My "Last" Keyboard: Can the HHKB Capacitive Keyboard Really Help You "Reduce Fever"?

It's a nonsensical question, and I didn't realize at all that the name HHKB might be made up of four initials — in fact, those four letters mean Happy Hacking Keyboard, so the answer is obvious, the first "H" in HHKB stands for "Happy."

However, the reality is that many innocent people enter the market with coins after hearing the rhetoric of "one hand will subside", and then open idle fish with the same strong point of loss and resell it with one click. It's simply unhappy, and as this unhappy thing grows, it makes HHKB seem like a marketing scam, and even reverses the "HHKB IQ tax" trend.

My "Last" Keyboard: Can the HHKB Capacitive Keyboard Really Help You "Reduce Fever"?

So to get the answer to the question "Can HHKB bring me happiness" does reflect a strong personal preference and need. Coinciding with the launch of the hybrid /HYBRID Type-S two new products on the shelves of minority stores, we also want to talk to you about which people are suitable for buying HHKB, is it really perfect for all programmers? If you're thrilled after reading it, click the link below to learn more.

Preferential pricing for minority stores (order at the top of the detail page)

HYBRID (dual template): 1999 original price 2488

【Taobao】https://m.tb.cn/h.frl8Eln?tk=YbQe2QIwm3x"[Minority] HHKB Professional HYBIRD Dual Template Electrostatic Keyboard Office Portable

HYBRID Type-S (Dual Mode Silent Version)

【Taobao】https://m.tb.cn/h.frl8EHJ?tk=Kg1u2QIEnGl "[Minority] HHKB Professional HYBRID Type-S Electrostatic Keyboard Dual Mode Mute"

Standard Edition: 2599 Wasu 2799

25th Anniversary Edition: 3399 Was 3799

Accessory offers

Colored keycaps: add 199 to buy the original price of 299

【Taobao】https://m.tb.cn/h.fs9zs0o?tk=UUk92QIwhM6"【Minority】HHKB Electrostatic Capacitance Special Color Keycap PBT Material Dye Sublimation Printing Process"

Walnut Hand Tray: Add 260 for 380

【Taobao】https://m.tb.cn/h.fHPWBJn?tk=qR4W2QIDySF"【Minority】HHKB Walnut Hand Rest Suitable for HHKB Keyboard Palm Rest Wrist Rest Easier To Type"

Activity time: 5.9 ~ 5.15

▍Whether HHKB has a fever-reducing grade feel

HHKB uses a capacitive shaft, and when pressed, the capacitance of the capacitor changes to achieve a key trigger effect. Since it is contactless, there is virtually no wear. Compared with mechanical keyboards, the design without physical contacts has a longer service life than mechanical keyboards, and because the electrostatic capacitance is non-paragraph-free, the feel is closer to the experience of the red axis.

First of all, we need to make it clear that HHKB's unique hand feel does not correspond exactly to the electrostatic capacitance trigger principle. The reason why I want to emphasize this matter is because you may not be interested in the triggering technology of the electrostatic keyboard by reading this article, but you are more concerned about the difference between HHKB and RealForce, Niz and even Amelo electrostatic capacitance.

Although the four are the same electrostatic capacitance keyboard that relies on capacitance changes to make switch judgments, in the matter of controlling the capacitance, HHKB and RealForce use a rubber bowl called Topre, Niz uses its own domestic rubber bowl that was imitated after Topre's patent expired, and Amilo's side is more different, although it is called static capacitance, but in addition to the trigger principle, the structure of the shaft body is closer to the mechanical shaft body.

Therefore, when it comes to the feel of HHKB, we can not simply apply "electrostatic capacitance" to summarize, in fact, the object of evaluation should be the choice of Topre rubber bowl static capacitive keyboard, so it is Topre's ultimate tuning of the rubber bowl and the perfect match with the taper spring to cast HHKB's excellent feel.

As for the "fever reduction" thing, my opinion is that you should at least have a fever to determine whether you are cured, if you have never experienced various types of mechanical keyboards and jumped from membrane keyboards to HHKB, then strictly speaking, you have no way to judge whether HHKB feel is the best for you.

▍Special layout: What sets HHKB apart

HHKB eliminates unnecessary keys such as number keys, function keys, and arrow keys, with only the least number of important keys. While the keycap size of each key is still 19.05 mm, the volume is greatly reduced.

