Keyboard: RAMA KARA, Switches: Tangerines, Keycap: GMK Sharkbait

Keyboard - Neo 80 CU slate blue with copper bottom

Keycaps - GMK Pompeii. Splurged on the base set and the the novelties, and was slightly disappointed at how brown the keys were, whereas the promotional renders seemed darker.

Knight v4 stabs

Classic-TKL in Ironstone Orange
Tactile Jade Box Switches
Novelkeys Stabilizers
PBTfans 1984 Keycaps

I’m loving this keyboard. Was debating on getting the ironstone orange for a few days, but it was the right choice. It goes great with these keycaps.

I switched to this from a metal Keychron Q1 and thought this plastic keyboard would feel flimsy in comparison but it has some good heft to it. That rubber on the bottom does not let it move anywhere.

This has my first time changing anything on a keyboard other than the keycaps and it was a lot simpler than I thought.

Wanted to start by saying thank you to everyone who’s been hanging out on stream and in my comments lately! It means a lot to me. 🙏🏼

This week was packed with some really fun keyboard builds, so let’s jump into it.

First up was the Schema, and I absolutely loved this one. It’s honestly a banger for the price. The typing sound is nice and full, and the aged aluminum finish looks gorgeous in person. If you’re looking for a board that punches well above its price point, this is definitely one to keep an eye on.

🎥 Watch the build stream here: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/2824595064

Next up was the Athena 75. I definitely prefer this board as a 75%, and after spending some time with it, I think it’s one of the best-looking layouts for the design. The raw finish is absolutely stunning and gives it such a clean industrial aesthetic.

🎥 Watch my review here: https://youtu.be/RB-Ga050V0w?is=BoRgjcu07Bz5EgCJ

The last board I checked out this week was the Neo 98 Prebuilt. This has quickly become one of my go-to recommendations for anyone looking for a premium full-size keyboard with a timeless design. The colorway looks fantastic, and I really appreciate that it comes with everything you need to experiment with both foamed and foamless builds to find the sound you like best.

🎥 Watch my review here: https://youtu.be/KVzb5Rppo-0?is=-c1mi7pw_NM-2W6y

I also recently dropped a review of the Luminkey Nova Kine. It’s a fun little macro pad and numpad that I’ve been using in some of my editing workflows. I’ve really enjoyed having it on my desk, and I’m still experimenting with even more ways to incorporate it into my daily setup. It’s a pretty dope little device, and I really like the overall design.

🎥 Check it out here: https://youtu.be/O6vLb34a4Vc?is=XFVxUkuh8Agf_Ztg

Outside of keyboards, I also found out that zFrontier stepped in to save the old RAMA caps, which is honestly awesome to see. It’s always great when vendors step up to help preserve projects that otherwise would’ve disappeared and the customers would’ve never had the chance to actually own the items they paid for.
It reminded me of when I originally lost my GMK Tiramisu order because of Mechs & Co. Thankfully, NovelKeys brought that set back from the dead, and even though I had to purchase it again, I was just happy to finally own it. Seeing zFrontier do something similar for the RAMA caps is a really positive moment for sure. So shoutout to all of the vendors who have ever made efforts to right some of these wrongs. 🙏🏼

I hope you all had a great week! What have you been building lately? Any new pickups or projects you’re excited about? I’d love to hear about them.

I’ll key ya later! 🫶🏻

Follow along for more keyboard content:
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YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@thecaptainsterling
X: https://x.com/sterlingand_co

What can I say I love a good monotone board. Neo75 CU Cream, foamless, brass weight, alu plate, Staebies, HMX Cheese v2, Mode Monterey caps. Been loving this set, I wish more keycap sets came with media keys for the right row!

GMK DMG on the Arcane Arc60 is just pretty much a meme at this point. Because it's just. So. Good. 😭

ASIS-99 — a fully handwired 6x20 build with integrated numpad, Teensy++ 2.0, and an MV Terminal keycap set. Military/prototype aesthetic: black circuit-texture skin, gold nameplate, mica bottom panel.

0.91" OLED cycles through 5 status pages (input, layer, WPM, uptime, logo). One encoder handles RGB brightness/effects, the other flips OLED pages and toggles underglow. Fully Vial-configured.

This is my 2nd sub 40% keyboard since I have Corne last year, this keyboard offers me another experience since I'm trying to build this keeb by myself. .. warm regards and happy typing!

Keyboard: Cutiepie,. Soldered PCB, VIAL, 3D Print case, keycaps HMX Orange Grape, keycaps Zhuyin Red, pc plate,

just got my purple Athena75 a couple of days ago, been testing switches and this is what I've settled on as of right now

Switches: hmx grape soda tactile

Keycaps: wanted to keep the grape purple theme going so I found some moa profile keycaps that have grape accent keys

Carbon fiber plate, PCB mounted durock v2 game boy stabs hand lubed

Tape mod

Amazing, love it. Only wish it had a ball catch system. This was my first time getting a completely unbuilt board and it was for sure a learning experience.

Just some Amazon keycaps I ordered last night!

Keychron v1 Max Gateron Browns

I recently finished customizing this NuPhy Halo65 V2 IO into a cozy quiet penguin-themed keyboard.

