deskthority

Due to a medical issue, I experience significant pain in the top joints of my fingers, particularly my pinkies, when I type for an extended period. This is especially the case when I type on keyboards with (i) "hard" keys, i.e. where finger impact feels like slamming down on metal or concrete, and/or (ii) keys that shake/vibrate after impact, however subtly.

My current setup in dealing with this is to use a silicon keyboard cover on my keyboard, which provides some degree of cushion when typing, and then on top of that to wear toe pads (https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01N915IHG) over my pinkies, which provides further cushion.

I'm wondering whether there might be a better solution out there. I'd be grateful for any recommendations.

OK, this might be a controversial suggestion, and I'd definitely wait for other people to chime in, but if it doesn't matter how much resistance the keys are allowed to have, (vintage) Cherry MYs might actually be a good idea for you. Most people here don't like them because they feel ‘like typing on wet newspaper’ or even ‘like prodding a dead octopus’ (actual quotes), but they are very smooth if you hit the keys correctly, and it's pretty much impossible to accidentally bottom out (i.e. the keys will never actually hit anything). If resistance is a problem (maybe because I misunderstood your issue), then these are right out, though.

Possibly Topre is a candidate — the tactile peak is very rounded, so you get tactile feedback without the shock associated with it. Being rubber dome, keystrokes are also cushioned, and the keys are relatively light. The cushioned feel was one thing that put me off Topre, but it may be ideal for you.

A variable weight model might suit you too, as the outer keys are lighter, thus less effort for your pinkies. Not everyone likes the variable weight option, but it is what I had, and I was fine with it. It took me a while to get used to the keyboard, but after that I was fine with it, but Cherry MX just felt crisper.

The Realforce I had was rock solid without any flex or vibration.

Lustique wrote: ↑OK, this might be a controversial suggestion, and I'd definitely wait for other people to chime in, but if it doesn't matter how much resistance the keys are allowed to have, (vintage) Cherry MYs might actually be a good idea for you. Most people here don't like them because they feel ‘like typing on wet newspaper’ or even ‘like prodding a dead octopus’ (actual quotes), but they are very smooth if you hit the keys correctly, and it's pretty much impossible to accidentally bottom out (i.e. the keys will never actually hit anything). If resistance is a problem (maybe because I misunderstood your issue), then these are right out, though.

Thank you. I don't think resistance would necessarily be a problem for me. What is painful is less so the initial contact with the key, and more so when the key hits the bottom. (Sorry if I'm not using the right technical phrases here.)

Daniel Beardsmore wrote: ↑Possibly Topre is a candidate — the tactile peak is very rounded, so you get tactile feedback without the shock associated with it. Being rubber dome, keystrokes are also cushioned, and the keys are relatively light. The cushioned feel was one thing that put me off Topre, but it may be ideal for you.

A variable weight model might suit you too, as the outer keys are lighter, thus less effort for your pinkies. Not everyone likes the variable weight option, but it is what I had, and I was fine with it. It took me a while to get used to the keyboard, but after that I was fine with it, but Cherry MX just felt crisper.

The Realforce I had was rock solid without any flex or vibration.

Thank you!

If you don't mind me asking, what does "rubbed dome" mean and how exactly are the keystrokes cushioned? This sounds promising.

Also, what does it mean that the keys are "light"? If that means they're more prone to bottoming out, that might not be a good thing, as I think that's the source of a lot of my pain.

My favourite switch is Cherry MX Clear which is hard.. but with the tactile bump high up and then highly increasing resistance that cushions the key stroke. I have adjusted my typing style so as to not push the key to the bottom - only past that tactile bump. The switch might be too hard for you though.

I have also noticed that many key strokes are somewhat at an angle on a regular flat keyboard.
Maybe you would fare better using a keyboard with the keys in a columnar layout such as an ErgoDox or Kinesis contoured where the keys are pressed more straight down.

Daniel Beardsmore wrote: ↑Possibly Topre is a candidate — the tactile peak is very rounded, so you get tactile feedback without the shock associated with it. Being rubber dome, keystrokes are also cushioned, and the keys are relatively light. The cushioned feel was one thing that put me off Topre, but it may be ideal for you.

