8 ms·

I don't get it either. Most of the custom mechanical keyboard market seems to focus on 60% keyboards, but personally I use keys beyond that set. The reasoning I

• bcrosby95 6y ago
  No one I know using a 60% keyboard only uses the 60%. As someone else mentioned, you use things like the fn key. For my keyboard: fn + jkli (or fn + wsad) for arrow keys. fn + uo for page up/down. fn + hn for home/end. fn + <number> for f1-12. I rarely used insert/delete. I never used the number pad. I have my capslock set to be fn. I was tired of a full sized monster keyboard taking so much space on my desk. At first I tried TKL but enter key placement turned out to be awkward for me, so I switched it out for a 60% since there was going to be a learning curve regardless.
  • est31 6y ago
    > fn + uo for page up/down. That would make the ctrl+ pg up/down shortcut that I use to switch between tabs in Firefox (or Kate) much harder. I'd suddenly have to press 3 keys at once instead of two.
    • mypalmike 6y ago
      You can just assign the functionality to different keys. Maybe fn with = and -.
    • deleted 6y ago
      [deleted]
    • square_usual 6y ago
      I use a 60% and I find that shortcut easier on the 60 than on a fullsize. I've mapped PgDn to Fn + ; and pressing Ctrl + Fn + ; feels easier than reaching for PgDn with my right hand.
  • syshum 6y ago
    >> I never used the number pad. I buy 15in or larger laptops specifically to get the 10key num pad built in.....
    • jonfw 6y ago
      What I really hate about that is that the keyboard isn't centered on my laptop, which means I'm either slightly lopsided on my screen or I'm bending my right wrist at a weird angle
  • barkingcat 6y ago
    I use numberpad extensively, to the point where if you gave me a keyboard with no alphabetical but only num pad, I'd be happy (and use fn keys to get at the rest) It's a change of mindset.
• f1refly 6y ago
  Most keyboard nerds I know use either something like https://neo-layout.org https://neo-layout.org or something completely custom. It's much better than a fullsize keyboards because your hands truly never leave the homerow for anything and your hand is much closer to your mouse.
  • pmontra 6y ago
    Is there any keyboard like that but with a touchpad below the space bar? Rationale: I used a mouse only for (a very few) games in the last 20 years and moving the hand to reach the mouse loses time. The touchpad is good enough to select and click stuff on screen (and a touchscreen would improve the experience for a few buttons here and there.) Furthermore the mouse has literally more friction than a finger on the touchpad (the ball ages ago, the laser now, the cord, the batteries, etc)
    • f1refly 6y ago
      I don't know of one, but I'm pretty sure you could hack something with a small enough wacom tablet if you really wanted. I used a wacom tablet for some time when my mouse broke and the store didn't have the one I wanted. Anyways, trackpoints are readily available and can easily be added even to custom keyboards. They're even more handy than trackpads in my opinion, since with a trackpad you still have to leave the keys while you can install the trackpoint at the hjn-join or the fgv-join (or whatever the layout puts there, for me it'd be nrt and aeä).
• uberduper 6y ago
  They put those keys on other layers. Like on many keyboards, you have a Fn key which activates a layer that makes the F8 key a play/pause button or w/e. Just put the less used but still necessary keys on another layer. Or configure certain keys to do something different with a double or triple tap. Double tap lshift = [ Double tap rshift = ], etc. They are highly configurable.
  • est31 6y ago
    Moving your hand to the key is faster than pressing a key combo needed for it or double tapping. At least for me it is.
    • uberduper 6y ago
      Moving your hand is also more likely to result in a repetitive stress injury.
      • germ 6y ago
        Heavy keys as well, and harsh bottom-out. There's a ton of rethinking what a keyboard is that is going on in the ergo space right now as to what a keyboard _should_ be and how they should function. From physical layouts, curvature, keymaps, layering and combos it's interesting to see the experimentation going on. These devices are going to be used for the rest of our lives, they should at least be non-harmful over time. Right now I'm using a GergoPlex, but my holy grail is a QMK'd DataHand. (And if you know who has one, please send them my way)
        • RBerenguel 6y ago
          You have already designed many keyboards, go on with a GergoHand! (happy Gergo, not Plex, user here)
          • germ 6y ago
            I wish it was that easy! There's so many mechanical parts to consider and CAD is not my strong suit. That being said, if someone wants to miniturise the LalBoard and rework it, I could design a PCB/firmware :)
• 1996 6y ago
  Have you heard about how people who grew up with MP3 prefer music that's not lossless encoded but that's missing the same frequencies as in mp3 files? It's the same, except with keyboards: if you grew up with a laptop, you want a 60% keyboard because it's "natural". If you don't believe it, just look at /r/MechanicalKeyboards on reddit: 9/10 posts are about 60% keyboards.
  • rualca 6y ago
    > It's the same, except with keyboards: if you grew up with a laptop, you want a 60% keyboard because it's "natural". I don't use a 60% keyboard, but I do use a tenkeyless keyboard because I do love my F keys. My choice has zero to do with laptop keyboard. In fact, I hate laptop keyboards. Laptop keyboards are the result of severe design constraints imposed by the laptop's form factor, and most of them are pure crap to begin with. Tenkeyless and 60% keyboards don't take over half your desk for no good reason, and provide you with everything you want or need. And they are symmetric too. To put it differently, there is absolutely no reason whatsoever a regular user going about their regular day would need a standard keyboard. The tenkey section is one of those oddities that barely anyone touches ever, and more often than not only serve as indicators of when you need to clean your keyboard.
