Behind the scenes #189

Keyboard projects, reviews, quick news, in the mailbox, meetups, vendors, discounts.

Hey, what's up everyone!

Welcome back for another recap and behind-the-scenes write-up.

If you are new to kbd.news, you can read how this started out and what this is all about nowadays. If you like what you see, subscribe to the newsletter (free) and donate some bucks to keep this otherwise free and ad-free project alive.

As promised, I've offered my March income from kbd.news for the Ukrainian cause. About $2,800 sent to the Dragonfeeders. Thanks for your donations. More details below.

Anyway, while the dumbest president of all time keeps destroying everyone’s wallets, I can offer some cool keyboard stuff as solace and a distraction. (The cut-off date for this issue was last weekend, I'm a bit behind while still working on the March switch market overview.)

Some posts worth sharing

No reviews this time. I've turned down a couple of offers, been traveling more than usual, picked up new hobbies, and I'm generally quite busy. No time for thorough keyboard reviews, unfortunately. A switch review may land on the front page next week though, featuring Akko's Cilantro – their first "deep-clack tactile" switches, manufactured by HMX.

• Erik Peyronson's Erkbd is a 3D printed, handwired 44-key split keyboard with displays and encoders.

• A wireless split with dual trackballs: Levels by Vincent Franco.

• MagnumMonk's KEEB is SPLIT is an open-source ergo keyboard with USB-A connection between the halves.

• A condensed version of the Batarang by Protieusz: 78-BRUCE with trackball and integrated RP2040.

• An open-source low-pro split by crolbar: Yuki.

• An MX version of Geist's popular TOTEM: TOTEMX by azhizhinov.

• A semi-handwired unibody split with some splay: Swanky Bojo by Tom.

• Vladimir's Pelican is a PCB-agnostic O-ring case for 60% keyboards.

• Chen Zeng created this nice!view dongle for a split keyboard powered by ZMK.

TIPS

• Timbetimbe of ergokeyboards.com designed an alternative case for the Crosses PCB. With less than vertical thumb cluster angle this time. Files this way.

• I don't know about you, but for me personally, seeing projects like this DIY force curve meter results in an hour of Aliexpress browsing… DIY force curve meter by 13ckPony.

• Glass substrate keyboard by BranchNo9329.

I’m a DIY enthusiast who just finished my first custom keyboard using a glass PCB substrate […] I went with a glass PCB for a unique transparent look, plus I was curious about its durability compared to FR-4.

• Science6uru discovered that nerf darts fit under keycaps:

Who knew. A lot cheaper than real rubber O rings, but I expect them to become useless in a few weeks. Probably not worth the time cutting and trimming them to the right thickness. I personally like the sound and feel of the foam but it’s not for everyone – Science6uru.

Closed-source, WIP, etc.

• Hyper7 R4 from mechboards.co.uk. New run. Pre-assembled, kit or barebones.

We're just finishing up production of the first wave, and have opened up orders on the second wave – Ben.

• Keebmaker custom Ferris Sweep Bling LP – posted by sillypwilly.

• A handwired unibdoy split: Iridiumfly by boring-beaver aka gwirn.

• Ikeji posted a sliding keyboard based on silent square microswitches and a UIAPduino (CH32V003) devboard.

• Meme board: The 1000 most common words + modifiers OLKB.

• Roy's Game Roy ADVANCE is a split where the halves communicate over TRRS or Game Boy link cable.

• The low-pro split Xaivent by WoodenCod is just 9mm thick. (The PCB has a cutout for the nice!nano / nice!view sandwich.)

• AUM is a Corne-derivative by TemperatureAgile.

• Rain2's Meka and Meka 2. Katana vs Alice layout with trackball.

• Galium58 by ooepi – with scroll wheel.

• Wallet42 – after the initial drawings by Notxtwhiledrive, here is a working handwired prototype.

• MDR Touch Refiner by panacamanana.

• Atomic Blast v2 is a handwired ortho board by anz507 – with rotary encoder and a toggle switch for Caps Lock.

• Totemist by ergomech.store – drawing inspiration from the Totem keyboards, but with key refinements to enhance usability while staying true to a purist, no-frills design.

• Ryan Norbauer's $3600 Seneca deserves a mention too.

