First Mechanical Keyboard Purchase

[TurdFurgusand]

Hi everyone!

I'm hoping you can help me pick a keyboard. I am a CS student and do a lot of coding. I recently bought a Kinesis Freestyle split keyboard with the VIP accessory (thinking that practicing good ergonomics early in my career would be a good thing), but found that it's actually hurting my hands. I've been fooling around in Vi, but might be switching to emacs soon.

I'm looking for a keyboard for around $100 that preferably already has the ctrl key mapped to  caps lock (but that's not such a big deal). I'd also like the keyboard to have a low key force, and one that I don't have to bottom out to use. It needs to be compact (no number pad on the side), and fairly quiet. I will be using it with unix / Mac OS if it makes a difference.

I was looking at either the happy hacking keyboard, or a tenkeyless with red or brown mx switches. The RealForce keyboards are a bit out of my price range, unless anyone knows of a cheap one.

Can anyone make a recommendation?

Thanks for the help!:laser:

[anethema]

You pretty much have it covered. If the topre switch keyboards like Realforce are out of your league price wise, these are your best bet:

http://elitekeyboards.com/products.php?sub=leopold,tenkeyless&pid=fc200rtab

They use the brown switches which have a bit of a bump and some noise associated with them, but nothing like the blues.

For sliightly less noise, you could go with black or red switches, but keep in mind they have NO feedback, tactile or audible on where the key has engaged, so aren't quite as nice for typing for some, though I personally game with my keyboard and much prefer the reds.

For an all around good typing experiance that you could game on should you want, the brown switches are the way to go.

Good luck!

[minifridge]

I'm looking for a keyboard for around $100

happy hacking keyboard

http://elitekeyboards.com/products.php?sub=pfu_keyboards

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[anthropornis]

I would stick with vi/m as it is more widely used and more often than not already installed on any linux terminal. Emacs is fine and has its strengths, but the great majority tend towards vi/m.

[TurdFurgusand]

Thanks for the responses everyone. Still deciding. By the way, I don't do any gaming. Is key feedback better for coding? I have been typing on regular keyboards that bottom out, I've never tried one with feedback.

[thegunner100]

You could get a HHKB 2 lite for $100 and under, but they're good rubber domes.

[Drew Baumann]

I'm a programmer and love my filco TKL with blues. I like brown switches as well... No idea how the reds feel.

Vim is pretty Leet. I stick to textmate while programming on OS X

[lorem3k]

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Hey, for some people, $300 counts as "around $100".

[TurdFurgusand]

Thanks for the responses. What would be better? A HHKB lite 2, a Leopold tenkeyless, or trying to get a realforce or hhkb pro 2 used (if the prices are low enough)?

[IvanIvanovich]

If you're good with the hhkb form factor, perhaps the Pure or Poker is for you? I've got Poker and I love it to pieces. It fits all your criteria, can map caps to ctrl with dipswitch, if get reds or browns you are set on switch low force, and price if can find in stock somewhere / for sale lightly used.

[The_Beast]

If you're good with the hhkb form factor, perhaps the Pure or Poker is for you? I've got Poker and I love it to pieces. It fits all your criteria, can map caps to ctrl with dipswitch, if get reds or browns you are set on switch low force, and price if can find in stock somewhere / for sale lightly used.

wat this guy said

+1 for the Poker and I don't even have one