Making your keyboard work for you! When shopping for a new keyboard you may have heard that you want to have a keyboard that is compatible with QMK, VIA, or VIAL. These are three different programs that allow you to modify the assigned keys on a keyboard. This is one of the major advantages of using a custom mechanical keyboard and one that I feel is criminally underused. Making small adjustments to your layers can allow you to tune your keyboard to your exact specifications. For example, I always swap the position of left control and caps lock. I’ve always felt that caps lock was a waste of such a valuable space. For those of you that read some of my earlier articles, you’ll know that my first mechanical keyboard was a Happy Hacking Keyboard. As you’ll see later on, my personal layouts are heavily inspired by this keyboard, even going so far as to mapping my backspace to the pipe key on nearly every single physical layout, yes including tenkeyless. Today, I hope you can take away...

DCL keycaps launched nearly a year ago, shortly after the release of the CSTM80 introduced them to the market. There has always been an interest in high-quality, south-facing shine through keycaps that also look nice (both with and without LEDs). We think that DCL has nailed the brief. Not only is the quality there, but the kitting holds no punches and allows for compatibility with nearly any not-totally-obscure layout. That is, as long as it’s an ANSI layout keyboard.  We’ve heard from many of our non-American friends out there that they’d like to pick up a set of DCL keycaps—if only we offered an international kit compatible with their language or physical layout. Well, the time has come.  DCL International Kits are here.  DCL Shadow and DCL Snow will be available in a range of international layouts, beginning with support for UK, German, French, Katakana, and Hangul layouts. Each of the five full kits will be available on their respective color (Shadow or Snow)...

So in my previous write-up, while highlighting the benefits of alternative and custom layouts, I declared without much evidence that QWERTY is not that bad at all, and also that it is in the top 2% of all the possible layouts. Well, like so many times in life: it depends. I did my original research many years ago - the exact value was in fact 1.82% -, but I forgot to mention that this is only valid in a special case: using my personal corpus and ruleset. It makes sense since back in the day I did this to support the design process of my own custom keymaps. Anyway, it was high time to redo my original experiment, dive in this topic a bit deeper, and reveal the logic and method behind my calculations. Spoiler alert: I was wrong! Or was I? ;) QWERTY Everyone knows QWERTY I guess. Christopher Sholes, Remington 2 typewriter, preventing jamming of type bars, path dependence, whatever. I'm not going to cover it here, check this previous write-up of mine if you are interested...

Figure 1: Are these even long pole? I don't know, but they're really serving 'long pole vibes'. Something tells me I should probably be a little more rigorous about them than that though.. Honestly, I’m a tad bit compelled to kick off this article by once again hammering on the meme that everyone newer to the hobby loves to repeat in that “all linears are basically the same”. While my aptly named last article from Drop titled ‘Not All Linears Are The Same!’ likely did a good enough job of dissuading most readers of that age old falsehood, this one may help put it to rest for the remaining few of you who weren’t so convinced. Don’t worry to all of you reading this who don’t care that much for linear switches, either, as the idea of ‘long pole’ switches can also apply to tactiles too! Once an odd design quirk developed to help emphasize sharp, forceful, and pointed bottoming out sensations in BSUN and Tecsee switches back in 2020, ‘long stem poles’ have since morphed into a...

DCX Bim is launching today, so to help celebrate the occasion we have called upon the creator of Bim to peek out from behind the curtain and share a bit about himself and his design process. Welcome balance, and thank you in advance for taking the time to answer our questions!  With that, let’s take a dive into the mind of balance!  How did you get into mechanical keyboards as a hobby? Was there any particular event that caused you to seek it out, or was it a slow burn over time?  I got into mechanical keyboards through one of my friends as he was really fond of keyboards and 3d design. What caused you to take the next step in the hobby, moving from enjoying keyboards to designing keysets and taking on more of a “making” role?  Actually, I was really interested in designing and 3d modelling and I have discovered people who designed keycaps. While doing this, I fell more in love with the hobby and designs around them, influencing me to make my first ever custom keyboard....