History

• As author Matt Adereth made us aware, the Dactyl turned 10! (The initial commit is dated March 7, 2015.)

I just realized it’s been 10 years since I open sourced the Dactyl code. It’s been amazing to see what people have done with it! […] My dark secret is that I now use a Kinesis Advantage Pro 360 – Matt.

• Hm. A wooden Cherry G80 posted by kossmetics. With sound test.

• A few years ago I was eyeing with just the keyboard of this Fanuc for months. Now PipeMasterPerry posted some photos to fire up my dormant gear acquisition syndrome.

Keyboard art

• Full CNC Dragon Ball keycap set coming in aluminum or zink alloy – by Keeyblock. Jeez, we usually see such things in dye sub and plastic. Lots of other cool metal artisans by the team.

• TereminGoat's 5th birthday collection update with 3,500 unique switches. Kind of like pixel art. Speaking of…

• Keyboard pixel art wallpaper by kellandrasue.

• Bad Temper mod – beekeeb board posted by alex35mil.

• There've been some Wolfjaw posts recently. This raw bronze one with the patina was treated with a combination of ammonia and salt – by whitefacemountain.

In the mailbox

Lots of switches are on their way, but nothing has arrived recently.

Ukraine stuff

So as indicated, I supported the Ukrainian cause with all the money I made with kbd.news in March. I have just summarized the results, and almost $1,400 have been collected from all the various donation platforms. Thanks a lot for your help.

As promised, I doubled your donations and sent about $2,800 to the Dragonfeeder foundation – rounded to a neat 1,000,000 HUF in local currency:

To recap, these funds are used for: aggregators, batteries, medical stuff, even children's books – as you can read here:

(Yep, the books are in Hungarian. As I wrote here, ethnic Hungarians from Zakarpattia Oblast are fighting alongside Ukraine, and we are supporting their home and community too.)

I'm going to continue supporting Ukraine via the Dragonfeeder organization, feel free to join me any time.

Donations

So last month's campaign of supporting Ukraine and the associated influx of new donations made it pretty hard to track everything properly across all the available platforms.

Anyway: Thanks a lot for your support!

• ErgoHaven (Russia) left as recurring donor due to this campaign, understandably.
• New recurring donors: Hana and Jeremiasz. Thank you!
• New donations from Rodrigo, Tim, Miranda, Roberto, Fernando, Ryan, etc. (and more – the cut-off date for this list was late March). You are awesome!
• As always, many thanks to my awesome regular supporters and everyone who helped this project thus far.

For all the donation options check out the donation page!

Meetup database

As always, this meetup database serves as both a calendar and an archive, so feel free to send me upcoming events or even ones from the recent past to make this collection as comprehensive as possible.

Recently added

• ZFX Meetup 2025 Shanghai, April 19, Shanghai, China
• Plus a few more that have passed in the meantime…

(As you can see, there have been a couple of two-day events added recently. I have yet to update my meetup engine to handle these correctly… Coming, ahem, soon.)

The Seoul Expo went under my radar, but miknayr shot a video with short interviews, as did purpleolive:

Vendors & Discounts

Feel free to use the KBDNEWS discount code at 171 keyboard shops! And do not hesitate to report any issues – like Edward did earlier. Thanks! :)

New shops and updates to the database of keyboard vendors this past two weeks:

• The Coffeekeys (Italy) discount has been updated to 5%.
• Keeyblock (China) offered you a 5% discount too (code: KBDNEWS). Check out all their cool stuff from mesmerizing titanium artisans to milled alu/zink keycap sets. Their CNC Dragon Ball set made it to this issue's keyboard art column.
• Weikav (China) added, offering you a 5% discount (KBDNEWS) as well. Keyboards, keycaps, and some switches too.
• Rumah Keyboard (Indonesia) added. Sort of.
• Tez Cables is officially shutting down on March 31, 2025. All of the in-stock items are on sale for 70% – well, sorry for this, I compiled this post much earlier…
• As of 17 March, Rama Works is officially in liquidation. Posted by _vastrox_.
• Kono website now offline.

Well, Geekboards is closed in theory, but you can still visit the place:

Turns out even closing a shop [in Germany] takes ages. Our lease obligates us to stay until the end, we did find a new tenant, but the landlord isn’t exactly rushing to sign the new contract. So we’re still here. […] you can still visit us for the next few weekends. We’re open Fridays and Saturdays – rguliev.