So is HHKB really a perfect fit for all programmers? This is a more complex question than "whether HHKB has a fever-reducing feel".

In fact, HHKB's so-called key optimization is mainly aimed at UNIX programmers (Vim/Emacs), through the Backspace down and left Ctrl transformation to capslock position, to achieve the purpose of achieving all the tapping behavior with the shortest finger movement distance; and further adjusted on this basis, the original left and right Ctrl position is left blank, and the right Shift fission is fissioned to a 1U fn key.

MacOS users will not be too unfamiliar with the interchange of Ctrl and Capslock, after all, it is a preference in the system; and the disappearance of the original Ctrl key in the lower left and right corners has greatly increased the recognition of HHKB, which is the biggest feature of its layout.

Although I am not a programmer myself, in terms of daily actual input experience, the position change of left Ctrl and Backspace makes the commonly used keys basically concentrated between the three rows of R2-R4, which does reduce the movement burden of the left and right hands. However, the standard ANIS layout input habits of more than ten or twenty years have been formed, and the input efficiency of the first few days of HHKB is very low; and the biggest problem is the arrow keys - for more ordinary users, the 60% layout keyboard without arrow keys is not easy to accept, and on this basis, the HHKB layout that continues to adjust and delete the keys is naturally difficult to escape the cold situation.

So when people other than UNIX programmers face HHKB, they can only do nothing?

It is certainly not without other solutions.

First of all, all the problems involving key layout can be solved by learning and adapting, just like you originally learned to type. My experience is that the efficiency gains brought about by the adjustment of Ctrl and Capslock are very worthy of my unaccustomed to the previous few days, and the Fn+ four-button combination is completely sufficient and convenient for the arrow keys in the codeword process.

They're using...

Note: Excerpt from "Used for more than a year HHKB electrostatic capacitive keyboard, we want to talk about this keyboard is not cheap.".

We found a few friends who have been using HHKB for more than a year and talked about their experience with HHKB. Before you get started, let's take a look at WHETHER HHKB is right for you.

@ Tang: I am a C-end product manager of the Internet, in addition to organization and communication, the main output content is the text-based demand document, in fact, I have 3 HHKB, the main model used is HHKB Pro BT white without engraving.

Outside of work, writing takes up more of my time, for example, the minority "Power+ 2.0" column can see what I write. At present, continuous keyboard input occupies a large proportion of my daily life, so I hope that when I use the keyboard for a long time, my fingers and wrists can have a more comfortable experience, and it is not easy to fatigue.

Honestly, when I bought my first Type-S, what really made my head hot was because of its appearance. Whether it is the size of the keys, the key range, the material or the engraving, every detail is extremely comfortable. Of course, its internal strength is also very deep, and it will never drop the chain when used.

Regarding the experience of HHKB over the past few years, in fact, I have already written it when I participated in the essay, here is a brief summary of the advantages of HHKB in my heart:

Favorite key position: Talk about HHKB is impossible to avoid the key position, I like this layout too much, not only the control, Esc and other buttons unusual default position, but also the spacing of other keys.

The keys are very stable: the performance of continuous input is what I care about the most, so four or five years of use, the performance of the keys has never disappointed me, always the same and crisp feedback, never wrong.

No extra keys: The HHKB (US layout) has only 60 buttons in total, which takes up almost no desktop space, but has a full-size keyboard.

Easy to keep clean: The same cleaning habits, other keyboards are obviously more likely to get dirty; HHKB's PBT material is not only easy to keep clean, but also not easy to "get old", always the classic feeling.

These are all subjective feelings, so if you are hesitant to buy, it is recommended to find a trial for a while. Check your wallet first, and then follow your own heart.

@ Eye Circle Black: I am currently a purchasing manager of a mechanical machine manufacturing company, part-time to do part of the design of configurable materials, usually in addition to organizational communication is some moderate text input work.

If the weight of the school bag allows, I will also choose to bring HHKB with me, so that I can update my work situation and handle text input in a familiar way between business trips.

Using HHKB Pro2 (PD-KB400B), after the sea tao a hasu board transformed into a Bluetooth wired dual mode (not because of the Bluetooth model ugly, simply because of poverty), if you are interested in hasu, you can take a look at the minority of this manuscript, of course, a treasure also has a better program.

