How are people’s semi-transparent keycaps holding up? I had a PBTfans Neon green spacebar kit and had to have three of my arrow keys replaced (the down arrow twice) for hairline fractures just below the surface. I used different switches (no cherry clears!) and one cracked while it was not in use. But since replacing they’ve been fine - I think they were from an early batch that has been improved. Are others having good luck with their sets - PBTfans or others?
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What plate do you have in each board?
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Both boards came with PC plates. I haven’t changed them.
No issues with any of my sets yet. I own lelelabs crystal x, SP polycarbonate and deadline studios caps.
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Durock v2 were praised few years back, they’re pretty outdated, this days we have much better standards today that doesn’t include pouring lube and reapplying it every other week.
Personally I’ve been using TX AP stabs and they live up for their name, almost perfect, I don’t see myself bother taking apart the board to put better ones, just avoid using bandage under the stem.
The rev 3 version had zero ticking from the stem-wire contact (the “classic” ticking cause), but had an issue with the stem itself hitting the housing causing a tick due to a wide opening, which the AP version fixed.
Also there’s a new screw-in version of the AP stabs, a bit hard to find but I’d recommend them over the clip-in version, there shouldn’t be any big difference usually when clip-ins are properly secured but TX’s specific clips just doesn’t stay in place securely for me.
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I noticed that Diykeycaps.com was dissed back in 2022 (List of Cherry-profile keycap sets - #82 by ajoflo), but I wonder if anyone has actually had experience with their keycaps? I think their custom keycap tool is pretty cool.
Been looking around Aliexpress and a few domestic vendors and coming up empty while looking for the the following PCB:
- Wireless (BT, Tri-mode, Ansibles, etc)
- Hot-Swap
- Tsangan (1.5u|1|1.5u|7u|1.5u|1u|1.5u)Bottom Row
I’ve found a few that match 2 out of the 3 criteria but nothing that matches all 3. Actually I did find the BIOI G60BLE Rev3 PCB which seems perfect but PlayKeyboard (my old CA66 friends…) doesn’t seem to carry it anymore.
I never considered using a BT keyboard before but using the Yang Controller on the HHKB has completely changed that. I’d like to try it in an MX board now but would like to be able to use a Tsangan board.
Vortex has a “Triple Mode PCB” that’s also hot swap and supports Tsangan, but it’s currently sold out. You can sign up for restock notifications or see if other vendors resell it?
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So I was going to wait until it got here to update but I sound a mech market post coding their M0ll0 has a G60BLE in it and I then came across an AliExpress post selling the pcb only for the M0ll0. I don’t know if it’s related to vortex or a rip off but I ended up ordering it. Fingers crossed.
Hope it works out! I was surprised by how few PCBs matched what you wanted when it’s not uncommon to have that type of PCB bundled with recent GB and in-stock customs.
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Yeah, exactly. Though considering I had never wanted one of these before and I’ve been doing this for a long time I suppose it’s not surprising that it’s not a popular product. Not to mention the additional fuzziness of having to get a battery separately (not hard but potentially confusing).
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The Aliexpress “M0II0” Hotswap BT PCB came in and I have to say it’s very nice looking. I plugged it in and confirmed that VIAL recognized it.
Does anyone recognize the logo on the board? Just trying to look it up and get a little more information, the Aliexpress page potentially says the manu is EZKB. I did a reverse image search and there are a ton of companies with similar logos but I couldn’t find a specific keyboard outfit with this logo.
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What is the difference between a pre-order and a group buy?
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Pre-orders should be practically guaranteed to deliver by established businesses as opposed to less organized group buys run by community members and smaller businesses. That’s how it should be, anyway. You’ll never know in practice how reliable a situation is unless you hear about issues or past successes.
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The terminology is a bit muddied these days - but a pre-order is straightforwardly buying something early - something that’s otherwise all-set for production. A group-buy is when a collective pools their money to then contract a manufacturer who has ostensibly not yet been paid. It’s a great way to get low-run products made, and was the only way a lot of customs got made - but these days a lot of companies throw around the term when they really do just mean “pre-order”.
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Maybe “group buy” is a useful phrase when one wants to capture a bit of the fomo energy
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What exactly is a “burger mount”? I’ve been googling a bit, but feeling a bit confused still. Does it refer to a style of top-mount but with o-rings on the screws above and below the PCB?
If im referencing correctly, burger mount seems to be what others also call isolated top mount which is what you described. I know some designs do “isolated top mount” differently, only an o-ring between the screw and plate, o-ring between case, plate, and screw, or a kind of “sock” covering over the plate tab.
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I think it just refers to the use of those little o-rings, on any number of mounting styles including but not limited to top-mount and tray-mount; pretty much any time mounting screws come into play there’s a potential opportunity to burger-ize them.
For example, I’ve done it with a tray-mount GK-61, as well as an edge-mounted NightFox.
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And all this time I thought it referred to some sophisticated industrial design but it’s really just turning stuff into a sandwich.
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