  • square_usual 6y ago
    I grew up with desktops with big ass full sized keyboards and gravitated towards 60/65% over time. It's just much more comfortable to use.
• qchris 6y ago
  For what it's worth, this keyboard seems right up my alley. I'm currently on approximately a 60% keyboard, and I'm wary of using anything larger because I simply don't have the desk real estate for it. I have single board computers and power supplies and notepads and cables and sticky-notes coming out my ears, and going further up in keyboard size would cut down on my free space even more. My current Keychron fits the bill nicely, and I think this System76 is right in the same vein, except with some improved flexibility. I don't need a full-sized keyboard, I just want a comfortable keyboard with dedicated PageUp/Down + Home/End keys. Plus, for whatever it's worth, I'm digging my Pop!_OS distro, so knowing that their keyboard will play nice with it is an extra bonus.
• mypalmike 6y ago
  I was surprised how easy it was to adapt to a 60% keyboard. Some obvious fn key mappings for pgup, pgdn, home, end, (arrows) and del (backspace) cover the bulk of it.
• __MatrixMan__ 6y ago
  I found that switching to a 40% actually caused me to use a wider variety of "keys" then with the 105-key that I switched from. The ability to control which keys go where in the firmware opens a lot of doors. For instance, I made a "nav" layer and put the arrowkeys under hjkl because I'm a vim person, and then I put Home, PgUp, PgDn, End under "nm,." because it made sense to me geometrically, and now I use those keys all the time. Or another one: I brought "Insert" to mirror "Tab" and configured my zsh to do bash-style tab completion on "tab" and to autocomplete from history on "insert". Who the hell uses insert regularly? Me apparently. Rewiring my brain took some doing, but I'm quite happy with the results.
  • rubenbe 6y ago
    Can you say which keyboard you're using? Because the idea of having hjkl available everywhere sounds appealing.
    • i_am_proteus 6y ago
      This sort of thing works on any QMK keyboard.
    • lolive 6y ago
      I do that with xmodmap under Linux (remapping that useless CapsLock key into yet another modifier key. So capsLock+jkl; are my arrows for years, capsLock+space is my return key, etc). But I would love to have a keyboard that is directly programmable so I can plug it in any OS and enjoy my re mappings without tricky configuration. Is QMK doing such a thing?
    • cestith 6y ago
      Not the parent, but that's the default place for the arrow keys on my Keyboardio Model 01. In Vim I can use them as-is, but on the Fn layer they're arrow keys. The wsad cluster under Fn are mouse pointer keys. In fact I only have two complaints about the default layout, both pretty minor. One is that {}[]\| are on the Fn layer which took some adjustment for programming. The other is that with alt and space side by side, I sometimes hit alt+space which on macOS becomes some non-ASCII space character that looks just like ASCII space. A find and replace for that works wonders.
• accelbred 6y ago
  I'd swapped to 60% so I could put my mouse where the rest of the keyboard used to be. With home row front and center on a full size the mouse was way to the right which is quite uncomfortable. Moving to 60% was a major improvement.
  • numpad0 6y ago
    ^ This was also how HHKB was born, IIUC. The guy designed it had issues with Sun Type 4 being way too wide to use with a mouse, and sketched down a sawed-off Type 4, and that got traction.
• murermader 6y ago
  You don‘t actually have less keys with a 60% keyboard. You have the same amount of keys, but packed onto function layers. Instead of reaching with your fingers to far-away keys, you will press a function key, and another key that is closer to your hands. This results in keys that are normally further away on 100% keyboards to become easier to press, because you don‘t have to move your whole hand just to reach that key.
  • speedgoose 6y ago
    To me it sounds like you have less keys but workarounds that you may prefer.
    • rvense 6y ago
      Having more keys is a workaround for not having extra layers :)
    • xvector 6y ago
      Layers are way faster and more versatile than having more keys. 60-65% is pretty ideal when you take the time to set up layers.
      • rovr138 6y ago
        That's a memory and repetition issue.
        • xvector 6y ago
          No, it literally requires less hand movement and allows for more function.
          • CRConrad 6y ago
            Yeah, but it also requires a) setting up and b) learning really well, to put it in muscle memory. The end result may be worth it, but I guess for most people the journey there seems so daunting they never set out on it. (Or am I just judging everyone else after myself?)
• kohlerm 6y ago
  Those who really care that much about keyboards often want an efficient touch typing experience. Many people think that less keys are more efficient (easier to reach and easier to find without looking) and you just use layers. I tend to agree with that point of view, but I am not yet at 40% ;-)
• rfoo 6y ago
  During very early days these DIY mech keyboards are all someone's hobby project, finding a low cost, easy to program microcontroller with USB HID support and enough GPIO pins for keyboard matrix is surprisingly hard. ATmega32u4 (and particularly Teensy/Arduino Pro Micro) is popular at that time, the two popular off shelf boards only have 18 GPIO pins usable, the absolutely maximum key count you can get is 9x9=81 keys, not even fitting a TKL, and that's assuming extremely weird routing, for a more sensible routing you wire a 6x12 keyboard matrix, that's 72 keys max, which is why most custom keyboard from these days are 60/67 keys. After that it's basically a cultural thing.