I have to start this off with a bit of a confession: I found mechanical keyboards incredibly obnoxious when I used to work in an office. Like, "wanted to throw some of my coworkers' keyboards out the window when I heard them click-clacking away at some code" obnoxious. So, when the incomparable Cassidy Williams had a giveaway for the ninth anniversary of her wonderful Rendezvous with Cassidoo newsletter (seriously, if you have any interest in technology or software at all and you haven't subscribed, go do so!), I entered with the hope of winning something, really anything, other than a mechanical keyboard.
Guess what I won?
I'm sitting here, typing this post on a Keychron Mechanical Keyboard, courtesy of Freestyle. Specifically the V10 Ultra 8K. I wanted to come into this post with an open mind, putting aside my preconceived notions about mechanical keyboards, so typing up a post for the first time in...well, way too long seemed like a good way to give it a go.
My original keyboard was a Logitech...something. I don't know. I bought it because I used to have the Microsoft ergonomic keyboard and, when that finally died, this one was about the same layout and a little cheaper. I tried to start investing in ergonomic equipment earlier in my career when I began developing problems with my neck and wrists in my mid-twenties. I wish I had done it sooner. (If you're a young developer reading this and you take nothing else away from this post, please pay attention to that now!)
Experience
To be perfectly clear, I know nothing about mechanical keyboards either. I know this one has a 75% Alice layout, can be used wired/wirelessly/via bluetooth, and it uses Banana Tactile V10U-D4 key switches. I didn't know that layout was referred to as an "Alice layout" and I think there are other key switches named after fruit because "cherry key switches" rings some sort of very distant bell. It also has a nifty RGB backlight. All of that is from the box and setting it up to type this post.
So, what can I tell you? My wrists have been comfortable while typing this post. The layout has taken a little bit of getting used to, but that's true of any new keyboard and was going to happen unless it was identical to my last keyboard. The "thwack" sound of pressing in a key is both a satisfying tactile experience while still being muted enough for me to not find it irritating. It's kind of the perfect blend of features for me to actually enjoy using it. I love knob in the top left of the keyboard, since that keeps me from playing the Shift + Cmd + F11/F12 game for controlling my Mac Mini's volume. As you would expect, it's both smooth to turn with little bumps as you go to let you know how far you're turning it. You can also press it in like a button to quickly mute everything.
A super nice feature is the Keychron Launcher, which you can utilize by plugging in your keyboard and visiting the site in Chrome/Edge/Opera. While I found this odd at first, the fact that I can switch between computers without having to worry about a software install to configure things is super convenient! It has quite an array of different settings that you can configure which appears to cover multiple settings for every key (thanks to different "layers") and per-key RGB settings. My keyboard now has a typing heatmap background, which gives it a nifty effect that, when I stop typing to think, it looks like the keys I pressed most recently have to cool down a bit, or like my words are echoing on the board. I'm looking forward to exploring more and adding macros in the very near future.
Wrapping Up
Overall, I love this new keyboard! I'm hoping it encourages me to get back to blogging. I think, if nothing else, I'm going to be spending a lot of time playing with all of the different configuration options and probably glancing at the Keychron store. I've already got my eyes on a mouse there, too.
And to Cassidy (and Freestyle!), thank you for this amazing giveaway! I will leave you with what this reminded me of: Tom Hanks's letter back to the Nerdist podcast when they sent him a vintage typewriter as a bribe in 2012.