Developments

• I've updated the image sprite for shop logos. A couple of changes since its last update in January.
• Added a best-selling switch section to the profile pages of the contributing shops, based on the previous month's data provision. (I coded and tested this last August, just forgot to roll out…)
• With about 300 switch models in the database, meaning 300 switch icons, it was high time to create a switch icon sprite too – this way your browser loads a single image, once, instead of 300 tiny pics. E.g. when scrolling through the switch list, but also in the monthly switch compilations.
• What else? Lots of small tweaks in the switch database and scripts, like the top sellers in the sidebar of inner pages, the "sort by price" function, and more. However, in an era of 50% tariffs coming and going daily, this latter is pretty useless until some decision-makers grow up and come to their senses.

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That's all for today. Thanks for checking by. As always: Keep learning and building!

Until next time,
Tamás

78-BRUCE

A condensed version of the Batarang by Protieusz: 78-BRUCE with trackball and integrated RP2040.

Protieusz shared the Gerber files and case of his unibody split 78-BRUCE, which is a condensed version of the Batarang and Armored Batarang models.

So I recently designed a condensed version of the Batarang which I called the 78-BRUCE. It has a interchangeable 34mm or 25mm trackball, 34keys column staggered with integrated RP2040 with hot swap – Protieusz.

Specs

• 34 keys
• MX, hotswap
• on-board RP2040 MCU
• trackball (25 or 34 mm, PMW3360 sensor)
• QMK
• 3D-printed case

Resources

• https://github.com/protieusz/78-BRUCE/
• https://makerworld.com/en/models/1207063-78-bruce#profileId-1221103

Erkbd (Erik's Keyboard)

Erik Peyronson's Erkbd is a 3D printed, handwired 44-key split keyboard with displays and encoders.

The Erkbd by Erik Peyronson (aka EarflapsOpen) is a 3D printed, 44-key split keyboard powered by QMK. It's handwired but comes with a detailed build guide.

The device features two rotary encoders, two 1.3" 128x64 OLED displays, and uses Waveshare RP2040 Zero development boards.

It is inspired primarily by crkbd together with the layout of the void ergo s. […] The name ERiks KeyBoarD is ment to honor corne (crkbd), which pulled me down this money burning rabbit hole combined with the fact that my name is Erik – Erik.

The keyboard was designed using FreeCAD and printed using a Creality Ender 3v3 ke 3D printer. The filament was creality CR PLA.

Specs

• 44 keys (6x3+4)
• handwired (MX)
• Waveshare RP2040 Zero controllers
• 2x 1.3" SH1107 OLEDs
• 2x EC11 rotary encoders

Resources

• https://github.com/erikpeyronson/erkbd

Levels

A wireless split with dual trackballs: Levels by Vincent Franco.

Vincent Franco aka timbetimbe of ergokeyboards.com made Levels, this wireless ergo split equipped with dual trackballs.

In the spirit of experimentation, I've decided to build a 54 key, wireless split with dual trackballs. What you are looking at is an MX switch based, wireless, split with a stainless steel switch plate. Once assembled - the keeb has a nice chonky boy feel that I deeply appreciate. Finally, since I am an 80s kid based the design on some of those little Casio keyboards(musical) from that era – Vincent.

Specs

• 54 keys (6x4+3)
• MX, hotswap
• trackball
• 3D-printed case
• wireless, ZMK

For the time being, the Levels requires a prospector dongle, which is a build in itself.

Resources

• https://github.com/Good-Great-Grand-Wonderful/levels-zmk

KEEB is SPLIT

MagnumMonk's KEEB is SPLIT is an open-source ergo keyboard with USB-A.

MagnumMonk shared an ergo split with a twist: the KEEB is SPLIT features USB-A sockets for connecting the halves. It was inspired by projects like the Corne, Cantor/Piantor, Cheapino, etc.

Whats the big idea? Robust, decent-looking, comfortable, cost-effective, easy-to-build/repair/use 3x6 split keyboard – Magnum-Monk.

