Drop Mech Keys Meetup Recap - Thanks for Visiting!
As you may have seen, we just hosted our first meetup in quite a while here at Drop HQ (Corsair HQ, but they seem to like us enough :) )! It was a blast to get to meet so many enthusiasts local to the bay area—it had been 10 years since I was last hanging out with keyboard nerds in the bay, at KeyCon 2014. We had a great time hosting everyone at the offices, checking out all the very nice boards y'all brought, and sharing some of our own projects/spaces! I knew it would be fun to host in the Game Room when I first saw it in person, but seeing it come to fruition was still so cool. Alright, I'll stop blabbering on now. xD Picture time! (Oh, real quick - there will be more of these! Stay tuned for more info and to catch the next one!)
May 15, 2024
"I clearly have a defective key but Joinhandmade will not replace or repair my product. Good that Massdrop is giving me my money back. I will stay away from any Joinhandmade products. If they are not even willing to give you a working product and took them months to saying just that."
I'll pass.
My initial comment was a response to someone saying it was $100 - it wasn't, it was $65 - in the same price range as this Hammer artisan spacebar.
Joiha clearly has quality control issues, and their brand name has gone down the toilet, in large part because they refuse to support their products. I own 4 Joiha keycaps, and none of them have any sort of quality issue. Having said that, I have also not purchased any Joiha keycaps in a long time, and I will not do so in the future, due to their not standing by their own products + their quality issues.
The reason Joiha's spacebar was brought up was because artisan spacebars are few and far between, and very few artisans will even bother producing them. Joiha even said they will no longer produce spacebars, since they couldn't even break even on their production of their spacebars (yes, it is damn labor intensive to make artisan spacebars). Hammer's spacebars are actually impressive because they can deliver at the same price point, without sacrificing quality, like Joiha has apparently had to do.
I happen to have both, and I have 0 issues with either. They're both incredible pieces as well. The price point makes sense, due to the difficulty of producing artisan spacebars, and the fact they cover 6.25 units of your keyboard. If you take the base price for an artisan, let's say $25 to cover 1u, you're actually getting a discount. You're entitled to your opinion, as well as your spending habits, but don't assume you know better.