Keyball44

1. Very effective for alleviating round shoulders.
2. The spacious middle section allows for placing items like a tablet, which is very convenient.
3. It’s also compatible with the Aten KM switch, making it perfect for those who use multiple computers without any hassle.

Very comfortable keyboard layout, corne like alpha cluster with compact kyria-like thumbs. Plus a ball! Bearings are ceramic, so in a way that is already pre-upgraded!

Build is entirely SMD based, so as long as you are comfortable with small components, soldering is a cinch. Pads are well laid out, spaced nicely, labelled well for the LEDs, and overall a very easy experience. I've soldered a fair few boards, all THT (something like 15+....) so this was a first for all SMD and it went very well. Keep in mind that I almost exclusively use a 2.4mm chisel tip with unleaded solder, and there were zero issues getting the iron in position for any components. Only partial issue I had was that the Kailh sockets are too narrow for that kind of chisel, so I had to get creative with iron positioning.

Note that the ball sensor orientation is vertical, and motion is best sensed directly opposite to it. The motion is thus optimized for thumb motion, however a finger can be used (the top of the ball is semi useless for up/down motion so you do have to use the side of the ball with your finger) in a pinch.

Remap does work well, UI is a bit annoying when you want to change the entire layout though (Colemak DH user, so the majority of the qwerty layout has to go!).

A small note with switches and the plate: I do not know if this is an issue across the board (heh), but I built this board with Infinity Key Cow switches. The switches had significant difficulty inserting into the plate, and I found that the LED side switch clips were all getting shaved once they successfully inserted. I did NOT have this issue with any durock or kailh switches that I tested with, so this may be exclusively an issue with the Cows (I did note that those clips did look a bit larger than the other switches).

Overall very pleased with the build, and the comfort of the board!

The build quality is good.
Although delivery took a month, it was worth the wait.
The trackball has excellent sensitivity.
Mapping software is also convenient.

I like building and collecting silly keyboards and this one is fun to use. I thought using the trackball was gonna be a pain at first but no I picked it up pretty quickly. Borrowing my friend's trackball mouse my mind would want to push the absolute unit around the table instead of pushing the ball but I believe since this trackball is attached to a keyboard my mind recognizes it for thumb use only.

I'm really cheap so most of my other keebs have some level of jank and in turn personality. I really tried (didn't try?) and it came out way nicer than expected. Mismatched MCUs, 3 different kinds of switches, and keycaps from an old typewriter.

Typing experience has taken me a bit to get used to. I'm used to 36 keys and much more aggressive pinky columns so I keep accidentally pressing the extra columns and I have repeating buttons because I don't know what to do with them.

I used remap to flash my keyboard and it worked great for me. My only minor issue was the spacers for the choc thumb cluster that was too short. Or maybe the others were too long? I printed some better fitting ones and it works fine now. I might get actual ones when I'm not lazy...

I'm relatively new to split keyboards, but in the few months since starting my journey, I have already developed some preferences and pet peeves that I was really hoping to find an easy solution for. Keyball44 fills that role pretty well.

The first is a need for a pointing device. I had been a Thinkpad user and was always partial to the track point, but most split keyboards with trackpoints mount them off to the side of the keys instead of embed them in between keys. Granted that would require custom keycaps and clever modifications to the PCB, so I understand why this hasn't become a popular solution. Otherwise my main pointing device has been a trackball mouse, so transition to the Keyball44 was seamless. The placement of the trackball is also quite appropriate. The MX switches increase the height a little bit, which provides the right amount of clearance between the trackball and the palm.

The second is a need for a 3-key, spread out thumb cluster. Plenty of keyboards satisfy this requirement, but my first split keyboard is a ZSA Voyager, which has only 2 keys per side, so the need for a slightly larger but well-placed thumb cluster is sorely felt. The 3/2 arrangement on the Keyball44 turns out to be perfect.

The rest of the features of the Keyball44 more or less just turned out perfect for my needs. For example I preferred a 6-column layout since I need some extra keys for international layouts, and I have been getting used to a 3-row layout in order to reduce hand movement.

Finally I took advantage of Idan's soldering service, which was very helpful, because my own soldering skills leave much to be desired, and I also wanted per-key LEDs and hot-swap sockets.

All in all, this was a great purchase. The only hiccup in the experience came after the keyboard was put together, because flashing the firmware was a bit of a hassle. The initial keymap seems to be a Japanese layout, so the lower-right key doesn't send a character when using other locales. This confused me into thinking that the hotswap socket was detached and led to some extra fiddling. Nevertheless all was well in the end.