So a few weeks ago I decided to pull the trigger on the Wooting80 HE. At first I was kinda put off the design, but over time it really grew on me. It’s a bit smaller than a TKL, which are too large for me personally, and just a bit larger than a 60%. It has arrow keys and the F-row which are useful for productivity tasks and non-FPS gaming, but it’s a little more compact, as I don’t really need 6 utility keys (home, end, pgup, pgdown, insert, delete) The excuse I thought up for buying it was, I could use it for casual coding on my gaming workspace, so I can game and code using the same keyboard. I do have a dedicated coding space with another keyboard and… several other keyboards, and I can code just fine for majority of cases with the 60 layout and layers I’ve set up, but I NEED IT you know. I love the Wooting60 I own, it’s the one I main for everything besides work, but I was alternating between Steelseries Apex Mini wireless and Wooting before, since I have several workstations, but since I had some issues with the Apex mini, I contacted the support and absolutely obliterated it broke the USB-C connector to get a coupon for a replacement. Sadly because of some EU laws, they couldn’t ship the wireless one (batteries and shipping) and I decided I’m just going to stay away from Steelseries anyhow, since I also had bad experience with Arctis Nova Pro Wireless. I ordered headphones for my friend and started looking at alternatives.

So, it turns out the market is pretty wild with all kinds of HE (Hall Effect) keyboards, from relatively cheap chinese ones, to the more premium ones. I decided I’m gonna change the case on my Wooting60, so I ordered Tofu60 Redux along with the brass weight and the carbon plate for testing, I hovered over the “order now” button a bit, rethinking my steps up to the point I was ordering and actual weight from China and paying half of the price for shipping alone, after I decided I am truly too far gone I ordered everything and went to quietly sob in a corner celebrate. Since I ordered Wooting 80 HE module, I had to grab some keycaps and switches. It’s gonna arrive probably next year around November/December anyhow, but I was already on a spree. After reading good reviews, I went with Jades (found really adorable pink ones), also got a pack of Black knights from GUGU since they were pretty cheap and I read good things about them, and I also ordered several keycaps. I was looking at Cerakeys a long time ago when they were still a novelty, and after wanting to try them out for so long I pulled the trigger and ordered them. I have several keyboards around the house, so I can use them somewhere even if I don’t like them on the Wooting, I heard the sound is great, but the feel is very subjective, some love it, some really don’t.

I also found POCO (deskmat, keycaps, it was a KB if I’m not mistaken) which started a deep dive into a rabbit hole. I found the deskmat from POCO which I really like since it’s quite goofy. It’s basically a mood chart for each day I wanted to buy it for my partner, but it was nowhere to be seen in EU, only place that had it was some shops in US, Korea and UK, which has import taxes and not the cheapest shipping, and since I didnt found anything else on the site I liked, it didn’t seem sensible to spend 60 EUR on a deskmat, and the switches and other stuff they had, I could get elsewhere without extra import taxes. I started exploring the Korean one and found out it’s really amazing and apparently well known. It was Geon works international website, which has a ton of amazing stuff. I found a lot of great switches, PCBs, really cool and specific tools (switch trimmer, stabilizer bender, stem holder) which I didn’t see before. Before you knew it I was at several hundreds of Euros in cart, not incuding shipping and the customs that will be waiting for me. The Venom HE TKL really sparkled my interest as the PCB looks gorgeous and the tests I found were really good, but after further thought I decided I won’t build a TKL first since I’m not really that big of a fan of TKLs and would be building it just for fun or testing. So I left it for the inevitable next order along with the Frog PCB. I did however throw most of their switches into the cart, some of them for a full build, rest for sound testing, I plan to 3d print the switch holders and testers, found good 3d prints that are stackable so I will just keep them nicely sorted.

Along with the switches I ordered some EPT case foam, the tool for holding the stems when analyzing or lubing the switches, and some ESD film. All of this sparked even more autism very specific interest from me, since I saw the foam the sold for the keyboard was ESD foam. I started researching what options I have for buying this in larger quantities and just cutting it to size, since I have all kinds of builds coming up. While I do prefer 60% (and lately 40%-50%, but I digress), I do have every other variation except a full one, numpad is just too nasty, even for me. So I saw some people use the PE foam you get in packages and layer it between PCB and the case, and others even sandwich it between switches and the PCB, poking hole through the foam with the switch pins. EVA foam is also quite common, poron foam and some more exotic options include Neoprene and Sorbothane. I decided I’m gonna pillage the homes of friends for PE foam from packages, and ordered some EVA and ESD foams to try it out. I still have the Neoprene in the cart, might buy it just to try it out, it’s probably a bit overkill. I must also check out the claims that some types of foam cause static shock and fry the PCB, while I do suspect it’s a bit more nuanced, as you would have to charge yourself or the foam and then touch the PCB directly for that to happen.

