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Ask HN: What is your favorite keyboard?

2 points by lprd ↗ HN
Hey everyone,

Keyboards are our main tool (besides the computer) when doing our daily work. As such, its quite normal to develop a strong preference over time. My personal favorite is the Leopold FC660C which I bought in Japan while visiting.

What are your favorites? It can be standard, mechanical, or even ergonomic models.

Cheers!

7 comments

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approxim8ion
Cheapest one I can find from a decent brand. Simply because I can't afford the ones I might actually like to use.

At $99ish though, the Anne Pro 2 seems like a really decent choice.

h2odragon
Old layout IBM model M. In 1996, I got to clean out an elementary school's "IT department" as they were replacing everything, which included a couple dozen M keyboards made from '88 to '92. I spent some time refurbishing them and used them until 2020; never worrying about adapting to new key layouts.

(A skin condition causes me to shed hand skin prodigiously, I tried a logitech "fancy" $250 kb last year in between the old and new model M's; it lasted 3 months before keys stopped actuating)

lprd
I would love to get my hands on one of those! I assume you have to use some sort of adapter to make the USB connection?
nikau
Some model Ms have high power consumption, there is a mod to replace a resistor which reduces it. This can upset some adapters and PCs.

I used one with a ps2->usb adapter I bought about 10 years ago, I recall I had to do some research to find one that's known to work without issues.

This is the adapter I have, looks like its no longer sold:

https://www.clickykeyboards.com/product/ps-2-to-usb-adapter-...

SubGenius
I had an accident that left me with some pretty nasty nerve damage on my left hand. It's essentially a non-stop tingling/buzzing sensation with intermittent electric-shock like pinching.

I switched to a Keynesian Advantage 2 late last year and it's been a tremendous help for dealing with pain. It took a while to get used to though. It was probably a good thing too because I always knew how to touch-type but I don't think I'd ever learnt it in a systematic way, just sort of pickedi up as a kid in the 90s. This time around I put in a lot more thought about finger placement etc.

The Kinesis has key remapping, macros and a whole lot of features I'm probably not using. It's great.

I still need a daily stretching session and stress-ball use to keep my hands feeling lose and healthy, but the Keynesis has reduced my hand pains quite significantly.

du_bing
HHKB Hybrid Type-s Black Blank Keycaps, this is good.