Over the years of collecting mechanical keyboard switches, I’ve been lucky enough to have encountered dozens upon dozens of rare and unique ones that have stuck in my mind to this day. Prototypes, factory errors, and even a few switches so rare that there is literally zero documentation about them anywhere in the world all fill that personal list from top to bottom. However, I realize that talking about switches so far outside of most people’s reaches, and even sometimes my own grasp, doesn’t make for the most exciting of articles about switches. To this newest generation of keyboard enthusiasts, though, there is one pretty rare MX-style switch which has made its way to the top of everyone’s “must try” lists – Cherry MX Locks. These often undiscussed and even more rarely seen switches are something that few people have seen and even fewer have had the chance to try at a meetup before. However, the list of people who really know how these unique Cherry switches work is even shorter...

As I walk down the hall to my office each morning, I hear the discordant clattering of keys coming from my coworker’s office. In the hall… several doors down… I hear them. Like the loose teeth in my grandma’s poodle, barely hanging on, they rattle and heave. If anyone’s ever told you that mechanical keyboards are too loud, it’s simply because that person has become completely desensitized to the garbage-bomb that is the standard office computer keyboard. In the 1980’s and 90’s, it was common to hear the sound of unmitigated excellence when you walked into an office building. The rapid gunfire-like precision of a room full of high-quality computer keyboards firing in unison. Even in the early 2000’s when I worked in a south-side Chicago newspaper newsroom, it was still filled with such keyboards. Ten to fifteen years into their professional daily use, they were still magnificent in sound and feel. Punctual, clean, decisive. In those days, professional keyboards didn’t come...

Figure 1: This is the keyboard of someone (0range) who clearly knows how to ask proper questions. Over the past couple of weeks, I’ve been lurking around the channels of a couple of different entry level keyboard forums and I have to admit that the experience is quite bleak. I’m not saying this because of “toxicity” or people being given wrong information, rather I see so many people’s questions going unanswered… and to be honest they’re kind of to blame for it. While I recognize that not everyone coming freshly into the keyboard space enters it with the same level of inquisitiveness that I did when I first joined back in 2017, these questions going unanswered really feel way under-thought or over-thought compared to where I was. On one hand, you get questions like this: What is best gaming keyboard? And on the other hand, you get questions like this: Hi, there everyone! I am just now starting to look into mechanical keyboards as an avid gamer and I need some help in...

Figure 1: Zeal's own photo of the first production bags of Zealios switches... I’m guessing that a good number of you reading this article right now clicked on with some sincere degree of confusion from the title. There can’t possibly be any way that ThereminGoat – the guy who has personally tried over 3,000 different switches – is claiming that there won’t ever be another switch like the Zealios, of all things. (I’m sure a few of you are further listing off at least a dozen other medium-heavy tactiles that you can think of that are close enough to Zealios on top of this, too.) While you would be right in calling me out for saying something of the sort about Zealios, the switches, what I’m talking about here is something bigger and more impactful – Project Zealio, a.k.a. the initial groupbuy announcement and ‘Round 1’ release of Zealios switches. I’m here to argue that not only did Project Zealio fundamentally changed the way that the mechanical keyboard community thought...

Figure 1: A fantastic Kailh switch photo from Blitzenx51! There’s any number of different details people look into when they’re trying to pick out switches for their next keyboard build. However, arguably none of them are as vague and mysterious as the materials used to make housings and stems. Yes, even as manufacturers are iffy about their spring weights and newer brands are sketchy about who actually made their switches, differentiating POM from Nylon from Polycarbonate remains to this day the least understood parts of mechanical keyboard switches. For what it’s worth, I don’t have a fix for that either. As someone who has completed a master’s degree in chemical engineering focusing on polymer science, I understand full well that attempting to reverse engineer the formulas of even the most simple keyboard switch materials would take months on end and nearly free-range access to numerous analytical instruments that companies simply won’t hand over to you. However, that...

