Today is day of sorrow and lamentation. My down right ancient keyboard found itself unable to continue fulfilling it’s duty and suddenly started throwing erroneous inputs, R and N stopped working entirely while pressing E, T and D would result in those letters followed by an endless row of Ns. Extensive exploratory surgery has failed to find a cause for the issue and old age has been determined as the cause of death.
It’s just a keyboard though, right?
No, it’s a keyboard of a design that hasn’t been manufactured for 20 years and I do not understand why. These split designs were amazing. I know that logitech wave exists, which is just slightly bent and uses a weird double column “home-end” key bank. I don’t like it. I think microsoft has a similar one as well but none as good as this.
Yeah that’s 3 adapters for it to be able to keep up with the changing times, but it worked and I’ve used it for hours on end every day for over 25 years. Show me anything you own which has managed that feat, if it’s a keyboard let me know if it’s still being made and where to buy it.
I’m going to be needing a new one currently on a tiny wireless backup board which is a huge pain to type on, maybe it’s time I just “got over it” and broke my wrists in to work with a straight board.
Anyone have any recommendations?
I’m looking to get something of good quality of course but other than that I’m not sure I care too much as long as it comes in the full sized correct button setup, the one shown above, and if it absolutely has to have lighting and shit in it then it needs to be possible to be turned off. I don’t know anything about modern mechanical keyboards and no idea how my old one compares, so let me know which switch manufacturer and hardness types you prefer and why.
They are by no means the same, neither of them are mechanical. The black one has that weird dual column arrow key setup and the white one looks like it uses laptop switches which are horrible to type with. I guess I could have been a little more clear, the design idea of a split keyboard still exists but none of them are like mine.
They also need to be available in a nordic layout.
Yes I have seen a few specialty ergonomic brands making these fully split keyboards, some with additional numpads also attached with a wire. I have yet to find one available in nordic layout. I am also leery of paying $150-200 with an additional $50 shipping on top for a product I have no way of knowing if I’ll like, even if they offer a money back guarantee that’s still ~$100 in shipping I’m out.
If you want to keep searching at least find someone who sells their products in Europe.
Edit: However you are correct in your assessment that split design has seen a resurgence. There was a dearth past the shift of the millennium where no one made them which is where my melodrama stems from, it lasted quite a while.
I don’t have a split keyboard, nor have I ever used one so I can’t help there. As far as cheap mechanical keyboards go, I’ve been using this one and quite enjoying it.
I know it’s got all that light up stuff whether you want it or not, but it can be turned off/the color can be made solid.
I love that keyboard @Fraggles . Tried to find one when first searching for stuff and gave it up. This one is kinda close, but I dunno if it’ll suit your needs.
Jeez. I think the last time I saw that type of keyboard was my father’s office computer. My keyboards last 3 times longer than my mice so I don’t buy them often. Normally the spacebar or some random key breaks and I get free keyboards from people just giving them to me. I think I had 5 in my closet at one point.
Currently I am using a keyboard from Korea (got as a gift) that has the arrow keys and WASD keys very specially made for several million more presses than the other keys. (Not the spacebar though). Theoretically to last longer for gaming. It is actto but I did a search and none of them look like it.
I searched other possibilities and I could only find:
But for some reason the 6 on your keyboard is on the right side of the split, and for others the 6 is on the left side. I couldn’t find anything with what looks like a button with a picture of your mouse between the split keys. And what is the nordic layout? It looks like a normal keyboard to me. Unless you mean the little stickers that can be pasted over the keys?
Though…keyboards are mechanically easy to fix. Especially the older ones. I’m sure if you take it to some repair shop somebody would be able to fix it for you. If you show it to them it is free to ask if they can fix it. It might be a bit expensive though. But definitely cheaper than $100.
I know how you feel about items you like. I have an old old watch I used to wear all the time. It broke but I kept it with the dream that I will get it fixed someday. Then I got a cell phone and now it stays stored away somewhere. But I still keep it! It’s hard to replace an object that you got used to.
More that i have never had a keyboard stop working. I also have no memory of throwing away a keyboard, despite having owned ones with both PS/2 and usb connections,( and perhaps one with a serial port??). So i just assume they are stored away in one of the boxes filled with old cables.
Looked around at the largest electronics and appliance store in the area which has a small selection of keyboards and other peripherals, but they wont let you actually try them in store. They will however let you buy them with a 2 week return policy that lets you try them out at home, which I remarked would cause far more wear and contamination of the products than if they had at least a few in store demo products. Or at the very least a test board with just the various switches attached for people to try out. No, buy a board, try it out at home and hand it back is their policy.
Also now upon having looked at a lot of boards I find a lot of them come with this small enter key setup.
As opposed to the bigger top heavy enter key which I am used to and I can’t find a designation that describes these two different layouts other than the weird one seems to be american and the correct one might be an ISO standard. But I’m finding both versions no matter what I’m searching for and some times I see the same keyboard sold at different sites showing different setups with no differentiation between them.
Enter is a rather important button, not one you want to be unsure about whether you’re hitting or not.
During my 25 years as a Database programmer/analyst I came across a keyboard that I loved so much, that it was the only one I would use. It’s the “Gateway Anykey Keyboard”, which is not made anymore, but I still own extra copies of it, and have one attached to my old Windows XP desktop, which I rarely use these days (I use laptops now). On this keyboard any key can be remapped or programmed with a macro via the keyboard itself (no software required), and the configuration is remembered inside the keyboard itself, so you can plug the keyboard into another PC and still have the macro’s (and you can backup the keyboard current configuration to a file, to be restored later). There are 24 functions keys instead of 12. The are placed in 2 sets, with 12 function keys on the left and the other 12 functions key on top. People old enough to remember will recall that keyboards originally had the function keys on the left. These 24 keys can all be programmed (macro’s) separately as well (ie, F1 on the left can have a different macro the F1 on top). This keyboard allowed me to be a very efficient high-speed programmer.
EDIT: Also, notice the “diagonal” cursor (arrow) keys. AND this area between the numeric keypad and the main keyboard can have all of it’s keys programmed too if you wish. Yes, this keyboard is wider than a standard keyboard LOL.
I still have my Nokia flip phone. Touch screens are great and all, but man I miss that thing. Simple and sturdy too. It died to falling into water - like a gutter full. T_T
I have no way of testing the keyboard without them and no way to test them without the keyboard, particularly the DIN → ps/2 one. The ps/2 → USB is working with my backup keyboard.
However it seems an unlikely point of failure as the keyboard’s signals were still received and the weird way it failed very much suggests a problem with the generation of the signal rather than a corruption of it. Particularly the erroneous endless repetition of an ‘n’-input, there’s no way a faulty adapter would cause an “echo” like that.
)
From now on I’m calling you Doomy The Creator:D