Unicomp SSK coming March 2020

[sharktastica]

Well, this is a pleasant surprise! I noticed the "Annoucing the Unicomp Tenkeyless" on their homepage, which links to their Gift Certifcate page (https://www.pckeyboard.com/page/product ... ertificate). You can preorder by buying a gift certficate and selecting the appropriate an option. As for the keyboard itself, it's $105 and it has Windows keys, lock-lights, detactable USB cable, and it really looks quite gorgeous in black!

[depletedvespene]

March 2020... of the Gregorian Calendar?

I mean, after all these years, we need to ask.


Also... woah, is that really a 1.5/1/1.5 / 5.75/1.25 / 1.5/1/1.5 bottom row? Let's hope that's not "just the prototype"...

[JP!]

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[depletedvespene]

Fine. 25 bucks just flew off my wallet, so to speak.

Unicomp, please don't disappoint us.

[sharktastica]

Fine. 25 bucks just flew off my wallet, so to speak.

Unicomp, please don't disappoint us.

Same, got my preorder sorted too! I, too, hope it lives up to the hype and gives them a new lease of life! For now, HYPE and GO UNICOMP I guess!

[depletedvespene]

Should I ask them for a custom set of X keycaps when the time comes? So I'll have a white and and black XXK?

[Fkazim]

Wow it is actually happening

[Rauha]

Still not gonna unlearn AltGr + 2 = @, AltGr +E = my currency, or any other AltGr combo from my muscle memory, simply because Unicomp is obsessed placing Right Windows key [for me the second least used key after Scroll lock) where AltGr should be. Nor am I gonna spend the roughly two billion Euros - Unicomps only european super-expensive shipping option- for a new keyboard that requires me to do USB converter right out of the box.

But I'm one of those old dusty fat fucks who doesn't really care about TKL/SSK form factor anyway. This could help buckling springs staying in production. So a good thing, maybe, I guess.

[Muirium]

Definitely a good thing.

The black looks cool. But I’ve already got IBM vintage SSKs… Unicomp isn’t exactly renowned for its quality, compared to the originals. But, hey, I must admit they pleasantly surprised me, getting this thing going at all! Credit where it’s due. And I do like the idea of a smaller spacebar. They just had to go and do this right when the new HHKBs came out!

You know what they say about compact keyboards: you wait forever and then two come along at once…

Then again, the Unicomp TKL is at the right price.

[robo]

Something about the Unicomp boards always just looks a bit off to me. Like the placement of the status leds, their keycap legends, etc. They just have zero sense of industrial design or style, so when they make small changes to the original design, it always looks kind of crappy.

But yeah, I bet they'll sell a ton of these. So much pent up demand.

Ironically I pulled the trigger on a used SSK just last week, after thinking about it for literally 10 years. Luckily I got a great deal and didn't pay all too much more than Unicomp's price, for a board in great condition. So no regrets there, personally.

[Muirium]

Morning after the night before. Zooms into image. Rubs bleary eyes. Double checks. Loses shit:

IS THAT ASSYMETRIC MODS!?!??! YOU MANIACS! YOU BLEW IT ALL TO HELL!

[depletedvespene]

Still not gonna unlearn AltGr + 2 = @, AltGr +E = my currency, or any other AltGr combo from my muscle memory, simply because Unicomp is obsessed placing Right Windows key [for me the second least used key after Scroll lock) where AltGr should be. Nor am I gonna spend the roughly two billion Euros - Unicomps only european super-expensive shipping option- for a new keyboard that requires me to do USB converter right out of the box.

From what can be seen from the picture, RALT (AltGr for us) is where it should be (1.5U in size, centered under /?). Fuse together the 5.75U space bar and the 1.25 RGUI ("second Windows") key and you'd have a "tsangan" bottom row. I still say that 1.25U key should have been 1.5U instead (and would work nicely as an Fn key, or perhaps even as the ONLY Windows key), though.

[depletedvespene]

Morning after the night before. Zooms into image. Rubs bleary eyes. Double checks. Loses shit:

IS THAT ASSYMETRIC MODS!?!??! YOU MANIACS! YOU BLEW IT ALL TO HELL!

I don't think you'll be thrilled about my idea for adding a leftside AltGr key...

[cli]

Still not gonna unlearn AltGr + 2 = @, AltGr +E = my currency, or any other AltGr combo from my muscle memory, simply because Unicomp is obsessed placing Right Windows key [for me the second least used key after Scroll lock) where AltGr should be. Nor am I gonna spend the roughly two billion Euros - Unicomps only european super-expensive shipping option- for a new keyboard that requires me to do USB converter right out of the box.

From what can be seen from the picture, RALT (AltGr for us) is where it should be (1.5U in size, centered under /?). Fuse together the 5.75U space bar and the 1.25 RGUI ("second Windows") key and you'd have a "tsangan" bottom row. I still say that 1.25U key should have been 1.5U instead (and would work nicely as an Fn key, or perhaps even as the ONLY Windows key), though.

Unicomp has a 103 keyboard that's close to the original IBM Model M keyboard layout

https://www.pckeyboard.com/page/product/UB40P3A

Hope they do the same with the SSK.

[Muirium]

Alt keys and Windows keys can be trivially remapped. It’s the physical asymmetry that bothers me.

[zrrion]

Iirc that is so they can use a single barrel plate for both tsangan and quasi-modern bottom rows, as well as limiting the number of caps they have to make. It looks like shit, but if you remove a keycap and swap on a proper 7u space bar you get a good bottom row w/o needing any internal modification.

[grasshopper]

I was under the impression that, in order to save costs, the (new) 104 key layout was designed so that it could use the same barrel plate as the (new) 103 key layout. Presumably, Unicomp would design the SSK's barrel plate to work in the same way.

[daedalus]

It always seemed odd to me that they didn't make the 103-key layout the default option. Since they are able to program the keyboards on their end, they could easily add an option to let you select between having two Windows keys, or Windows on the left and that useless menu key on the right.

On their Mac keyboards, they have an Fn key on the bottom row, but they could solve this by copying the original Apple keyboard more closely, and moving Fn to the "Insert" key position, and making Eject an Fn combo.

[brainandforce]

From what I understand, you can just buy a long spacebar from Unicomp and swap it in, removing the spring from the right Windows key in the process, and you have a 103 key model for cheaper.

Granted, I still think the 103 key layout is superior and should be standard, but it's cheaper to do it yourself than to buy a conversion for $10.

[lhutton]

Man, how did I miss this? Got a pre-order in because I definitely need another yet buckling spring keyboard. Among my Model Ms and Model Fs I have a black/white/grey full size Unicomp UltraClassic and it looks pretty slick I think so I'm pretty happy with the color choice.

[vometia]

I wonder if there'll be any persuading them to make the case out of thicker, heavier plastic than their more recent offerings...? Though the narrower width combined with the absence of the Trackpoint's blanking plates may be enough.