Figure 1: Oh yeah, I meant it when I said obscure... There’s no doubt that mechanical keyboard switches have gotten increasingly better in their stock forms over the past half decade of releases. Despite switches now having tighter manufacturing tolerances, smoother factory lubing, and overall higher quality per dollar spent, aftermarket modifications of switches is still one of the most discussed topics by people freshly joining the hobby today. This hyper fixation on switch modding is due in no small part to the glut of keyboard content creators that produced videos, shorts, and all manner of content during the peak of COVID talking about the art and science behind lubing and filming for switches. For a while there, it almost seemed as if you had to have some content about lubing, filming, and/or ‘frankenswitching’ switches if you wanted to cut it as being a true keyboard content creator in the space. However, as people like this have flooded the internet with...

Diffusing the Diffuser We love RGB, but we also understand that it’s not for everyone. The problem with integrated RGB designs is that even when you turn them off, the plastic diffusers are still visible—a byproduct of RGB that some users find visually unappealing. Solving this issue, the SENSE75 has its LED diffusers hidden on its underside of the keyboard, making them entirely invisible from standard viewing angles. When turned on, the subtle LED underglow casts on the desk surface providing a natural and pleasant looking halo. Turned off, the keyboard’s minimalist design takes over and keeps the focus on its soft lines and curved transitions. Applying the App We know how important it is to have full, customizable control over your keymappings and lighting options. That's why we’ve built a Windows- and Mac-compatible configurator application for the SENSE75—complete with an easy-to-use interface that lets you quickly customize your keys and lighting. Future versions...

CTRL, ALT, SHIFT V2 We think it’s fair to say Drop’s original CTRL, ALT, and SHIFT keyboards have earned a place as classics within the hobby. But, since their debut, it’s also fair to say there has been a lot of evolution among mechanical keyboards. So, what do you do to modernize a classic without sacrificing what made it so in the first place? And, beyond that, what might something totally new look like? When we’ve done customer surveys and asked buyers why they picked one of the three the answer is usually the same - the design. Machined from a solid block of aluminum, then sandblasted and anodized, with pleasant rounded corners and simple-yet-elegant industrial design, CTRL, ALT and SHIFT look as great as they feel.  However, the common complaints we’ve heard are related to stabilizers, switch compatibility, and typing sound. So, we’d like to introduce you to the V2 family of these icons.  The refreshed V2 versions of CTRL, ALT and SHIFT will all have several...

Offices are tense spaces, there’s no way around it. Whether they’re silent, museum-like tombs or raucous zoos filled with energy. In this place of distraction, and often discomfort, it’s important to have tools that make you more efficient, comfortable and focused. Personally, I am lucky to work in a happy, healthy work environment with amazing coworkers, but my office is filled with distraction and on my best days it’s a challenging ecosystem in which to create. I’ll be honest, I’m no gamer, and it wasn’t the speedy, silent linear switches or 8000Hz polling rates of gaming boards that drew me to this hobby. It was the spirit of clickety-clackety typewriters of the past and a desire to craft my words on a surface that deserved them… one that amplified my ideas and provided a comfy ambience that encouraged creativity. I don’t feel old, and certainly don’t act old, but I’ve been a designer for 25 of my 43 years and in that whole time I’ve hated the keyboards I’ve used. With the...

I don’t think this is an article. I’m pretty sure it’s the beginning of a book. The "technology" section of every thrift store is a potential treasure trove. Swap meets, estate sales... they're the same. I honestly enjoy sifting through stacks of typewriters, radios, turntables and dusty old keyboards... hunting for treasure. That's what has led me to ask my friends in the hobby a pair of simple but nuanced questions… what’s your dream thrift store find and what’s your holy grail? It turns out, that for many, that’s the same question. For a lot of people in this hobby, finding the perfect board for you happens at some point, and rather than staring at your collection of boards on the wall, or continuing to buy keyboards until your room looks like Wall-E’s trailer… Instead, mature keyboard hobbyists tend to do a number of things: Sell/trade artisan keycaps Purchase keycap sets Sell or trade rare/nice (and sometimes new) keyboards to keep things fresh Most of us haven’t...

