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For my money, you simply cannot get a better electrocapacitive keyboard than the Bauer Lite with a DynaCap kit.
[Editor’s note: Huh?]
You can get a nicer EC keyboard, without having to build it yourself, by simply spending $3,600 on a Norbauer Seneca. Or you can get a Happy Hacking Keyboard or a Realforce for south of $300, also without having to build it yourself, with genuine Topre switches, Bluetooth if you want it, and decent — but not great — remapping capability.
Or, for about $250, a set of keycaps, and a couple of hours of assembly, you can design a Bauer Lite in any of a zillion color combinations and use DynaCap parts to turn it into a fully remappable EC keyboard that feels like Topre while still being compatible with the vast world of aftermarket keycaps. Doesn’t that sound nice?
Omnitype Bauer Lite (Design Lab Edition) $ 136 $ 136 A 65 percent gasket-mounted wired mechanical keyboard kit. Use the Design Lab to customize its top, bottom, switchplate, and accent colors, plate materials, and mechanical or electrocapacitive PCBs. (Switches, stabilizers, and keycaps sold separately) Read More $136 at Omnitype
Dynacap kit $ 122 $ 122 A bundle of parts to convert a mechanical keyboard into an electrocapacitive one. Use a 60/65% bundle with a 7u space bar for a Bauer Lite you’ve configured with a Dynacap plate and EC65X PCB, or the DynaPak, which includes the plate and PCB, if you are converting one you already own. Read More $122 at Omnitype (60/65% bundle)$191 at Omnitype (Bauer Lite DynaPak)
DynaCap is a system of third-party, Topre-compatible parts from Clever Keebs that make it (relatively) easy and (relatively) cheap to create new electrocapacitive keyboards, convert an existing mechanical keyboard to EC, or modify a Topre board to use standard keycaps. The full DynaCap stack consists of sliders, housings, stabilizers, domes, springs, silencing rings, and plate gaskets (required only if you’re converting a Topre board). All you need is a compatible PCB and switch plate to turn any mechanical keyboard into an electrocapacitive one that works with MX keycaps.
Stop me if you’ve heard this part before. Topre keyboards rule because their electrocapacitive switches give them an unmatched, top-heavy tactile bump that you can’t get anywhere else. Unfortunately, there are only a handful of actual Topre keyboards still in production, in only four layouts: full-size, TKL, a new nonstandard 75 percent board, and the Happy Hacking Keyboard. And except for a couple of okayish Realforce gaming keyboards, they’re not compatible with the MX mount style used by pretty much every keycap set ever. This is a big problem for a small number of people, and some of them have tried to fix it.
It’s not as simple as just swapping the sliders from Topre to MX. MX-compatible keycaps are designed to fit over Cherry-MX-style housings; if you use MX sliders on Topre housings, some keycap profiles on some rows will bang into the housings on the way down. Both Ryan Norbauer and Clever also redesigned their switch housings to accommodate. Norbauer’s are radically different to the point where they’re incompatible with Topre switchplates, but that’s moot because you can only get them on a Norbauer board. See above re: $3,600.
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