Dynacap turned my favorite mechanical keyboard into an electrical capacitive one

For my money, you simply can’t get a better electric capacitive keyboard than the Bauer Lite with the DynaCap array.

You can get More beautiful EC keyboard, without having to build it yourself, simple Spend $3,600 on a Norbauer Seneca. Or you can get Happy hacking keyboard Or a reelforce For south of $300, and also without having to build it yourself, with the original Topre switches, Bluetooth if you want it, and decent – but not great – remapping ability.

Or, for about $250, a set of keycaps, and a couple of hours of assembly, you can design a Power lite in Any of a zillion color combinations And use DynaCap Parts to convert it inside A fully remappable EC keyboard that looks and feels like a Topre while still being compatible with the wide world of aftermarket keycaps. Doesn’t that look nice?

DynaCap It is a system of Topre compatible external parts Kipps is smart Which makes it (relatively) easy and cheap to create new capacitive electrical keyboards, convert an existing mechanical keyboard to EC, or modify a Topre to use standard keycaps. The complete DynaCap kit consists of sliders, housings, stabilizers, domes, springs, silencer rings, and panel gaskets (only required if you are converting a Topre panel). All you need is a PCB and a compatible switch board to convert any mechanical keyboard into an electrical capacitive board that works with MX keycaps.

Stop me if you’ve heard this part before. Topre keyboards reign supreme because their capacitive keys give them an unmatched heavy tactile bump that you can’t get anywhere else. Unfortunately, there are only a few actual Topre keyboards still in production, in only four layouts: Full size,TKL, 75 percent new non-standard boardand Happy hacking keyboard. With the exception of a couple of Realforce gaming keyboards, they’re not compatible with the MX mounting pattern that almost every switchgear ever used. This is a big problem that a few people face, and some of them have tried to solve it.

It’s not as simple as just switching the sliders from Topre to MX. MX compatible keycaps are designed to fit Cherry-MX style caps; If you use MX sliders on Topre housings, some of the keycap profiles in some rows will hit the housings on the way down. Ryan Norbauer and Clever also redesigned their switch housings to accommodate it. The Norbauer is radically different to the point where it’s not compatible with Topre keyboards, but that’s controversial because you can only get it on a Norbauer board. See above re: $3600.

On the other hand, DynaCap parts are available upon request and are compatible with Topre parts. DynaCap sliders fit Topre shells and vice versa; DynaCap domes and springs work with Topre plates and vice versa. If you just want to make the Topre board work with MX keycaps, you only need the sliders, squelch rings (optional) and housing gaskets and housings (unless you’re converting a board with a built-in keyboard).

But the real magic comes from owning the complete set. coupled with PCB And for the keyboard, you can use DynaCap to turn a keyboard designed for MX switches into one that looks a lot like the Topre, and even better in some ways. DynaCap works with keyboard resellers to sell DynaPaks—kits that include all the parts needed to transform your keyboard—and many upcoming keyboard kit purchases include DynaCap options.

The DynaCap system was designed by Kipps is smartmanufactured and sold through Comprehensive typeand one of the first DynaPaks available is Omnitype’s Bauer Lite keyboard. This is very convenient for me. I own a Powerlite. I love Powerlite. It’s a 65 percent keyboard combo with a ton of different transparent color combinations and a design that combines the best features of the Happy Hacking Keyboard and the beloved and now discontinued Leopold FC660C: split backspace and Arrow keys. And now, with DynaCap, you can also feel like these are two Topre keyboards.

If you don’t already have a Bauer Lite, you can configure one using a DynaCap board and PCB in Design laboratory For $135.99 and up, depending on other options, add $121.50 60/65% DynaCap package For the rest of the parts (make sure you select the 7u mounting wire option). If you already have Bauer Lite, you can get… Complete conversion kit With a board and PCB for under $200, which is what I did.

Converting a Bauer Lite to a DynaCap was not complicated, although it was a bit tedious. I unscrewed the four screws on the bottom of the chassis, removed the top cover, disconnected the JST cable, and the entire board, PCB, switch, and keycap sandwich came out in one piece.

After that, it was a simple matter of installing the switch housings into the DynaCap plate, adding silencer rings to each slider, lubricating the slider rods on each housing with one type of lubricant, using a thicker lubricant on the housings and mounting wire clamps, dropping the sliders into the housings, placing the domes on the sliders, putting the springs in a bag with a few drops of oil and shaking them (you can skip this part if you get coated springs in gold), which results in the desperate disengagement of the springs from the bag into a box and then shaking it Which Until enough springs are separated from the block, place the springs into the undersides of the domes one by one, carefully position the PCB over the entire assembly, and secure with dozens of screws to ensure even pressure. Then I put everything upside down in the upper chassis, reconnected the subpanel cable, connected the bottom, and replaced those four screws. Then, all I had to do was install some keycaps, plug the keyboard into the computer, and open it up viacalibrate each key by placing it below it, applying my preferred keymap, and adjusting the RGB bottom lighting (obviously).

If you’ve never designed a keyboard before, you might ask yourself: why bother? Great question. It’s more effort than I put into my mechanical keyboard designs; There, I just lubricate the fasteners and stop there. But it is not a lot More effort. Lubricating electrical switch sliders is easier than breaking open mechanical switches.

But here’s why: I’ve been using mechanical keyboards since 2009, and I’ve had a Topre capacitive keyboard since 2017. I’ve spent a lot of that time trying to find switches that would make my mechanical keyboards feel more like Topre; I purchased a third party controller for my Topre board to make it resettable like a mechanical board.

DynaCap is not Topre. The mid-weight DynaCap domes in my Bauer Lite feel lighter than the 45-gram Topre domes in my new HHKB review unit, and significantly lighter than the eight-year-old domes in my Leopold board. I don’t have the $3,600 Seneca review unit anymore, so I can’t compare that. But I don’t need the DynaCap to be Topre; I have a Topre panel for that.

DynaCap brings Feels good about being alone with a rubber cup To my favorite keyboard other than the Topre, this is exactly what I wanted.

Photography by Nathan Edwards/The Verge Except where noted.