Hey! I saw posts from here on my feed, and have been sucked in. Beautiful keyboards!
But, I’m a bit overwhelmed with options. If I want to get started with an EMK, what would you suggest?
I am comfortable with general soldering (though haven’t done surface-mount), so putting a kit together should be doable. I use a Dvorak keyboard layout, so would prefer a way to customize keycaps. But … I would prefer a kit that comes with everything (or at least a checklist), and doesn’t require me to figure out what components to order, to help ensure I have compatible parts.
Thanks for your suggestions!
In my opinion, https://typeractive.xyz/pages/build offers a very compelling way to customize a build. They’ll let you pick whatever features you want and send a partially completed kit (limited soldering needed). The only limitation is that they do currently only the Corne in either 42 or 36 keys, but will do either of those in either MX switches (taller, but a lot more options for switches and keycaps) or choc switches (low profile, but limited options for switches and keycaps).
One thing you have not mentioned is that you probably want to get everything with hot-swap sockets so that you can swap out switches, microcontrollers etc. I’m still in the beginning myself with my first board and I’ve swapped switches, taken them out, modded them, etc. There is a lot to learn, and you will not get your perfect board the first time. Socketing both means that you can try out tons of more options now for the switches, and that if you decide your first board is not to your liking at all, you can then move the switches and microcontrollers over to another board of a completely design, say going from a Corne to a Soffle, without needing to repurchase everything. The switches, keycaps, and microcontrollers are the majority of the cost in many boards.