nonagoninf
Wow, there are more people and posts here than I expected. I hope that that this community gains enough momentum to stand on its own outside Reddit.
The Kinesis Advantage2 (and earlier Kinesis Advantage/Contoured models) have 20 degree tenting built-in. Also the usual ergo features (column stagger, thumb keys) and key wells.
I have tried to overload the home row keys as modifiers but that is a huge mistake as it causes misfires or takes TOO LONG to aviate, there is no middle ground with that one.
Did you try bilateral combinations? They reduced accidental misfires to almost zero for me:
These are separate things. You can easily replace the SmartSet controller in the KA2 with a KinT controller with QMK. The key wells and thumb clusters are connected to the controller with removable ribbon cables. The swap-out takes maybe 5 minutes.
Kinesis offered replacement flex PCB and key wells in the past, so that you could replace your switches. They don’t sell them anymore and instead you have to go through an expensive UpgradeKeyboards.com build.
I’d only consider the Moonlander if you have large hands. I have very average male hands and the Moonlander thumb cluster was quite painful. It’s far away and the keys are angled weirdly. Other good prebuilt options, from close to a regular keyboard to ticks off all ergo features:
- Kinesis Freestyle Edge RGB
- Dygma Raise
- Keyboardio Model 100
- Kinesis Advantage
- MoErgo Glove80
My experience is that once you go ergo, you’ll end up wanting all features, so you’ll save yourself a lot of money by immediately buying a Kinesis Advantage or Glove80.
The next obligatory step, assuming you need (or want for whatever reason) an ergo keyboard, is a visit here: https://jhelvy.shinyapps.io/splitkbcompare/
It’s nice for flat keyboards, but not really useful for contoured keyboards like the Kinesis Advantage, Glove80 or Dactyl. I am still hoping that someone will provide a service where you can offer stub versions of common contoured keyboards so that you can try how they’d feel. Of course, the 3D construction if one of the more expensive parts, so I don’t know how feasible it is…
Thoughts on thumbcluster re reachability?
Good question! I think when floating I can reach 4-5 pretty well (for the innermost upper key I’d definitely have to move my hand). With my palms on the palm rests I can reach 3 (the lower row),for the upper row I move my hand. I can reach the closest upper row thumb key, but I’d be worried about pressing the keys below it.
Also, what switch did you end up getting?
Red. I don’t like Choc Brown and White are probably too noisy. They feel better than expected. They also offer a limited run of Pro Reds in the next batch. I also considered getting the variant with switches unsoldered. I wouldn’t have much of an issue soldering them, but with the price of the keyboard I preferred I decided not to do that.
Did you try Choc linears? Even though I’d still like to try Sunsets, I think tactility is far less useful for low-profile switches. Click/tactility was originally added to MX switches to make it possible to type without bottoming out. But typical MX switches that actuate at 2mm still have 2mm post-actuation travel.
In real-world measurements, the overall travel of Choc switches is 2.8/2.9mm [1]. A typical Choc switch actuates at 1.5 to 2mm, so there is very little post-actuation travel. So if you add a perceptible tactile bump, it’s unlikely that you can type without bottoming out and the effect might be that you slam harder into bottoming out.
I think with low-profile switches, it’s better to accept that you are probably going to bottom out and get switches with a lower spring weight so that you bottom out with less force. Otherwise you’ll get an Apple Magic Keyboard - the steep tactile bump makes you crash into the wall at high speed.
How are you getting on with the lower profile switches?
So far so good. I accept that I’ll probably bottom-out more than on the KA2’s Cherry Browns due to less travel after actuation, but since the switches are fairly light anyway it’s probably not a big issue.
Would love a follow up once you’ve used it for a while.
I’ll probably post a review after a few months of experience.
