if you're the kind of person who works and plays in front of a keyboard it's
really worth considering getting something that's at least a little bit ergonomic so that you have hands when
you're old I've never had an RSI and that's partly because I use an ergonomic
keyboard at my desk at work this is a pretty ergonomic keyboard it's also kind
of not in some way so let's check it out this is the the uhk that stands for
ultimate hacking keyboard 60. it's a small keyboard it's a split keyboard and
it comes with a bunch of modules and stuff because guys just because you're
going ergonomic doesn't mean it isn't a fun mechanical keyboard lots of
customization you know it's a fun mechanical keyboard when you get the
telephone cable that's the one that's called Curly little pigtail guy I don't
know in the Box you get the split keyboard which does combine but look at
that in a second you get these little guys which appear to be click in feet
like oh God look at the other one these are like the uh like the stands I think
that you can flip out to increase the Tilt which you shouldn't do from Arizona
perspective more on that later also have a combined key switch puller and key cap
puller branded uhk you also have a branded cable tie properly fixed to this
table which looks like it's like five feet long oh it's actually USBC to see
with an adapter to a and that's it for
the box so where does this plug in I guess it goes into one side of this and
then the sides are connected by what they call the bridge yeah this actually
stretches pretty far oh where does this go oh there it is on the right module
there is a USBC Port hidden in there so
you can plug into that and then run through this little channel oh she's
tight and it's in and then it runs off that way away from you like that guy in
and there you have the keyboard so that's the setup but actually I want to
unplug that if I can because I want to take a bit of an exterior tour of this
thing there's a lot of info on the back here start with uhk.io start it looks
like their website is actually fairly robust there's an arrow over here
pointing to a reset button that tells me that you can reprogram this keyboard and
if you want to reset the factory settings you just actually do it that
way which is kind of cool you've got these little pegs with rubber domes on
them or feet and over here there's kind of a list of the features I don't know
what agent means adaptive mode Mouse control macro programming copy left
repair friendly durable and key rollover agent it's the hacker keyboard in terms
of the ergonomics of this thing the first thing you notice that's weird about it is it's a split keyboard and
that's good for your shoulders actually so you can actually spread it apart like
this because it's kind of awkward for us to sit like this
you naturally want to spread out broaden the chest you know don't collapse your
shoulders forward so much in like a hunching way a second benefit to having
the split is something called ulnar deviation if your hands are together on
a regular keyboard and they go like that that hurts that pinches that can cause
RSI but as soon as you spread it you're not anymore there's no reason to
go like this if you have this space if it's nicer to actually you can even go
like this just come in totally naturally like that now there's two other elements
to keyboard ergonomics that this as configure is not serving at all one
being extension and pronation so extension let's put these little guys on
it looks like it just goes right around this foot
I'll make sure I put this on the right way oh my God those things just really
want to fall apart so you have some options of where you put these things I'm going to show you where to put them
to be ergonomic right there in the middle now usually
geez they're delicate okay
when you see little feet like this they're on your keyboard and they're
making your keyboard go like this you know they're they're bringing they're
raising up the edge of the keyboard that's farthest away from you but then I learned about extension so with any
joint uh well for this joint specifically this is extension this is
flexion it's bad for you and you'll get an RSI if you're in extension too much
and so if you actually tilt your keyboard so it's like that you're
getting more extension you want this joint to actually just be straight across that's ideal or even a little bit
like that there they are the reason I put them there is for the the final
dimension of ergonomics on a keyboard which is pronation and I think this one
affects me the most I even feel this when I'm driving in the car sometimes
I'll hold the steering wheel wrong when your forearm is this way the two bones
in your forearm which are the ulna and the radius they actually scissor
like that and they pinch there's tissue in between them that will be pinched and
they'll get like less blood flow to that tissue and that'll cause you pain so
you'd actually don't want to use your keyboard like that you want to be like that see that it's very it's pretty
subtle it's just like my hand is just maybe 30 degrees turn and that's huge
but now if I just bought this keyboard and I put those on to eliminate
pronation and I'm sitting there like this you can see I do have some extension there what's the remedy to
that why it's this accessory sold separately 75 advertised as giving you
tenting negative tilting look at that see that's that's for you'll actually be
in flexion and positive tilting which if
you're raising I don't know I'll try it 75 seems kind of like a lot but let's
