(2024-09-30) It's time to talk about PC input devices
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I'm writing this post using a new mechanical keyboard. The catch is, it costs
much less than my older optomech (A4Tech Bloody B800) and generally is as 
Chinese as it can get, but in fact I like it even more. I'm talking about 
Ziyoulang K68, but that definitely isn't the only thing I'm gonna talk about 
today.

You see, I'd used to be more or less indiscriminate about choosing my
peripherals. Having used membrane keyboards and regular mice for most of my 
life, I can say that they are objectively not as bad as some might think. 
There is, however, a difference between "not bad" and "really good", and the 
difference is huge. So, once I, for example, moved away from mice, touchpads 
and sometimes trackpoints to trackballs, I'm not even thinking anynmore to 
try and go back. Trackballs were the first thing to change my interaction 
with the PC forever. The same holds true when I bought the B800. I just 
don't want to return to other keyboard types after having tried it out and 
extensively using it for several years. I can definitely recommend it for 
whoever wants a full-sizer and doesn't care about RGB, as there only is a 
single backlight color for the entire keyboard.

Why did I switch to the cheapo K68 though (besides just buying it as an extra
to a Data Frog SF2000 and a Miyoo Mini+ that deserves its own dedicated 
post)? Well, two reasons. The first one is that it's fully wireless and can 
support 3 devices at the same time (1 via the dongle and 2 via Bluetooth), 
which is perfect for my "personal nettop + corporate laptop + tablet" 
scenario. The second one is that it's really compact (in the 65% class 
although some folks even put it into the 60%) and takes up much less space 
than the B800 on the table. Moreover, I just wondered how long will a 
Chinese wireless mech keyboard last for such a price, so consider this 
another kind of experimnent. And, despite it lacking the general key 
backlight, I'm pretty liking it with its red Jixian switches. Even though 
that's the first keyboard I've seen in my life that has a dedicated combo 
for locking just the "Win" ("Super") modifier key. What's that for? Who 
knows, who cares... I only have a single thought about it: maybe it's made 
for Faildows-based gamers who are afraid to accidentally press it and have 
the game minimized as the "Start" menu will show up. No other ideas, sorry.

As I said, however, this isn't the only change I've made in my setup, having
also upgraded the trackball itself in a similar fashion: from a brand to a 
noname with more connectivity options. For the recent 2.5 years, my main 
trackball has been a Logitech Ergo M575, a wonderful piece of engineering 
that, nevertheless, had its scrollwheel broken beyond repair within the 
2-year period. For its retail price, I find this unacceptable. So, I have 
upgraded to a Jomaa (aka Jelly Comb) MT50 trackball. This one, despite a 
lesser price, has several advantages over the M575, the most important of 
them being three devices support (again, 1 via the dongle and 2 via 
Bluetooth) instead of just two in the Logitech, a DPI adjustment button and 
a USB-C charging port. Although, I must admit, an option to use an AA 
battery instead also wouldn't hurt. On top of that, the ball itself in the 
MT50 isn't as good as in M575, but the good news is, they are absolutely the 
same size and easily swappable, so that's not a problem at all for me now. 
In fact, I'm running it with the M575's as of the time of writing this post.

Overall, having tested both of these goodies with three aforementioned
devices, I can conclude that they pretty much fit for the job and haven't 
let me down once yet. How long they will last is another question, but I'll 
defintely keep you posted. 

--- Luxferre ---