Hands-on with Ursa, a new keycap option for Topre keyboards

Happy Hacking Your keyboard can finally get new uppercase letters.

While regular keyboards suffer from an embarrassment of keyboard options, Topre keyboards are like HHKB or Real Force R3 no. They’ve more or less transitioned to OEM PBT keycaps with dyed legends, in light grey, charcoal, white or (more recently) a few Hotter Options. Something as basic as black keycaps with white legends wasn’t present on the unmodified Topre boards. yet.

I’ve been writing about a near-final set of white-on-black Ursa caps for a few weeks now, and they’re as close to a must-buy for Topre users as any completely optional purchase. The recessed ball caps are comfortable to write on, and the edges are well-defined without being too sharp. There is little texture to the writing surface. The center legends are clear and well aligned, reminiscent of classic SA and DSA keycaps without being identical. The stems in my sample set don’t buckle like other aftermarket caps I’ve tried. The bottom row is fully convex, like the space bar; It’s extraordinarily comfortable and as far as I can tell it’s unique among keyboard profiles in this regard. Everything was very well implemented.

It has been used on Leopold FC660C Because that’s what I have; You can see it on the most popular Happy Hacking keyboard In Lightning Keyboards. The legends on the white-on-black keycaps will be a little brighter than those on my samples, according to FKCaps’ Simone Tarchichi, but they’re otherwise identical to the final versions, which I’ll get when my pre-order arrives.

the Ursa keycaps available In cream and grey, in black with white legends (with optional red or blue modifier switches), and in a limited edition vintage-inspired brown, green and cream finish. There are also blank versions in classic and black colors.

Add-on prices are the same as during group purchases. It will cost $80 to cover the HHKB, or $120 for a full-size or keyless panel. (You can get a full-size set of blanks for $60 if you don’t need the legends.) There’s also a new $8 set, in red or blue, with only the Escape and Enter keys. The Minicom color is a limited edition, and Tarchichi told me it won’t be restocked, but the company plans to keep other colors available, and release new variants in the future, so don’t worry if you miss out on the extras.

I’m a big fan of Topre keyboards, and it’s great to have a high-quality, affordable keycap option that doesn’t involve disassembling your keyboard to make it MX compatible. (Although This is also getting better and less expensive in the very near future). As I said when the group purchase was launched, I will not be asking you to buy these keycaps. But I did.