I have experienced pain in joints in my middle and index fingers after extensive use of variable Topre Realforce at work. The keys for the little fingers are lighter though.
I find the the cushioning at the bottom to be not much. Less rubber at the bottom than typical rubber domes. More similar to mechanical keyboards with O-rings installed in my opinion.

Someone in a different forum made me aware of these gel keycaps...

https://www.aliexpress.com/item/Silicon ... 86624.html

And also soft landing pads...

https://elitekeyboards.com/products.php ... d=sl120_cs

O-rings have come up a few times, too.

I'd be curious if folks think any or all of these would be helpful, perhaps in combination with some of the other suggestions that are being made.

If you're after a new keyboard, check out the Matias Linear switches. They are quite well dampened and light.

Check Chyros' video on them: https://youtu.be/V1K9dA91qeM

If you already own a Cherry compatible board, then gel keycaps+landing cushions should, theoretically, provide enough dampening, although I don't have experience with this setup.

O-rings (again for Cherry compatible switches) do not provide enough dampening for your needs (as I understand them), they simply prevent plastic on plastic "clacks" when the keys are bottomed out.

alexcr wrote: ↑Thank you. I don't think resistance would necessarily be a problem for me. What is painful is less so the initial contact with the key, and more so when the key hits the bottom. (Sorry if I'm not using the right technical phrases here.)

Then I think that it might actually be worth it to try a keyboard with MY switches. These can be had really cheap (used), so if it doesn't work for you, it's no big deal financially. If you decide to go that route, search for ‘Cherry G81-1800’, ‘Cherry G81-3000’, ‘Cherry G81-5000’, ‘Cherry G81-7000’, ‘Cherry G81-8000’, etc. I found the following keyboard after a quick eBay search: https://www.ebay.com/itm/282695315184 It seems to be new and only costs US $3.50 + whatever shipping is to where you live. You'd probably have to buy a PS/2-USB-converter though, unless Macs still have PS/2 ports…

alexcr wrote: ↑[…]
Thank you!

If you don't mind me asking, what does "rubbed dome" mean and how exactly are the keystrokes cushioned? This sounds promising.

Also, what does it mean that the keys are "light"? If that means they're more prone to bottoming out, that might not be a good thing, as I think that's the source of a lot of my pain.

‘Rubber dome’: wiki/Membrane_keyboard#Rubber_dome_over_membrane
‘Bottoming out’: wiki/Bottom_out
‘Light keys’: wiki/Force
‘Actuation’: wiki/Actuation

Lustique wrote: ↑[…] Then I think that it might actually be worth it to try a keyboard with MY switches. These can be had really cheap (used), so if it doesn't work for you, it's no big deal financially. If you decide to go that route, search for ‘Cherry G81-1800’, ‘Cherry G81-3000’, ‘Cherry G81-5000’, ‘Cherry G81-7000’, ‘Cherry G81-8000’, etc.

There are two different variants of MY switches, which have a totally different feel:
wiki/Cherry_MY



Which are on a given G81 keyboard is not apparent from the outside, the white ones (those with the "wet newspaper" or "dead octopus" feel) will be found on more recent keyboards, the black ones only on vintage keyboards.

Yeah, I just typed a bit on my board with vintage MYs (the G81-3004 HAD / 10 from my signature; it's not plugged in though), and in my opinion they do feel better than modern MYs (i.e. what I'm typing on right now/G81-3424LPNDE-0/00). However, I'd bet that the force graph of both switches would look very similar (i.e. linear and then almost ‘exponential’ after the actuation point), so I don't think it would matter much to OP which kind of switch they get.

My main reasoning behind recommending to try out Cherry MYs is that the things that almost all people dislike about these switches might actually be beneficial in OP's case. I mean if OP actually prefers to type on a silicon cover over a rubber dome over even a normal rubber dome, because it's more comfortable to them, mushy switches that get really stiff towards the bottom might be exactly what they'd like. Also MYs are dirt cheap (see the board I linked). In any case, OP would probably have to learn proper typing if they don't already do this (or at least to not bottom out) to get any real benefits from the keyboards that people are recommending here.

kbdfr wrote: ↑There are two different variants of MY switches …

Three, but until I get a Type 2 module, I can't photograph it. I should have one in a few weeks. Type 2 is, of course, fairly rare.

