Vida
60% - Wireless - Magnet closure - USB 2.0 hub
Design brief/what we want to achieve:
With Vida, we wanted to try something a little bit different. Typically we like to develop things as much as possible in-house using our own vision exclusively before sharing the idea with the wider community. This time round, we are mid-way through development and wanted to share our early findings with you all, and genuinely wanted your feedback before we push this project through to the final stages.
Simply put, we wanted to create a keyboard that had all the trappings of a custom keyboard that we all expect, but designed carefully in a way to achieve a much more affordable price tag without compromising on the design and quality. Of course, this is easier said than done, and we can never truly compete with offerings from various Chinese brands solely on price as we don’t manufacture our boards in-house, but we wanted to take a similar ethos and add our own shine to it.
Design so far/our findings/next steps
We have already had one prototype made and through thorough testing, we’ve found a few hiccups and decided that a few changes need to be made:
- The case is closed using magnets and for the initial prototype, we experimented with various shapes and sizes to see what would be the most effective and ultimately, some long, horizontal bar magnets were the size that we landed on. The next step with these is working with Hongtu to ensure that these are pre-installed cleanly and effectively.
- Due to how the top and bottom case are held together, you would need to press on the keys while pulling the top case up to remove it from the bottom. Because of this, we have opted to bottom-mount the plate on some soft gaskets to ensure a nicely cushioned typing experience. The current gasket design was great on paper, but in practice they sometimes got chewed up by the screw thread when fixing the plate down. From here we will need to amend the gasket design to ensure that once installed, they’re not at risk of being caught by the screw threads.
-
The top and bottom case have fairly tight tolerances between them (~0.2mm all round), but because there aren’t screws to hold the top case in a fixed position, the top case can move laterally for the full ~0.4mm. This doesn’t sound like much but it does make a noticeable noise if you intentionally move the parts yourself. To combat this, we plan to implement some alignment pins/pegs to slot the case parts together and eliminate any lateral movement.
- We have ordered a wireless PCB but it hasn’t arrived yet - we have only tested using a Bastion 60% hotswap PCB so far to great success, but we will add our findings on the wireless testing once we have the PCB in hand.
We’re hoping for some genuine, constructive feedback from this IC so please make your thoughts and suggestions known in the IC form (feedback form here). If any of your feedback seems useful or viable, we will be sure to implement this on the next (and hopefully final) version of the board.
Current specs & features:
- 8 degree typing angle
- 19mm effective front height
- Wireless/bluetooth PCB
- USB 2.0 hub (2 ports)
- 6063 aluminum top/bottom case
- Anodized aluminum inner (2) and outer (2) weights (tested) - other materials and finishes planned
- Bottom mount plate (with poron dampeners)
- Designed by James from AKB
Proposed PCB support:
Hotswap (wireless):
The first PCB prototype we ordered has support for split backspace and split right shift. Currently it doesn’t support stepped caps lock due to the placement of the bluetooth switch, and it is fixed to a 7u bottom row to allow room for the bluetooth module. However, we are currently working on including stepped caps lock and a 6.25u bottom row by moving these components around and seeing what fits. Will update when we have news.
Hotswap (non-wireless):
Includes full/stepped caps lock, full/split backspace, full/split right shift and both 6.25u/7u bottom row options.
Solderable (non-wireless):
Includes all options currently available on our Bastion 60% solderable PCB: full/stepped caps lock, full/split backspace, full/split right shift, ANSI/ISO, 6.25u, 7u & split space bottom row support.
GB plans:
- “None yet” - hopefully this year, subject to interest, but we need to perfect the design first
- Target starting price of $225 or less at 100 MOQ, more details to follow as we progress further through the design phase.
A general meta comment on pricing and how we see Vida’s place in the market:
Many boards by QK, Meletrix, TKD, etc. are able to be sold for relatively lower prices due to the sheer quantity of boards that they can sell. The Chinese market is really big, and they’re able to use their combined audience to commit to buying multiple thousands of units - leading to a really low list price.
For Vida, we’re choosing to target a $225 or less starting price solely based on pricing at a lower MOQ. Depending on interest, we know we can reduce that to $200 or even less - but we’re not willing to risk committing to a lower price yet, before gauging interest first.
If a $225 price turns your “Yes I’m interested in this board” into a “No, I’m not interested in this board”, please let us know! Or even better - let us know how much you’d be willing to pay for a board like this.
Boards that aren’t sold en masse with thousands of units sold are going to have a cost premium compared to the ones that sell at higher volume. But the reason we are still making this specific board is because we think that option and variety are what makes our keyboard hobby interesting.
With that in mind - we’re offering Vida because it’s different from other lower-priced options out there. If the design language, aesthetic, specific featureset, mounting style, or acoustics of Vida speak to you - that’s exactly what we’re going for! We understand that we’ll likely never be able to compete with other brands going for “most features for X dollars” - who also have their own unique design languages - but we still think Vida has something great to offer the community and the hobby.
We’re looking forward to hearing your feedback on this project, so please feel free to let us know on the link above.