Usual work can not be separated from a large number of paper documents, so the desktop for me to land, will choose this type of keyboard mainly because it does not occupy the place, with Bluetooth I can easily change my desktop layout. Before using HHKB, I bought a relatively inexpensive 67-key red axis mechanical keyboard, although it was a red axis, I still worried about disturbing others, and finally I chose HHKB.

In terms of my personal experience alone, in half a day, I fell in love with the design of the Control key and even adjusted the key of my company's notebook, which is convenient for maintaining a relatively familiar key when traveling and ensuring input efficiency.

For example: because I will concentrate on adding or maintaining some configurable materials for about a week every month, my hand movements are often frequently repeated when dealing with this work, control + C/V and then enter some key statements, when using HHKB input, my left hand can basically be fixed in one position, and the input efficiency is very guaranteed!

@Xiaobo: I am a product manager, before engaged in the hardware industry, doing Internet of Things solutions. In the last year, I managed projects at a company that did Chinese NLP, mainly responsible for the delivery of the toB business. Work and keyboard dealings should be at most to write documents, Party A needs a variety of documents, is using HHKB Pro 2 white engraving, purchased in 2014.

For a technically born and VIM user, buying HHKB should be sooner or later.

Here are the main reasons I chose HHKB:

The default Control button position is to protect my little finger

Native macOS Command button position, because it is a Mac user, this should be just needed

Limited but sufficient hardware DIP switches adjust key positions without relying on the system or software such as AutoHotKey to modify the key layout, ensuring out-of-the-box use

Small but adequate 60% keyboard layout, this one is just a personal preference

In addition, HHKB's "shaft" uses a technical solution called electrostatic capacitance. Unlike the traditional mechanical switch shaft used by Cherry, Kaihua and others, curiosity about this electrostatic capacitance was one of the reasons why I chose to buy HHKB.

Because my main need is to write documentation and code, from a personal use perspective, there are several feelings:

60% of the keyboard layout is just right, especially the position of Control and Fn, the only fly in the ointment should be the "~" layout, which may be very unaccustomed to use at the beginning, which will affect the situation of quickly jumping to the Home directory under the CLI; delete's key layout position is also just right, not too far and not too close

Electrostatic capacitance does a very good job in both the feel and the key feedback

Basically satisfies my need to "keep my hands on the keyboard"

Two additional USB ports can be plugged into the receiver of the wireless mouse, avoiding wasting the increasingly strained USB interface on laptops today. You can also extend keyboard capabilities, such as plugging in an additional keypad

▍ Finally

Is HHKB still recommended? If you don't mind the special layout mentioned above, a user who rarely plays competitive games and can tolerate missing Capslock, F-zone, and arrow keys, the subjective answer to this answer is undoubtedly yes. Of course, keyboard hand preferences are very personal, which does not mean that static capacitance is the standard answer, can only say that most people sitting in front of the computer code words should not hate it.

The controversy over HHKB has always existed, and it carries too much symbolism as a text input tool. There should be no chain of contempt between membrane keyboards, mechanical keyboards, and electrostatic capacitance, so consider the question at the beginning of the article: whether buying an HHKB can bring you real happiness, rather than pleasing the viewer through "electrostatic capacitance".

On the version selection, there is no doubt that the HHKB Professional HYBRID, which has updated the dual-mode connection and Type-C interface, is suitable for most people. The type-S silent version adds a mute ring, which weakens the noise when the HHKB rebounds to a certain extent, and the disadvantage is that the type-S's rubber bowl paragraph number is lighter, and the feel will be more "meaty", which appears to some users to be a little weak.

▍P.S. About keycaps

It should also be mentioned that although it is common to replace the keycaps for mechanical keyboards, on HHKB because the crater-shaped "chrysanthemum" does not match the regular MX axis keycaps, and the Market for Topre-like electrostatic keyboards is not large enough to support several third-party keycap factories, so there are not many personalized choices for keyboards such as HHKB on keycaps. In addition to the official, Topre's own RealForce electrostatic keyboard can also be transferred to HHKB; domestic keycap brand Domikey has also launched several keycaps with good colors for HHKB in the past few years, but it seems that it is also selling a set of less than one set.