously you would have more experience with this and I am sure you have ran very thorough testing to see if the performance is there.

I guess I partially ran out of patience as well. Maybe I will become sucked into the keyboard vortex of geekhack forums and give a Leopold a go some day to learn that it really is a great board.

Any comments on your own experience with the performance of NKRO, the pcb, or design elements of the Leopold? I appreciate you taking the time to comment. It was tough to decide on a new product like the leopold, especially in light that the Filco has already been cherished here as one of the best for the past couple of years.

[majestouch]

I can't remember where I saw it, but apparently there were tests done that saw performance of NKRO not quite being up to snuff with the Filco's. As a distributor, obviously you would have more experience with this and I am sure you have ran very thorough testing to see if that the performance is there.

I guess I partially ran out of patience as well. Maybe I will become sucked into the keyboard vortex of geekhack forums and give a Leopold a go some day to learn that it really is a great board.

Any comments on your own experience with the performance of NKRO, the pcb, or design elements of the Leopold? I appreciate you taking the time to comment. It was tough to decide on a new product like the leopold, especially in light that the Filco has already been cherished here as one of the best for the past couple of years.

I made a pretty thorough comparison a few days ago here. I don't comment on NKRO specifically, as it works as well as FILCOs.

[RiGS]

I don't remember any NKRO problems with Leopolds.

And asking Majestouch for an opinion of Leopold versus Filco is like asking a recent divorcee what their wife was like.  Some inherent bias.

This is why I turned down a free review Ducky keyboard sample.  Allows me to be a royal, but morally superior, *******.

Best thing to do is wait until they ship and read the reviews of people that actually paid money for the keyboard.

I like your approach.

[patrickgeekhack]

I won't tell you what you should do. But, as far I am concerned, I like to have a security blanket where if there is a problem, it will be taken care of under warranty. My first Filco had a intermittent problem and Elitekeyboards handled the situation well.

[itlnstln]

Majestouch actually did a pretty good comparison of Ducky versus Filco.  Don't tell him I said that.

Ducky or Leopold?

I liked his Leopold comparison.  I thought it was quite objective.  Majestouch's opinions of Diatec, however, that is something to behold.

[BucklingSpring]

But they do have an English-language return process, on the other hand

Is AG webpages only available in TWeese?

I can't read that stuff.

[Arcanius]

Hold on a sec. The link below says Amazon.com does in fact ship to Canada. Is this incorrect? I'd love to get a Filco for my upcoming birthday!
http://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=596192

[Surly73]

Hold on a sec. The link below says Amazon.com does in fact ship to Canada. Is this incorrect? I'd love to get a Filco for my upcoming birthday!
http://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=596192

Any time I've ever actually tried it (including up to a month ago) it tells you that you must shop from amazon.ca.  Until recently, all amazon.ca had was books, music and movies.  They're starting to get other stuff but it's nothing like amazon.com.

A Canadian can BUY from amazon.com but must ship within the US.  At least they take Canadian payment and will separate shipping/billing addresses.

[cbf123]

Hold on a sec. The link below says Amazon.com does in fact ship to Canada. Is this incorrect? I'd love to get a Filco for my upcoming birthday!
http://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=596192

My understanding is that it's up to the merchant to decide whether or not to support shipping to Canada--and 99% of them don't support it.  I've never actually found an item that they'd ship to me, it always fails right at the end of the checkout process.

[TurboDance]

I made a pretty thorough comparison a few days ago here. I don't comment on NKRO specifically, as it works as well as FILCOs.

Hmm... I apparently missed this comparison. I'll be honest and say that I'm more than a little worried about a DOA knowing that the previous quality filter is gone (you), but so long as it works out of the box I should be good since I'm very gentle with any equipment I own.

Just wondering, will you guys still be carrying click clack keys for Filco boards, or is that distribution line going to somewhere silly like Amazon as well?

I may be interesting in modding mine a little while down the road, and it would be nice to know that I can order custom keys from somebody that speaks English =D.

One last thing, I am sure since you're such a good guy you will warranty any DOA board just for the hell of it (=D), but in the assumed case that you won't, are you still going to be offering Filco repairs on fixes that don't justify buying a whole new board? Or do the cost of repairs usually justify buying a new board anyways?

[mojojj13]

I'd be interested to know if and how much they charge for customs.  I was thinking of ordering from them too, but was scared of duties.  I'm in Ontario.

Re: Amazon.com shipping - it really depends on the items.  The product page will say "cannot ship to your address" if they... can't.  Otherwise it won't say anything.  When you go to check out it'll only give you the standard shipping option (no free shipping).

[TurboDance]

The shipping was expensive, no doubt. Shipping was about a third of the total cost, but then again the base price of the board was super cheap. Think Pre-order leopold pricing cheap. It was about $105 Canadian for the Board and all told came to $158 after paypal charges as well. I believe that all charges are included with that cost including customs, so it appears that the low cost of the board evens itself out with delivery.

For me I just couldn't wait to pre-order and receive maybe 3-4 weeks down the line, and Amazon wouldn't ship to me in Manitoba. So I'm gambling slightly buying overseas, but hopefully it's a good gamble. Oh, plus the Armygroup Filco comes with some WASD and esc key custom keycaps with a remover - just a nice little bonus that I wanted to purchase anyways.

[patrickgeekhack]

The shipping was expensive, no doubt. Shipping was about a third of the total cost, but then again the base price of the board was super cheap. Think Pre-order leopold pricing cheap. It was about $105 Canadian for the Board and all told came to $158 after paypal charges as well. I believe that all charges are included with that cost including customs, so it appears that the low cost of the board evens itself out with delivery.

Including customs? I am not too sure about this. I don't know how things work in Manitoba, but sure work differently in Ontario. If my memory serves me well, the last time I called Canadian Border agency, I was told that there is no custom fee on keyboards, but the regular GST and PST (at the time). How much you need to pay for Custom Broker fee will depend on who was used as courier. From the US, USPS is the best, hands down. They have the lowest flat rate.