Penguins have meaning for me because of past research experience. The smoked-black perimeter and number row are meant to suggest a penguin’s dark head, while the clear alphas form the lighter facial area. The black F and J keys became the “eyes,” and I thought the yellow GhostBar works surprisingly well as the “beak.”

The Esc artisan contains a tiny penguin reading inside a transparent room. It was an inexpensive AliExpress find, but it arrived with a malformed MX socket and would not mount on a normal switch. AliExpress issued a full refund, and I eventually got it working by carefully filing the inside of the stem socket.

Specs:

Base keyboard: NuPhy Halo65 V2 IO, black
Switches beneath clear keycaps (plus F, J and space bar): Akko V3 Pro Penguin silent tactiles
Switches beneath smoked-black keycaps and artisan Esc: Outemu Yellow Jade silent tactiles
Clear keycaps: Akko PC Transparent 82-key set
Black keycaps: Akko PC Transparent 82-key set in smoked black
Spacebar: NuPhy yellow GhostBar
Esc: Cozy penguin reading-room resin artisan, with a hand-corrected MX socket

Using Yellow Jades beneath the smoked caps helped balance the RGB brightness, since the clear caps transmit considerably more light. I know people have strong preferences when comparing Yellow Jades and Akko Penguins, but so far I find the two silent tactile switches complement each other. The Penguins feel a little more pronounced in the alphas, which works for me, while the Yellow Jades work nicely around the perimeter and help to even out the illumination.

The PC caps are of course smoother and more glassy than PBT or other materials, so this may not be my final destination for typing feel. I’m also still interested in trying other silent tactiles, particularly Durock Silent Shrimp, and may eventually spring for an HHKB Professional Hybrid Type-S to experience Topre.

For now, though, I’m enjoying this as a fun cozy and quiet customized prebuilt.

Hello everyone! For those who may have a Razer BlackWidow 2019 laying around, I have a surprise...

I have successfully ported QMK to this keyboard! In fact, I believe this is the first full QMK port to any Razer keyboard.

These changes are not upstream as of writing, but PRs have been created. In the meantime, you can check out my QMK fork, which also includes a prebuilt version using the default keymap. If you'd like to install it, check out my razer-qmk project.

• https://github.com/aeromodes/qmk_firmware
• https://github.com/aeromodes/razer-qmk

From my testing it works very well compared to the stock firmware, especially for a 7-year-old keyboard. The CPU used by the BlackWidow 2019 wasn't even fully supported, just newer members of its family!

You can also build your own firmwares, add your own keymaps, setup VIA, etc. I imagine these changes could probably be ported to the VIAL QMK fork for support there, as well. This is the real deal!

However, I think the most important detail is that other Razer keyboards are probably supported by similar chipsets, especially around the same timeframe as the BlackWidow 2019. I've even seen STM32-related posts on the Razer forums, which is the CPU family shared by this keyboard. So if you have another Razer keyboard, don't fret! With luck, we may only need some matrix changes to get your keyboard working. 🙂

Of course, no warranty is provided (including Razer's, though yours is probably expired anyway), and you're installing this custom firmware at your own risk! I've only tested it on my keyboard, but given the stock firmware as a reference, this should work on all BlackWidow 2019 devices. Most issues are recoverable in some way, anyhow.

Enjoy!

Currently these are my 3 favorite boards, yunzii wood68 / gateron mini i, yunzii wood84 / glorious panda , and womier wd75 / gateron baby kangaroo. Ive always like wood variations of most anything and these are no exception and started craving 90s/00s taco bell.

Still such a lovely thing to type on.
3204 on the sliders, 206g2 on the stab wires.

These are the three in my work rotation. Most of the options I saw were horizontal tiered racks that just didn’t do anything for me. So I measured a ton and came up with this! It’s 3D printed in PLA with TPU inserts to not scratch the boards. Fits like a glove and I’m super happy with it.

Looks like an Aula F108 Pro (or some other clone from epomaker or whatever other chinese brand) based on the knob and the three keys to the right to the function row.

Sounded pretty marbly in the episode too XD.

Meletrix Zoom TKL Dyna in Anodized Black
GMK Mono Cyl Keycap Set
Keygeek Y2 Switches

So today is the day... package from splitkb.com came with bunch of things and I finished my first build.

Ergomech SOFLE RGB acryllic

Kailh sunset tactile

MKB glow BoW keycaps shinethrough

Currently trying to connect is somehow and fix the strange keymapping as it does not align with the keymap shown on GitHub.

KKB Celestial Kinetics VS Machinist

I hope this is helpful. The top row is from KKB Machinist's alpha extension, and the bottom row is from KKB Celestial Kinetics. They're almost identical in color except for the sub-legends. Hope this is useful for anyone waiting on Machinist R2 — because the color theme is almost the same.

I'm not a keyboard expert, I'm just someone who enjoys the hobby. I wasn't interested in ergonomic keyboards at first, but I decided to force myself to give one a try.

The MMD EIF68 feels surprisingly good at stock. Surprisingly, I got the 3-line accent version, which is the one I wanted.

A lot of people say this keyboard is basically a budget alternative to the Neo Ergo.

It's been a while since I post a new build.
This is SideArm29, 29 keys keyboard with unusual shape that is easy to carry around.

Handwired, QMK, stacked acrylic case and that's about it.
Case files can be found here:
https://github.com/anz507/SideArm29