Hi! 🤑

Yes, the right one is really in front of you! I have learnt it the hard way, after spending more than 1.000 € (~1.130.85 $ at the time of this writing).

I haven't paid much attention to keyboards when I started programming. I was just fascinated by some of them, especially the vintage ones, like the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Model_M_keyboard.

An IBM Model M keyboard
An IBM Model M manufactured in the early 1990s. Source: Wikipedia - Model M Keyboard

Somehow the style and colors captured my attention. I was 18 years old at that time and nothing changed with the University or my move the UK afterwards.

However, my perspective shifted dramatically when I moved to Germany and I sat at my office desk for the first time. There, I found a Cherry Stream keyboard and for the first time I was actually using a different layout compared to the Italian one, which was pretty hard to use in the beginning. In fact, in the UK I used my own laptop, so I wasn't forced to use any other keyboard there.

A Cherry Stream keyboard
Cherry Stream keyboard. Source: Cherry Stream keyboard

At first, I immediately changed the layout to the Italian one. My muscle memory was good enough to avoid looking at the keyboard to find the right character to type after many years of usage. Also, I fell in love with that keyboard, even if I didn't like the fact that what I was pressing was not the same value of the keycap value (they might invent a disease for this).

At this point, I had two issues:

  1. I didn't want to use the German layout.
  2. I wanted to try other keyboards.

The problem was that I couldn't find any interesting keyboard with the Italian layout, so I decided to switch to the US one, because the large amount of keyboards I could find online. I also developed a strong interest in mechanical keyboards, so the damage was done at that point.

Over the years, I've built up a small collection of keyboards:

  1. Keychron K6.
  2. Keychron S1.
  3. Niz Plum 87.
  4. Topre Realforce R2.
  5. Topre Realforce R3 TKL.

The first two are the so called mechanical keyboards, whereas the last three are membrane ones and use Topre switches.

If you want to know more about keyboard technology, I would strongly suggest to read this Wikipedia article.

Now you might ask, where are you typing this article from? Well, from the Cherry Stream keyboard. Wait, what? Yes, after trying so many keyboards, I bought a Cherry Stream with the US layout and started to use it again. Its low profile and the typing response it gives me, are too satisfying compared with the other ones. At least for me, it feels just better even if it costs ten times less compared to any Topre one.

That's another lesson that I learnt the hard way. Everyone is different and, especially, not all that glitters is gold.

Lastly, there is an analogy to this. My wife was my neighbor and we met in that way. Well, I didn't try other "keyboards" while we were together, but I felt the same feeling I had with the Cherry Stream keyboard when I first met her. I might have transformed an article about keyboards to a love one, but, yeah, it is fine.

Cheers!