After a bit of research on the materials, I also noticed there is a ton of keyboards on the market, and quite a few below 100 EUR mark. Over the next few days I was scouring the internet for tests to see how well they actually perform, a lot boast with 8k polling rate, but few actually make use of that. To be honest, it doesn’t really matter much for performance, it’s not like that alone is gonna make me a top tier player, but it’s a nice gimmick, and I think if you implement the 8k well, good latency and responsiveness comes together in a package, which is objectively good. I found several excel spreadsheets and some websites I had to use a translator with, but it was all worth it (I will list the helpful websites in a dedicated section on the blog). The ones that finally caught my attention were (some of the links coming up are affiliate links, if you don’t want to support me in that way, you can just search for the img title online):

Slightly pricier ones I want to try out

• Rakka - Sadly I missed the train where I could get the PCB, since they discontinued that due to user errors, and the kits were all sold out, I sent them an email, hoping to see a response where / when I can buy the PCB or the kit, looks fantastic and supposedly performs top notch
• Iqunix EZ 60/63 - Looks good, the colour scheme not so much, but performance wise and the aluminum look really inviting, hopefully I can get my hands on that and try it out thoroughly, quite excited about that. They have two options, ez60 is classic 60 layout, and 63 is same size but with arrow keys in the bottom right
• Everglide SU68 - Not out yet in the international market afaik, and bit overpriced, but looks great, would love to test it
• Meletrix Boog75 - Quite like this one, kit is at a good price, but not really a fan of TKLs, if anything I would build a Venom HE TKL before, will see, if there would be genuine interest in this I’m willing to make a fun build out of it The kit itself is $99 and you can put it in any compatible case, add some keycaps and you’re done, or you can buy a prebuilt kit for around $200, prebuilt options seen here
• Venom 60 HE, which I mentioned on the top, but this just cemented my wish to buy it since the tests were top tier, hoping Geonworks finishes testing on Korean market so I can order

Lower priced ones I want to try out

• - Zuoya is making fantastic keyboards and kits, everything I have tried from them so far I absolutely loved! Really excited about trying this one. 8k polling rate, featuring rapid trigger, if their previous keyboards are anything to take into account, the build quality and the sound will be fantastic as well, all in all a great package at this price.
• Teamwolf Raven68 - It’s actually 8k and the tests were promising, if they fix their firmware it could be a really good budget HE board, ordered it for sub 70 EUR and will test it out a bit
• Keydous NJ68-CP - I almost ordered this one, but wasn’t really sure on the layout, 68 is just in this weird zone where I don’t really use the arrow keys as I have a different bind and layer configuration, but it looked good on paper. Perhaps I try it out later, would be open to this

Ones that I found but for several reasons didn’t decide to get, if anyone really wants me to try them out, hit me up and I may just order and test it:

• Redragon M61/FIZZ K617/K683WB: Aliexpress Amazon US Amazon DE

• Womier M68 - 68 format is not my favourite, and the performance is supposedly lacking, I do like the stock look though

• DrunkDeer G60 and others - They are decent, but now when the market is flooded with clones and cheap versions, there is really not much of a reason to get one imo

• Waizowl Lightning 60 - Risky buy, looks decent but not so sure about firmware/drivers

• Akko 3061s - This one looks cute and price isn’t so bad, but again, with so many of the keyboards coming out, this one just isn’t performing that well, open to testing it out. So I won’t just trash talk Akko, I hear MOD007v3 HE Year of Dragon is actually really good, but at that price I’m getting something else

• Rain65 - Found this while writing this blog post, looks similar to Raven68, price is amazing but drivers are horrible at the time of writing, perhaps I order for testing purposes, it looks quite nice

• Teamwolf seemingly also released a keypad called HK25, which is a 25% keyboard that has HE switches, I was originally searching for this because of a friend who really wanted this layout since he mostly plays shooters and he’s weird and doesn’t want to use a larger keyboard, but at sub 50 EUR price I just said frick it, and ordered it. It has a 8k polling rate and I’m excited to see it in action, will review it in the following blog posts

There are quite a few more I found, but not going to mention all of them as I can update this post weekly, if someone wants a comprehensive list of a type (budget HE ones only, tested and good ones, premium ones), throw me an email and I will reply with my suggestions

So currently I have hundreds of switches on the way, along with some prebuilt budget HE keyboards, several keycaps and quite a few options for materials used inside the build, and over the next few weeks/months I’m gonna work on builds. I am not really expecting any emails, but if someone wants to talk about this, ask me anything, wants me to try some combo in a build, let me know and I’ll do my best