I dug out my TG3 keyboard with trackpad (the one that was essentially made for use in police cars) to try it out with the new version of iPadOS, since they finally added mouse/trackpad support. It actually works fine – both the trackpad and the keyboard work, and you can even remap some of the modifier keys in the OS now, which wasn’t possible before. Unfortunately, this particular board doesn’t support two-finger scrolling or any other multitouch gestures, which are pretty vital to actually using an iPad without touching the screen.
So I wouldn’t really recommend this, but it does have me thinking about the new Magic Keyboard that Apple announced. At $350 for the larger version, it seems expensive even to me (i.e. someone who spends way too much on keyboards), but it does add a trackpad and better-feeling keys, in addition to letting you power your iPad and still use the USB-C port.
Like a lamb to the slaughter… LOL, seriously though how are the switches? I got unlucky last time I harvested some old MX blacks & the batch ended up being fairly scratchy unfortunately.
One board is noticeable scratchy but the other one feels surprisingly good.
I was originally after the stabs and crack open the switches and harvest the spring and stem. But I will give it a go and de solder them.
Would u say I need desolder equipment if I don’t care for the PCB?
You can get away with just using a soldering iron & wick (a hand held desoldering pump would be very handy too) to harvest switches if you’re not worried about the PCB. Not sure how to tell if plate mount stabs are genuine Cherry or not, however I will say they look just like some I bought when I rebuilt my 660M. So they should be genuine ones.
I’m actually typing on a board right now that uses some “spill guard” domes from a TG3 board. They sit on silent cherry switches with gat clear 35g springs (to reduce the finger breaking tactility of those domes) and SA keycaps to accommodate the domes without having to trim them down. The mods don’t use the domes so they have 70g TX springs in them. The setup feels wildly similar to topre 55g.
I flip the windows key for ergonomic reasons. I use a handful of keyboard shortcuts with that key (it’s connected to a Mac at work), sometimes very frequently - with my posture / hand size, this just makes the shortcuts a bit more comfortable. It’s like how a lot of people flip their space bar - I almost always flip mine as well, though MDA space bars are symmetrical front-to-back much like SA or DSA.
LOL, seriously though how are the switches? I got unlucky last time I harvested some old MX blacks & the batch ended up being fairly scratchy unfortunately.
