If you happen to thought the $199 asking worth for a Corsair K100 was bordering on ridiculous, then wait till you see the value of this customized keyboard. The Norbauer Seneca may look unassuming, with its pastel pink, grey, and white keys, and its lack of a numpad, however beneath the keycaps lies a narrative of innovation, and that comes at a worth. In reality, in accordance with Norbauer, the price of the Seneca will begin at round $3,400. Yep, that’s simply the beginning worth.
On condition that you possibly can purchase a complete new gaming PC full of the newest top-end PC gaming {hardware} for that worth, the Seneca is an electro-capacitive keyboard that’s clearly geared toward notably discerning (and wealthy) clients. It could properly find yourself being top-of-the-line keyboards you should purchase, however why does it value a lot cash?
The reply all comes down its growth by unbiased Californian firm Norbauer, run by its namesake, keyboard aficionado Ryan Norbauer. “Sparing no expense, I’ve optimized each nook of the Seneca in ways in which no mass-market electronics product ever would,” says Norbauer on the Seneca product web page.
Norbauer has been making keyboard components for some time, however the Seneca is the corporate’s first try at a complete, “ready-to-type” completed keyboard, and it’s spent a very long time in growth. Norbauer says he spent “three arduous, lively years growing and refining the (now patented) key stabilizer mechanism on the coronary heart of the Seneca,” as a way to make it quieter than the usual stabilizers utilized in most mechanical keyboard designs.
The primary drawback with present keyboard stabilizers, says Norbauer, is that “all of them sound terrible,” and recognized “rattle” and “tick” as the 2 most annoying sounds generated by the stabilizing wire in a normal Cherry stabilizer when it hits or rubs towards the plastic housing.
Norbauer’s resolution to this drawback is an elegant-looking, ground-up design (pictured above), which makes use of a number of pin joints to permit the hinge leaves to maneuver up and down with out making any noise.
The stabilizer isn’t the one customized half within the keyboard both. In reality, Norbauer says the Seneca was “constructed from the bottom up totally out of bespoke Norbauer elements.” You’re not shopping for a mass-produced keyboard constructed from commonplace components right here, however a very customized design for each single half.
The Norbauer Seneca launch date is in Summer season 2024, however if you’d like a customized keyboard that doesn’t value fairly a lot cash, try our information on methods to make a customized keyboard, the place we take you thru the entire course of, together with the components you want.
