Sooo, which one's the enter key? (Sorry, I'm new to this, and intrigued)
this post was submitted on 09 Feb 2026
77 points (100.0% liked)
Mechanical Keyboards
12985 readers
201 users here now
Are you addicted to the clicking sounds of your beautiful and impressive mechanical keyboard?
If so, this community is for you!
Here you can discuss everything about mechanical keyboards (and only mechanical keyboards).
Banner by Jay Zhang on Unsplash
founded 5 years ago
For me its the left space bar, with the right space being space. I also have them mapped that if I hold them down they active different layers. I like the two most used keys on my keyboard to be for my thumbs as I like using both my thumbs. A single space bar, particularly a huge one like a 10u is more aesthetic but its slower for me to use, really depends on what your typing style is.
However you can make any key anything you like, even macros, so you could put it anywhere you like. I find using the same basic map on all my keyboards is best as I am not hunting around working out where things are.
If you'll forgive my ignorance, what's the anniversary?
Today is international 40s day, the day to celebrate 40% keyboards, even if this one is closer to a 45%
Do we celebrate with wrist braces or some other therapy for repetitive cramped typing injuries?
Is that anti SA as the spacing on this keyboard is identical to a full size.
SA you have to have hover hands, which you are meant to do any way.
Not anti SA per se, but I learned to type on a Commodore 64 as a kid and recently got the C64 Ultimate, so the clunkiness of the experience is just fresh. This is a lower profile than the Commodore 64 though, so probably not as bad.
Yeah SA is a little shorter than C64 keycaps, this set is all R3 so its shorter than standard mixed profile SA for the other rows.
How you finding the Ultimate? I really fancy one but I am not sure how much I would use it.
It was definitely a nostalgia purchase. If I ended up doing any development for it, I'd still probably emulate and transfer files to it. But I never did anything more than play games on it as a kid, so there would be a time sink and learning curve if I wanted to do more with it.
I've been showing it off in my makerspace to the college students who weren't alive in the 80s (or 90s). All the new features are welcome additions — USB, HDMI, WiFi, etc. And there are some modern chiptune applications included.
I've vindicated my childhood by discovering that the games that were difficult and confusing back then still are, and maybe some of them were just poorly designed in the first place.
I still love the soundtrack to Rock N Bolt and a good playthrough of River Raid though.
I would be in the same boat. I picked up a clockwork pi as a toy but never with the intention of learning to program it directly, despite me having a passing understanding of python. Always with the intention of sticking in an upgraded board so I can run linux on it. I like the idea of being able to program on a retro device, but the reality is just too painful.
I've been doing some simple python scripts on a raspberry pi 5 that I'm currently using for a cyberdeck project (designing a printable bigger case for a 65% Bluetooth gaming keyboard and shoving the pi and other devices into a 3D printed skull that will mount on the keyboard case), but even then I at least plug the pi into a full screen rather than use the 7" display I have for it when I'm actually working on it. The 65% isn't bad though. Even came with a wrist pad.
SA Teletype is such a pretty set, and I really like SA R3, and the designer seems like a good guy. It was the one time I was seriously tempted to pay full price for "name brand" keycaps. I don't even use 40s, but I had a layout rigged to adapt an existing no-stabs FRL 1800 PCB I designed a while back.
No stabs is such a good vibe, I do not use stabs for anything smaller than a 3u.
Not sure if you saw, but there was a normie set for this, I wanted the 2.25u for this board but I couldn't quite justify the extra for the one keycap, especially when I would rather have the ;
I have never regretted getting SP SA sets, other than SA Espresso as they fucked up the gradient order, they are so hard to get with a 40s kit outside of GB for me. You either pony up or just plain miss out, even the pre sales at prototypist tend to have very low numbers for the 40s kits.
I got Tatooine, Oblivion (Hagoromo), Laser, and Mitospeed for some pretty steep discounts, as well as the DSS Honeywell from PrimeKB. My options for cheap but unused SP are quickly drying up though, lol.
Funny enough, the board I come back to most often is the first one I did on the no-stabs PCB (minimum order quanity is a burden to us all!), which has semi-sculpted Akko SA on it.
All with full 40s sets?
I got Honeywell from PrimeKB when it was on sale back in 2019, before they stopped shipping to the UK. Laser I have a couple of GMK sets, didn't get around to picking up the SA version.
All with full 40s sets?
Oh, God no. Sorry! Mostly they're on more normie boards, but the Mitospeed being R3 and full of nonsense legends would go well on a 40 or 40-adjacent.
I've reluctantly come to realize that I just don't like the feel of Cherry all that much. I prefer DCS if I'm going to go cylindrical. The sharp edges on Cherry are just all wrong for my poor typing technique.
DCS I do not like the relative height on the r5 row, not that I use it that much on 40s, most of the time its just r2 to r4.
Yeah single row profile keycaps make 40s so much easier to kit, this set is all the better for it. Other option is a 40 with full size modifiers, those are a great way to get started, but I find them a little big to use so I end up using home row modifiers.
Split space is the hardest for me as my preference is for 2x3u, and that normally means having to get hold of a separate space bar kit on top of the standard kit, and the 40s kit.
Most of the CYL kits I have looked at simply do not do spacebar kits, so I have never purchased one and wont till its fixed. If I cannot use in on half my boards why would I bother?