Creating a flexible novelty tool for DCX keycap sets Before we can talk about the nuances of different novelty tool designs, it’s important to discuss how DCX keycaps are produced to begin with. DCX tooling is all designed to use a doubleshot injection molding process, which first injects the inner legend shot, then flips the entire metal slab of tooling to another portion of the machine, where the outer shot of plastic is injected to complete the keycap. In contrast, an alternative method would be to use a process called “insert molding”, which creates many of the inner legend shots in a row before—you guessed it—inserting those back into a different machine for the outer shot to be molded around. Each process has its pros and cons. Most important to the topic at hand, the doubleshot process is very efficient and designed to produce an entire keycap set’s worth of keys at once. However, this comes at the cost of rigidity, requiring an entire new tool to be produced if you want to...

We're here today to share an interview with our latest collaboration designer, Captain Sterling. You've probably seen him around the community before, having designed a few sets over the years as well as being one of the more prominent social media creators in the space (and, frankly, taking some of the most stunning keyboard photos you'll come across). With that in mind, we are beyond excited to be able to feature an interview with Captain Sterling—thank you so much for taking the time to answer our questions and share so much about your own life with us all! We’d love to hear a little bit about yourself and your history - relevant to mech keys or not. Where are you from, what is your “day job”, what are your other hobbies and interests aside from keyboards? I was born and raised in Texas. I’m married and have a lovely, supporting family. I am a full time Product and Wedding Photographer who pursues Content Creation on the side. I also love to play video games, most...

Welcome back to our series on designing custom keymaps! After looking into how good/bad QWERTY is, the power of layers, and the potential of custom keymaps, last time we took the first real step by examining your options for compiling a corpus. As a recap: The corpus is simply a big chunk of text. We use this collection of textual data, often a single text file, to characterize your typing habits (calculating various language statistics), and feed it directly or indirectly as an input into layout optimization algorithms – to find the optimal keymap for you! Today we’ll expand on this idea by exploring your options if, like me, you prefer a personalized corpus rather than grabbing some general (and mostly irrelevant) data available online. Image 1: Letter frequencies – the most basic use of corpora – in this very post We've seen that a well-crafted, personalized corpus plays a key role in determining the outcome of the optimization process. We've also explored...

I must have watched this GMMK Pro pre-sale build video from a YouTuber named IO Sam a dozen times before I pulled out my wallet and pre-ordered it. In retrospect, I learned a great deal about building keyboards from Sam’s straightforward, professional delivery. I watched and re-watched sections I didn’t understand, and certain phrases and moments in the video stuck with me in ways where I still think about them. Especially at 23:10, when he compliments the MT3 White on Black keycaps with an actual chef’s kiss, locks eyes with the camera and says “Perfecto.” (I still do that whenever I put MT3 WOB on a board.) In that video, IO Sam introduced me to DROP, when he referenced the MT3 WOB’s and the GMK Kaiju keycaps that he set the Glorious GMMK Pro up with. I was in love with the look and feel of the MT3 profile. (I still am, as you can read in my previous article “In defense of MT3”) As a life-long Godzilla fanatic, I fell head over heals for GMK Kaiju. In the latter parts...

Having just returned from That Windy City Keeb Meet (a long-winded way of saying "The Chicago Meetup"), still recovering from the whirlwind that is a meetup weekend, I wanted to quickly put keeb to talk post (as they say) and share a bit about the event. Drop's vendor table at That Windy City Keeb Meet 2024 First off, if I ran into you at the meetup, it was great to meet you! I had a blast (as always) getting to know and reconnect with keyboard fanatics from all around the country. It never ceases to amaze me how many overlapping and interconnected hobbies we all share—certainly helps keep the conversations interesting as we veer off into retro gaming, photography, music, and anything else that comes up. All eyes on the announcement podium for giveaways 🫡 We were joined at the vendor tables by Sneakbox, Switch Oddities, and Tactile Zine—all run by amazing individuals. I wish I had taken pictures of all of their setups to share here. The only one I have is of...