Daniel Beardsmore wrote: ↑

kbdfr wrote: ↑There are two different variants of MY switches …

Three, but until I get a Type 2 module, I can't photograph it. I should have one in a few weeks. Type 2 is, of course, fairly rare.

I know there are three, I just didn't want to complicate things with remarks which are irrelevant here.

By the way, I would have sent you half a dozen of them months ago at no charge at all, not even shipping costs, but well…
w-a-n-t-t-o-b-u-y-f59/2-cherry-my-type- ... ml#p354903
Oh, I guess that's a remark which is irrelevant here

Depending on the level of pain that OP is experiencing, but if the pain is on the extreme side, I'd modify light linear-cushioned full-travel switches, like mx silent red for example. Open up the switch, mix up a cup of soft silicone and put a few drops at the bottom of the switch housing. This might shorten the travel a little, but provide additional soft cushion at the bottom. MY switch might be okay, but if you happen to bottom out, it'd still be painful.

If its the bottling out that causes pain you would be better with a stiff switch that activates high up.

You don't want tactile or click as it adds a bump that you have to bypass making it more likely to bottom out.

You want something that gets stiffer and stiffer the further you press it and thats MY.

You could even try the xmit hall effect and change the height that it activates (yes you can do that in software) to as high as it will go , and use the stiffest springs.

I wanted to follow up with a report on how this all played out. (I'm the original poster.) Here it goes...

o After realizing that the Elite Keyboards store is right here in the LA area, I decided it would make sense, as a mechanical keyboard newbie, to stop by there and get a feel for the different switches to see what might work best for me and my condition. I'm really glad I did this. Brian at Elite Keyboards is a super nice and helpful guy, and was more than fine with me hanging out and trying out different switches and setups. I highly recommend stopping by his shop if you're ever in LA!

o At Elite Keyboards, it became clear to me, no pun intended, that Cherry Clears are the right fit for me. It might be counterintuitive to some, but the stiffer switches actually help with my finger issues in that they make it less likely that I'll bottom out when typing, which seems to be a main causes of my pain. Some of the other keyboards I tried, like the Topre, would have been a big mistake for me as I found I was bottoming out on them way too easily.

o Unfortunately, Brian didn't have any Cherry Clear keyboards with numpads. His suggestion to me was to get a WASD CODE 104-Key Mechanical Keyboard with Cherry Clear switches. I took his advice and ordered one off the WASD website.

o I also purchased soft landing pads from Elite Keyboards and both red and blue Cherry Rubber O-Ring Switch Dampeners from WASD. The o-rings make a huge difference; after testing both types, I went with the blue o-rings, which offer even more shock reduction and shorter key travel than the red o-rings. As for the soft landing pads, I tried combining them with the o-rings, but this would often prevent keys from actuating, so I wound up removing the landing pads.

o Finally, I got in touch with Nathaniel from Rhinofeed, who had reviewed a gel keycaps set on YouTube...https://youtu.be/QTtuHkO0jxw. I really wanted to try out gel keycaps on top of everything else, but was having trouble finding them available anywhere. Luckily, Nathaniel still had the gel keycaps set that he had reviewed and was looking to sell them. I bought them off of them. I'm not using the whole set, but rather about a dozen of the keycaps for the keys I most often use with my pinkies, which are my most sensitive and pain-prone fingers.

Overall, the combination of Cherry Clear switches, Cherry Rubber O-Ring Switch Dampeners, and gel keycaps has been a game changer for me. I admittedly am often still wearing gel toe pads (https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01N915IHG) over my pinkies, as well. Is the setup perfect? No, there sometimes still is a some finger sensitivity. But it's a huge step forward from what I was dealing with before. Thanks so much to everyone who shared their thoughts and advice! I hope this thread is useful for anyone out there who has similar issues.