Specs

• 42 keys (6x3+3)
• MX, hotswap
• Pro Micro footprint
• USB-A between the halves
• 3D-printed case

Resources

• https://github.com/Magnum-Monk/KeebIsSplit

Yuki

An open-source low-pro split by crolbar: Yuki.

YUKI is a diodeless split keyboard with a column stagger layout, shared by crolbar. Heavily inspired by the Cantor.

The thumb cluster was a bit uncomfortable at first, but i got used to it and now its not that bad – crolbar.

As many Japanophiles know, 'yuki' means 'snow' in Japanese – hence the snowflake silk screen art.

Features

• 44 keys (6x3+4)
• MX or Choc V1 (different PCBs)
• reversible PCB
• STM32F401CCU6 development board
• TRRS connection
• 2 USB-C connectors, with a choice from which the keyboard should send keystrokes
• OLED support
• Firmware made with Keyberon – "A rust crate to create a pure rust keyboard firmware."

Resources

• https://github.com/crolbar/yuki

TOTEMX

An MX version of Geist's TOTEM: TOTEMX by azhizhinov.

TOTEMX, this 38-key column-staggered split keyboard by azhizhinov, has been around for some time, but it was brought to my attention by dummyboi_cyc's recent post (the image on top depicts his builds). This board is a replica of the famous TOTEM by GEIGEIGEIST – for MX-spaced (19.05x19.05mm) MX switches.

Ever since I bought a totem from AliExpress it has been my daily driver. My only complaint is I wish to use MX switches for typing feel and keycaps tailored to my taste – dummyboi.

Sure, there's also the feature-rich KLOR as an alternative, but the TOTEMX is a no-frills adaptation. In addition, it was meant to be used with a Seeed Studio XIAO RP2040 or nRF52840 (vs the Pro Micro footprint of the KLOR).

Specs

• 38 keys
• MX, hotswap or soldered (also soldered-only Choc?)
• reversible PCB
• Seeed XIAO footprint (e.g. RP2040 or nRF52840)
• TOTEMX uses the same firmware as the original TOTEM
• various 3D-printed cases

Dummyboi and his friend also made modifications to the case, aiming for a similar low profile to the original Totem. They shaved 2mm off the top and bottom cases, customized the bottom case cutouts for the hotswap sockets à la Horizon, and added 3mm x 2mm magnet holes to the middle and top cases for screw-less assembly.

Resources

• https://github.com/azhizhinov/TOTEMX
• https://github.com/GEIGEIGEIST/totem
• https://github.com/GEIGEIGEIST/KLOR

Swanky Bojo

A semi-handwired unibody split with some splay: Swanky Bojo by Tom.

Tom aka seattledirk/pandrr shared the 3D case files of his Swanky Bojo, a semi-handwired monoblock split keyboard with splay. Inspired by the Le Chiffre and Totem.

My second self designed 3d printed keyboard. Modeled completely in tinkercad, because I am an idiot… – seattledirk.

Specs

• 44 keys
• MX, soldered – via single-key PCBs
• Pro Micro
• splay
• 3D printed case

Resources

• https://github.com/pandrr/swanky_bojo

Pelican case

Vladimir's Pelican is a PCB-agnostic O-ring case for 60% keyboards.

The Pelican by Vladimir aka kapee1/kape.0 is a 60% O-ring case compatible with many PCBs of this form factor.

I was heavily inspired by the Bakeneko and Aperture (a keyboard from the local community with no worldwide GB). So I decided to combine the best of both and make it available to anyone who enjoys DIY projects as much as I do – Vladimir.

The hole serves multiple purposes at once: it helps reduce the front height without any consequences (but affects the sound, of course) and makes pulling out the whole PCB sandwich much more convenient.

Features

• Unikorn-like O-ring mount
• Space for a 402080 battery installation
• Front height = 17.7 mm
• C-series daughterboard compatibility
• Most 60% O-ring PCBs will fit

Resources

• https://github.com/kapee1/pelican

Nice!view dongle

Chen Zeng created this nice!view dongle for a split keyboard powered by ZMK.

Chen Zeng (aka Sasuke2083/tokyo2006) shared this nice!nano dongle using the Micro nrf52840.

This device requires manually flashing the bootloader. Switching between normal and dongle setup requires flashing each time.

Resources

• https://github.com/tokyo2006/zmk-dongle