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Showing 1 of 73 conversations about:
ID75 Hot-Swappable Ortholinear Keyboard Kit
MM1377
9
May 29, 2020
I'm new here and this is my first purchase from Drop and only my second mechanical keyboard so if the following causes you to roll your eyes, you have my apologies. I purchased my keyboard in January from the March drop and sure enough it shipped at the end of March 24 as expected. This is my first group buy / Drop purchase so I had no idea what to expect regarding shipping time. I was super excited when the tracking indicated that it had shipped on March 24. All the same I expected a delay due to Covid-19 issues. May 2 it arrived in California, about 2 weeks later it arrived in Illinois, about a week later it arrived in my city. Overall time was from Mar 24 until delivery on May 26. That was longer than expected / hoped for but once again with Covid-19 I have no idea if this is normal or unusual.
The keyboard arrived thoroughly wrapped in bubble wrap. Opening the bubble wrap revealed a very nice looking black box that made a good impression despite the couple of dings that it had taken in shipping. Opening the box revealed a USB cable, screws, and rubber feet in a plastic bag. Underneath the plastic bag was the PCB in an anti-static bag. The case was wrapped in foam wrap and the switches were in the plate. This kept the pins from being damaged so that was nice. First step in assembly was to remove the screws (which required a small phillps head screw driver), then pop the switches out of the plate. Putting the PCB into place was fairly easy. Once the PCB was into place, reassembling the case was easy for 4 of the 6 case screws (a couple were harder to get lined up. Only a few of the switches had pins bent so much that work was required to straighten them out and one of the pins required pliers to fix the bent pin. Putting key caps on was complicated by the fact that there was NO documentation on the keyboard layout. In fact there was NO documentation whatsoever. No steps on disassembling the keyboard. No documentation on the keyboard layout. No link to where the firmware can be found on the web. So I _think_ the link for it is here
https://github.com/qmk/qmk_firmware/blob/master/keyboards/idobo/keymaps/default75/keymap.c
at the very least this is the keyboard layout.
There is no soldering required, the switches are swappable. It is worth noting that once the key caps are on the switches, that attempting to remove a key cap usually means pulling the switch out as well. A friend pointed out that he'd had instances (not the Drop kit) where the switch actually split rather than come out of the plate so I think that having the switch come out rather than split is good. I'll post an additional comment after I flash the firmware but I want to run with it as it arrived to verify there are no issues but so far all is good.
I purchased my kit with a black case and Gateron Brown switches. The switches seem very nice. My other mechanical keyboard is a Tecware Phantom RGB. I do wish this keyboard had LEDs for the keys. The LED underglow is nice but doesn't help when trying to type in low light situations. The new Idobo 75 does seem quieter than the Tecware Phantom RGB (which has Outemu Brown switches).
Would I buy this again? Yes I likely would but it helps that I have a friend who is mech keyboard savvy. I'll add some pictures later.
I might decide to even purchase LEDs so I can light up the keys (the PCB appears to have holes for adding LEDs).
Is there anything I didn't like about the experience? Well the lack of info about when it would arrive was frustrating (but when I ordered in January how much Covid-19 would impact things was unknown so there is that). Shipping issues aside, biggest issue I could say as a problem would be the lack of documentation. I don't need a book or anything, but a sheet of paper with the keyboard layout and the URL to the firmware doesn't seem too much to ask for. The other thing I would suggest on this particular drop would be a few extra keys (I suggest 5) to cover any issues with bent pins either on arrival or in the future. An option to add keycaps would be appreciated as well so that when the package arrives, you have everything needed.
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