Lorem Ipsum 36? Dolor Sit Amet Keyboard!

February 6, 2025 by Kristina Panos 8 Comments

You know, it’s a tale as old as custom mechanical keyboards. [penkia] couldn’t find any PCBs with 36 keys and Gateron low-profile switch footprints, so they made their own and called it the LoremIpsum36. Isn’t it lovely?

This baby runs on an RP2040, which sits flush as can be in a cutout in the PCB. This maneuver, along with the LP switches in hard-to-find SK-33 sockets results in quite the thin board.

[penkia] says that despite using a 3 mm tray for added rigidity, the entire thing is thinner than the Nuphy Air60 v2, which is just over half an inch (13.9 mm) thick. For keycaps, [penkia] has used both XVX profile and FKcaps’ LPF.

And yeah, that area in the middle is crying out for something; maybe a trackball or something similar. But [penkia] is satisfied with it as-is for the first version, so we are, too.

Do you like 36-key boards, but prefer curves? Check out the Lapa keyboard, which doubles as a mouse.

Illustrated Kristina with an IBM Model M keyboard floating between her hands.

Keebin’ With Kristina: The One With The Keyboard Configurator

February 3, 2025 by Kristina Panos 10 Comments

Have you ever wished you could experiment with different layouts super easily, just by adding or removing a few switches here and there and printing a new case? Well, [heyisjambo] says that it’s more than possible with menura, the modular keyboard system.

A collage of menura keyboards, which are modular via the VIK standard. — So many lovely options! Image by [heyisjambo] via GitHub

[heyisjambo] is happy with 36 keys, but is reduced-count-curious and wanted a way to explore without a lot of wasted time and PCBs.

At the same time, [heyisjambo] wanted to experiment with split vs. uni-body construction, and especially the different shapes that are possible when tweaking the angle and distance between them.

And as if that weren’t enough, there’s support for [Sadek Baroudi]’s VIK standard for interfacing data between PCBs, which calls for an FPC 12-pin, 0.5 mm pitch connector and allows for ultra-cool magnetic connectors. This way, you can easily add things like displays, trackpads, and trackballs in the between the halves.

Thanks for the tip, [calculus]!

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Keebin’ With Kristina: The One With The DIY Homing Keys

January 28, 2025 by Kristina Panos 42 Comments

r/keebgirlies Is Totally a Thing Now

When [coral-bells] posted her first build to r/mechanicalkeyboards, she likely felt some trepidation. After all this is reddit we’re talking about, so right away you’ve got two layers of male-domination hobby.

Most of a lovely plant-themed keyboard. — Image by [coral-bells] via reddit

What she likely didn’t expect was to be upvoted into the tens of thousands, or to receive such a response from other girlies who came out of the woodwork to share their builds.

And so r/keebgirlies was born, and already has a few thousand members. This is a brand-new subreddit for women and non-binary folks who are into mechanical keyboards. As it says in the sidebar, men are welcome but limited to the comments for now, so don’t go trying to post your builds. The girlies are currently seeking moderators, so give that some thought.

As for [coral-bells]’ lovely build, this is an Epomaker MS68 with MMD Vivian V2 switches, and those flowery keycaps are from Etsy. She is currently waiting for supplies to mod a Yunzii AL66, but wants to build a kit at some point.

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Lubricating a keyboard switch the proper way, with a brush and the switch opened up.

Probably Ruining A Keyboard For Science

January 21, 2025 by Kristina Panos 32 Comments

Lubing your keyboard’s switches is definitely a personal preference, though we’re sure that many would call it absolutely necessary. However, people from both camps would probably not suggest is using WD-40 to do so, instead pointing toward Krytox or at least Super Lube. But there are enough people out there who have tried the great water displacer and claim to have experienced no problems that [Sea_Scheme6784] decided to give it a go (so you don’t have to).

Having now collected enough boards to sacrifice one to the lubrication gods, [Sea_Scheme6784] chose a completely stock Logitech G413 SE with brown switches and heavily sprayed every one. Oh yeah, there was no taking them apart first as most lube enthusiasts would advise. No carefully painting it on in the right places with a small brush. Just mad spraying, y’all.

The effects were noticeable immediately — it changed the feel for the better and made the switches way less scratchy. Also the sound is more poppy, despite drowning in not-lubricant. Interesting! [Sea_Scheme6784] says the stabilizers are still rattling away, so that’s no good. Keep an eye on r/mechanicalkeyboards for updates on these shenanigans. We know we will.