see what you get are those even the same size one seems
longer than the other this on the website they call it's like Beachwood that's been like stained and sanded and
freaking pickled and brined it's crazy they really want your money they fit
onto here as you can see from this little GIF so simply oh this module is
actually wider than the other one because I guess because it has these
keys oh my God you guys got to work on that
part okay let's say I fit that together this is meant to just slide on here
this it looks so easy in the animation I
guess I'm supposed to use the hardware that comes with it a little handle on
here it's kind of like a little purse there it is that looks cool looks more
complete and still separates
very soft very soft on the pumps feels
good man now how does it work with these though and how does it add negative and
positive tenting it just seems to extend it
okay two feet start simple
that's not right don't do it this way here's the configuration with the
negative tilting that's pretty cool
now can I config it so I also get tenting take these off
okay oh no oh my God they say that on
there open and lock there's like some arrow action on here
okay that solves one problem
probably says that the manual or something I don't know if you can see this but I have different orientations
of these feet one's going down one's going sideways but that's just to show
you the options this is pretty much the config I would use because I think the
the tending is more important than the extension it looks pretty smart it looks
cool there are other colors I probably would have gotten a different color the
black looks sharp your executive Sleek gamery but I gotta say I'm partial to
the mustard real quick mention about the switches that come with this thing as
mentioned it comes with this right so that means that you can actually pull the switch right out of here hot
swappable switches that's awesome put whatever switches you want in here as
long as they're compatible with this standard configuration what they offer
on the website is kale switches either
red brown or blue and either these kind
of cross stem the Box stem or the circular silent stem right now there's
no extra cost for the different switches they're all the same price but there is
a footnote that says that the particularly Island switches May cost
more in the future just be aware of that they are double shot PBT keycaps so the
light on the RGB which this does have per key RGB I should plug this puppy in
it'll shine right through the switch there is screen printing for the
secondary layers down there on the legend that's not gonna be as durable
but you shouldn't be touching it as much I'm going to plug it in to see the lights but more importantly I want to
mess with these modules which seem super cool how do they interact with these
little clicks that are on here there's so many questions still right after this message from our sponsor thanks to
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cool default lighting configuration it's like a banana lavender you can see it
says qwr up here by default what that is is an indication of what layout you're
using on your keyboard you can actually go switch if you hold down function two
dvo is Dvorak good luck everyone always
wanted to try it the new cool Mac which is amalgam between QWERTY and dwarx is
supposed to be a little more accessible and then you switch over to going
between the Mac version of that now
let's check out these cool things this one says ultimate hacking keyboard
module trackball the least sold module
65 bucks it goes on this side only
looks like it only fits in this one spot those pipes which are cut male go into
this female and you don't have them in the same spot on this side cool there's
a little trackball on there now that's funky it doesn't click itself but it
does have two little clicky buttons here I would say it feels a little cheaper
than the rest of the keyboard it's pretty light
kind of Radley there's no satisfying click at the end kind of just slides
linearly on the rails one thing I look for in my ergonomic keyboards is thumb
clusters your thumbs are your strongest digit makes no sense that on a regular
qwerty keyboard you only use it for space bar and you pretty much only have
you know one key shared by both of them on the keyboard that I use I use these
for like four or five buttons each putting mod here is a is probably a
waste personally I don't really like having to go to a second layer which is
another reason I don't I hate that I hate the fact that a lot of Ergo
keyboards are small keyboards dumb because that's not ergonomic ergonomic
is a 10 key list but they never make them like that they always make them
these cool little funky guys which is great too but I would rather not have to
go into any function layers like the reason I use the keyboard I have at my
desk is because it has F Keys you can't
get that on so many Ergo keyboards okay let's check out this touchpad that's
cool too the more you can put onto the keyboard so that you don't have to reach
over here for the Mouse which is pretty not ergonomic the better so is this
compatible with this no it kind of looks like it goes in the same spot as the
trackpad that makes sense they have the same roll
um as long as I can actually oh look at that I'm flipping around over there I'm
trying to click and it doesn't appear to actually click all right we're set up
properly now with the software which is called Agent that's why the picture and
