deskthority

Hey guys,

So with all the awesome resources here I've been able to come up with a layout I like as well as what I think is a good plate design. The layout is this:
I'm just going for a slightly smaller board that still has most of the useful buttons. Feel free to correct me on the usefulness of some of them! Haven't decided what the Fn key will do yet, but I've got some time.

I've made a plate design based on a lot of the designs here and other sites, especially using the resources here http://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=47744.0. It's been interesting, but the last time I used CAD software was in high school. I'm foregoing a PCB because I have more confidence in my wiring skills that PCB design skills. Here it is:
I've used the DWG files with all the hole sizing from the geekhack thread and everything looks to be the correct size (14mm holes, 19.05mm centre-to-centre spacing on the 1x1 etc). I'm going to add dimensions later and email the laser cutter people, but if anyone has a second and can see any glaring flaws that'd be awesome. I can't seem to upload DWG files here, but I guess I could upload them and link them if anyone would like to see it.

The screw holes in the middle are for spacers between the plate and the back plate of the case, just for some extra stability.

I've ordered a teensy and most of the other stuff I will need for the wiring so I'm getting pretty excited. I'm going to design the case later and just start with this first step. Let me know if that's a terrible idea!

Thanks for all your help and for all the resources that have been gathered here. You guys are awesome.

Daiern

The Keycool 84 uses exactly the layout you want, but I don't know if it is programmable.

I think the MX Mini PCB will support that layout. It runs only the PS2AVRU firmware AFAIK. There is an acrylic plate in the GB, but it is for PCB-mounted stabilisers.

Thanks for the replies guys. I saw the Keycool 84 a while ago and then forgot about it. Then apparently subconsciously designed the same thing haha. Oh well. This is more for a project and I didn't really like the case for the keycool.

I am now however trying to drop the top line of F keys and somehow integrate them with the number keys, but the main thing is that I need the Escape and Delete keys on the corners. Weird personal preference. It's going to be a fun design challenge though.

Also, I'll be checking out the MX Mini PCB as well. Thanks a bunch for letting me know about that!

You could change the \ key to be Backspace and split the 2× wide key into \ and Del, but the ~ and Esc keys would still clash. The HHKB and some keyboards for old Unix workstations have this arrangement.

Another option would be to split the space bar, making one of the two keys Backspace, and replace the 2× key with ~ and Del. The drawbacks are that you wouldn't be able to fit the controller under the Space Bar, and the difficulty of finding keys in Space Bar-profile that are smaller than 6× wide.

Another more unusual option would be to reduce the key spacing on the ZXCV row with about 1/3 mm, which would allow the right Shift key to be split in two so that you could put Home to the left of Up-arrow, and move down PgUp and PgDn a step.

Okay so I've redone the layout. Took me a while with all the new ideas (Thanks!). It breaks the "Del on the corner" rule, but if worse comes to worst I'll move it to where Home is and move Home to the Fn+Backspace keys.
I'm sort of trying to stick to standard key sizes, since it's the first time doing this. I kept trying all the new stuff but I couldn't stop going back to something like this... fairly standard I suppose. It's similar to this one in another thread at the bottom, with slight modifications on the Fn keys (since it has none).

Thanks for the help. Here's hoping there aren't any crazy things wrong with it!

I quite like Home/End/PgUp/PgDn on Fn+Left/Right/Up/Down (respectively).

It's funny, that's the same layout I ultimately ended up with for my own custom board. I even started with F1-F12 and later removed them.

I've tried putting them there, but then what happens with the extra row on the end? I can't seem to squeeze the arrow keys one key to the left without having a tiny right shift key. And if there's one thing I know for sure about the way I type it's that I will be hitting Up more than Shift if that's the case.

It's nice to know that I'm following some sort of sane pattern with this design haha. How did you find the Esc key and Fn+Esc for tilde? I don't think I use those enough for it to matter, but it looks cluttered to me.

Yep, I ran into all of these ideas too. I keep mine as (top to bottom)

~
PgUp
PgDn
Fn
Right Arrow

Then home/end are on the fn+arrow layer because I use them less than PgUp/PgDn. I really like having Fn there because it's more HHKB-style, it works a lot better for me because it's easy to find.