Want to know what else you can do to to switches besides lube? Lots of stuff.

Main and thumbnail images via Kinetic Labs

Smallest USB Device… So Far

January 20, 2025 by Bryan Cockfield 37 Comments

For better or worse it seems to be human nature to compete with one another, as individuals or teams, rather than experience contentedness while moving to the woods and admiring nature Thoreau-style. On the plus side, competition often results in benefits for all of us, driving down costs for everything from agriculture to medical care to technology. Although perhaps a niche area of competition, the realm of “smallest USB device” seems to have a new champion: this PCB built by [Emma] that’s barely larger than the USB connector pads themselves.

With one side hosting the pads to make contact with a standard USB type-A connector, the other side’s real estate is taken up by a tiny STM32 microcontroller, four phototransistors that can arm or disarm the microcontroller, and a tiny voltage regulator that drops the 5V provided by the USB port to the 3.3V the STM32 needs to operate. This is an impressive amount of computing power for less than three millimeters of vertical space, and can operate as a HID device with a wide variety of possible use cases.

Perhaps the most obvious thing to do with a device like this would be to build a more stealthy version of this handy tool to manage micromanagers, but there are certainly other tasks that a tiny HID can be put to use towards. And, as far as the smallest USB device competition goes, we’d also note that USB-A is not the smallest connector available and, therefore, the competition still has some potential if someone can figure out how to do something similar with an even smaller USB connector.

Thanks to [JohnU] for the tip!

Keebin’ With Kristina: The One With The Hardware-Layered Keyboard

January 20, 2025 by Kristina Panos 6 Comments

You know (or maybe you didn’t), I get super excited when y’all use the links at the bottom of this round-up we call Keebin’ to communicate with your old pal Kristina about your various labors of love. So just remember that.

Case in point: I was typing up this very issue when I heard from [Jay Crutti] and [Marcel Erz]. Both are out there making replacement keyboards for TRS-80s — [Jay] for Models 3 and 4, and [Marcel] for the Model 1. Oooh, I said to myself. This is going at the top.

A TRS-80 Model 4 with a replacement keyboard. — A TRS-80 Model 4. Image by [Jay Crutti] via JayCrutti.com

Relevant tangent time: I remember in the 90s having a pile of computers in my parents’ basement of various vintages, a TRS-80 Model 2 among them. (Did I ever tell you about the time I got pulled over for speeding with a bunch of different computers in the backseat? I was like no, officer, first of all, those are old machines that no one would really want, and I swear I didn’t steal them.)

I think the TRS-80 is probably the one I miss the most. If I still had it, you can bet I would be using [Jay] and [Marcel]’s work to build my own replacement keyboard, which the 40-year-old machine would likely need at this point if the Model 4 is any indication with its failing keyboard contacts.

To create the replacements, [Jay] used Keyboard Layout Editor (KLE), Plate & Case Builder, and EasyEDA. Using the schematic from the maintenance manual, he matched the row/column wiring of the original matrix with Cherry MX footprints. Be sure to check out [Jay]’s site for a link to the project files, or to purchase parts or an assembled keyboard. On the hunt for TRS-80 parts in general? Look no further than [Marcel]’s site.
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An Instant Gratification Game Boy Printer

January 19, 2025 by Tom Nardi 7 Comments

When the Game Boy Printer was released back in 1998, being able to produce a hard-copy of your Pokémon diploma or your latest Game Boy Camera snapshot at the touch of a button was was pretty slick indeed. But in our modern paperless society, the GB Printer somehow sticks out as even more archaic than the other add-on’s for Nintendo’s iconic handheld. Even among the folks who are still proudly playing the games that support the Printer, nobody actually wants to print anything out — although that doesn’t mean they don’t want to see the images.

The TinyGB Printer, developed by [Raphaël BOICHOT] and [Brian KHUU], could be considered something of a Game Boy Non-Printer. Powered by the RP2040 Zero development board, this open source hardware device plugs into your Game Boy and is picked up by all the games as a legitimate Printer. But instead of cranking out a little slip of thermal paper once you hit the button, the image is displayed in all its 240×240 glory on a 1.3 inch TFT display mounted to the top of the board.

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