it's actually kind of cool you can unplug these modules and just see it
disappear plug it back in and there it is and it
says left click but unfortunately I have found no ability to click on anything
with it so I don't know what the deal is with that let's see if I put the
trackpad in if those clicks will work
The mousing Works no problem this little bastard stay there uh hello why is my
whole left side's gone let me plug that bridge in better let me redo it
come on side and my module is not showing up here
either oh there it is
maybe that was the problem weird Okay so funky behavior and let's see if I can
click on stuff nope even though it's mapped to left
click right there this click that does nothing either so weird though because
if I go back to paint I was able to use this clip see I can
draw but I couldn't click on anything in their software and what if I use
I can't click on that so what the heck what's the logic here firmware
okay now what because it does have to restart things nope here we go set up
ready to go trackball Mouse isn't working just Well it's worse now I'm
just gonna you're gonna unplug it firmware update failed nice yeah so it
wasn't done cannot find connected device if a USB
port launch agent again cannot find your USA please plug it in well it appears we
have a brick of the keyboard it no longer turns on but this is a thing that
happens apparently so they actually have a page on their website about how to
unbrick it so all we need to do is open up the back and short a couple of little
pads here so I'm going to unplug it
there it is frame come off there's the little things
we gotta jump oh God stuff's already happening so now
I fix uh we're back to where we started all
right at this point I'm just gonna continue evaluating the other modules
that I wanted to show you your mileage may vary as to whether or not the clicks
work out of the box install the newest firmware from the GitHub page I don't
think it's on their website you actually have to go to GitHub which is stupid make sure it's done before you unplug it
I'm not sure that's what happened uh if it does get brick try doing the reset
the unbricking page it was actually pretty easy
um and if it gets super bricked like ours then good luck on having a keyboard
for a couple of weeks while they do all the shipping and everything but here's
the rest okay this one is the track point is very much like the like the
track Ball but it's you know that Lenovo nipple guy the health I think I did that
too rough here it is the nipple came
right off let's go on here it's kind of weird for
all of these especially the trackpad to use your thumb this one without seeing
the feedback on the screen it feels like I'm not actually doing anything like it
I can't feel the joystick rocking over uh it also has clicks it's pretty
similar the other one and then finally the thing I'm most likely to get a
couple keys this actually goes on the other side so this is the one module
we've seen where you can have it in combination with another that's great
and as I said before I love thumb action so that's kind of a reach to get way
over there I probably wouldn't use these for much I might use this for like
home and end like a seldom used kind of like destination key you might say
whereas this mod key is where I'd like to have like backspace and this one
that's right there is like something decisive like enter
um speaking of enter they don't have an ISO layout like European style with you
know the tall ass enter button that thing's cursed I don't blame them for
not having that use this instead it's so annoying and hard to get used to when
your pinky reaches over to hit enter and it just doesn't I think going the other
direction is easier to learn so you know adapt or die there's another little
thing on here it's like there's its own little trackball right here and does
that click it does and that's a click too this dude
this has like a full three click Mouse built into it this is the best value if
they're all 65 bucks this is like two modules in one that's the one to get if
you're on a budge update all is well with the world we got
it fixed all we did was hold the wires
across those two little jumpers for longer hold them for longer and actually
throughout the duration of the firmer flashing I'm not sure if that was required but that's what we did and it
works now uh the other thing was about the clicks not working even though they
seem to be mapped in the software we got that working too all we did was map them
to something else and then back to the clicks and then they worked as as
intended so it's all good user error
Don't Unplug it before it's done flashing the firmware my bad with all
that considered what are my final thoughts on this keyboard I think it's
definitely a contender for your roster of Ergo gaming type keyboards although
you don't have to be a gamer it has a very clean look if it could fit in your
minimalist setup as well especially if you go for the white chassis it's a
little bit expensive yes but honestly you always pay premium for Ergo I don't
really know why because they're wacky I guess but it's pretty cool the modules
aren't really selling me they're kind of awkward to use with with your right thumb especially the trackpad one but
it's cool that they exist I will probably go for the key cluster the
thing with Ergo keyboards is you have particular needs keyboards have lots of
different dimensions of quality so just look at five or six consider the price
pick the one you think fits you the best so it's worth looking at