
Wireless Das Keyboard Modification - rayshan
http://www.ivanyu.ca/blog/2014/2/2/wireless-das-keyboard-modification
======
chimeracoder
> As someone with an affinity for both wireless devices and mechanical
> keyboards, I am saddened that wireless mechanical keyboards are few and far
> between.

There are two reasons for this. First, mechanical keyboards are generally
larger than other keyboards, which makes them less portable.

Secondly, mechanical keyboards are oftentimes used by professional gamers, and
for their use case, wireless just doesn't cut it. Higher latency (and more
importantly - higher _variance_ latency), as well as multi-key rollover[0]

That said, as someone who owns two Das keyboards and hates typing on laptop
keyboards (or, worse, on tablet screens), I'm very happy to see this!

[0] Even the Das keyboards don't support n-key rollover over USB; you need to
use PS/2 cables, IIRC:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rollover_%28key%29](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rollover_%28key%29)

~~~
archagon
I think "professional" gamers tend to be needlessly fussy about their
equipment. I beat Super Meat Boy 100% with a wireless gamepad with no issues
at all. I also use a wireless gaming mouse to play Counter-Strike and other
FPS. These are both Logitech products so they use their own receivers instead
of Bluetooth (presumably for better performance), but it looks like this
keyboard mod is doing the same thing.

~~~
nightski
For me it is batteries. Why deal with connection issues/batteries for a
peripheral that never leaves the desk? Seems ridiculous.

~~~
archagon
My mouse lasts about a month, and I much prefer the experience to getting my
movement occasionally (frequently) cramped by a rigid cable!

~~~
nacs
If its a frequent problem, you can use a mouse bungee [1] [2] [3] to prevent
it.

They're targeted at the gaming crowd and most "pro gamers" use those. I'm sure
you could rig up a cheaper solution with sticky tape or something if you don't
want to buy one.

[1]: [http://i.imgur.com/l8Ynobn.jpg](http://i.imgur.com/l8Ynobn.jpg)

[2]: [http://www.amazon.com/Mouse-Bungee-Management-Fixer-
Holder/d...](http://www.amazon.com/Mouse-Bungee-Management-Fixer-
Holder/dp/B00IE00HTW/) (~$9)

[3]: [http://www.amazon.com/Thermaltake-Tt-eSPORTS-Galeru-EAC-
MSB0...](http://www.amazon.com/Thermaltake-Tt-eSPORTS-Galeru-EAC-
MSB001/dp/B00BOVOED8/) (~$20)

------
clebio
I'm confused as why you wouldn't just use a USB breakout board and a bluetooth
or serial modem (e.g. [1]). Having to desolder every key seems like an immense
amount of work and risk of error. At any rate, an awesome hack. I love my Das
Keyboard, and wireless wouldn't hurt (gaming isn't my use-case).

[1]:
[https://www.sparkfun.com/products/12700](https://www.sparkfun.com/products/12700)

~~~
nacs
Perhaps it would help with latency a bit?

    
    
        Key signal > USB > Wireless
                   vs
        Key signal > Wireless

------
sashk
I have different problem - keyboard I love doesn't come as wired keyboard,
only wireless. I want something to turn into wired one. Why? Because wireless
microsoft keyboards aren't secure. And I'm talking about Microsoft Sculpt
Ergonomic keyboard...

------
entee
I too wish there were more out of the box solutions for these. I also wish
more keyboards separated the keypad from the main keyboard. I like to stay
centered in front of the monitor, which means necessarily the number pad makes
the whole thing asymmetrical and knocks into the mouse (I have a very narrow
desk).

I'm surprised they're not more common, because many of my programmer friends
also prefer mechanical keyboards. At that point latency seems irrelevant? It
doesn't appear mechanical keyboards are intrinsically less suited to being
wireless...

~~~
abroncs
There are quite a few tenkeylenss or 60% boards that exist for this very
reason.

------
darklajid
Off-topic, but something that surprised me: This site comes up blank/empty
here. I assume it's ublock - haven't tested that.

I did look at the source of the page and .. whoa. Can someone explain to me
what

meta og:description (more or less the whole text, I guess)

meta itemprop="description" (as above, a full copy)

meta twitter:descrption (a third one..)

are? Is that normal? Sane? I've never seen that before.

Plus, meta description is .. present but empty. The body starts roughly 600
lines into the document.

~~~
bdchauvette
og:description is metadata for facebook's OpenGraph. [1]

twitter:description one is metadata for Twitter Cards. [2]

itemprop="description" is metadata in the microdata format [3]

\----

[1] [http://ogp.me/](http://ogp.me/)

[2]
[https://dev.twitter.com/cards/overview](https://dev.twitter.com/cards/overview)

[3] [https://schema.org/docs/gs.html](https://schema.org/docs/gs.html)

~~~
darklajid
I know I'll pay for derailing this, but thanks a lot. My biggest confusion was
that these overlap so much, and that they contain the full content.

Again, apologies. I just got curious and was hoping the author might share why
this is the case.

Even after following your links I'm confused, but - I got the gentle nudge and
understand that this isn't the right place to continue this.

og:description - "A one to two sentence description of your object."

twitter:description - "Description text will be truncated at the word to 200
characters."

itemprop="description" \- "A short description of the item."

------
meo2
since no one has mentioned it, there's this
[http://matias.ca/laptoppro/mac/](http://matias.ca/laptoppro/mac/). IMO, it's
the perfect solution for a portable mechanical keyboard. It's small, so you
can throw in your bag and have it with you always, and the rechargeable
batteries inside this thing are seriously impressive. I last recharged mine
about 9 months ago and I use it all day every day.

------
PebblesHD
An interesting project, and a nice result, but I'm curious about the goal of
not having inscriptions on the keys? You may not look down at the keyboard
when typing but what if someone else needs to use it or for whatever reason
you cant focus? It seems like needless one-upping, even their website seems to
acknowledge that its really only for showing off...

~~~
jen729w
If nothing else, it means they can make one version without annoying half the
population - in this case me, as a Mac user. It's simple enough to remap the
Ctrl/Win/Alt cluster to their Mac equivalents.

It's also forced me to be a better touch-typist; I'd never really bothered
learning the numbers up until now. I didn't even realise it but I was looking
down at them each time I needed them. No more!

Aaaaand it does look cool.

~~~
Encosia
To be fair, using PC keys might annoy ~10% of the population if you include
Linux users, not half. They actually make an Apple version of the variant that
does have printed keycaps.

But yeah, the stated purpose of the blank keycaps is to force you to become a
better typist (citation needed as to whether it actually works).

------
mrmondo
If you really want to make your Das wireless - why not just use a wireless USB
hub?

