Great video. As far as the growth of the keyboard hobby, lets not forget that there are also quality board kits that can be had for less than $100 USD. Boards like the Luminkeys are on what I consider the high end of budget keyboards. When I got started in the hobby about 8 months ago, yes I was attracted to boards around the $120 to about the $150 price range. But since I had never built a board, I felt like I wasn´t ready for these boards. So I started on boards like the GMK67, Novice68 and a couple of others, which turned out quite nice BTW. By doing and learning on those builds, now I feel ready to move up to boards like the Lunimkeys 65. The keyboard hobby is definitely growing, you can tell by the fact that even the entry level custom keyboard makers are bringing out new models often. Which is good for the hobby, since they are an inexpensive way to get started and learn, while we move up to the higher end models.

So good to see there is still innovation and growth in the tank!

Love to see you thriving brother.

My first custom was GMK67 (typing this on it now) which I got around a month ago and I still love it. However, as happens to most of us in this hobby I guess my second build is coming in the mail. I went with Monsgeek M7 with GMK Panda keycaps and Boba U4T:s for the switches (GMK 67 has baby kangaroos and I don't think I will be going back to linears after these). GMK67 will remain as my travel/work board since it is so light to carry around and is also wireless. Monsgeek M7 will be my home board which will get the most love in regards to modding in the future. This hobby is awesome!

Great video! Embrace the in stock boards :D Looking forward to see a different LK65 configs, esp with HMX switches

The budget space definitely pushes for more “features” in a board, while lacking in design. Where the designer boards push the actual design forward and lack in features. I think we’re going to start seeing both sectors of the hobby push past those weaknesses until we get another boom again. I am confident this is what we’re going to see.

Disclaimer: I own a kohaku. Having said that, I’ve tried a Luminkey 80 and it is a great value for the price, but if the 65 is of similar quality, I would say it is quite a stretch to compare it to a kohaku.

I started building my own boards sometime in 2017, and there's no denying how the landscape of availability has shaped the hobby's progression (and sales models). Ideally, people these days are following their favorite designers (or brands), as opposed to what's trending. And while the market is certainly oversaturated (for some layouts), ultimately providing more options than ever before, things have stagnated enough that pricing structures will continue to adapt. One can only hope that affordability doesn't compromise the quality some have come to expect with certain materials.

Compared to 5-10 years ago: what would have been considered endgame is now affordable by your average consumer, what would have been considered a high end board is now competitive with gamer keyboards in price, what would have been considered a budget board is being overtaken by relatively cheap aluminum keyboards. You can get a full entry level build now for around $40, with hotswap sockets, and for $5-10 more you can get tri-mode wireless. You can get the GMK67-S (barebones) for $35-40 currently, or the Feker IK65 (prebuilt) for around $60-70, both of which support VIA, and for around $80-90 you can get aluminum now. These are all really competitive against a lot of the gaming marketed keyboards. And now the (entry-level) endgame choices are around $200-250. It just depends on whether you value wireless and/or RGB, or if you want a keyboard that is more of a limited edition piece of furniture than a peripheral. The market is really competitive. You can afford to own a keyboard for every mood.

The QK65 literally changes the whole industry and how we look at keyboard prices nowadays. It's insane how far this hobby had gone and im proud to be in this community

I have the barebones on order in red, can't wait. Sounds really good with no foam as well! Still trying to decide what caps and switches to put on it once it gets here though. If it matches well enough I'll go with GMK Red Samurai if not I'll probably go with WoB or BoW. My preferred typing switch is the WS Heavy Tactiles so that will probably be what I use as it's in the other boards I travel with as well. From your review and knowing that switch my guess is that it will sound fantastic with no foam and GMK caps. Thanks for the review and breaking it out the way you did!

@MakerMods

3 ай бұрын

Great choices! I love the WS heavies, and I’ll see how the red stacks up to GMK red samurai for you when I get home! From memory though I think red samurai is a pretty different shade, but I’m also color deficient so I see shades differently HAHA!

@MarbsMusic

3 ай бұрын

@@MakerMods Now that you mention it I think you are right, the RS is more of a dark red and the gold would clash with the copper. I do have a DCX garnet set but that is on my Jris75 and looks good on it so probably GMK BoW or WoB. I do like the DCX as they are close but there is just a little more texture with GMK, if only they were cheaper, lol!

Idk how accurate it is to say that the hobby has died down. I’d say the main reason for the price dip is simply much more competitors over the years, thus increasing supply.

@MakerMods

3 ай бұрын

I think a lot of the prevailing sentiment is that compared to COVID and shortly post-COVID where there were new keyboard and GMK group buys on seemingly a weekly basis, that aspect of the hobby is much slower these days. To some, the increase in mass produced, in-stock affordable boards that are high quality is seen as a bad thing, aka the hobby is “dying” or at least the enthusiast keyboard space. I think it’s important to consider the nuance; there have always been affordable mechanical keyboards but it wasn’t until recently that affordable mechanical keyboards matched custom mechanical keyboards in feature set and quality. It’s pretty clear that if the hobby was dying down in overall popularity then economics would dictate that competitors would leave the market. So I guess the “Hobby” is different than simply “users of mechanical keyboards” and that’s also a bad thing because gate keeping and hype will only drive people away from using mechanical keyboards!

Great video as always! IMO Keycult price even at retail especially for its low quality powdercoated color really show the concept of house-made doesn't means good as it just kick up the cost as it is produced in USA but the quality is like a mid end keyboard. There is no reason for them to not use Chinese factory other than want to promote about "In-House" production and made from "the USA". Facts from KC TKL No.2 Rev 2 powder white owner 😂

Wait… I had no idea that the Keycult headquarters are just a casual drive from my house. That’s crazy.

Sounds better without foam imo.

i got wrecked by GMK Bingsu and Cw60 too. Tbh not sure which is more egregious- the non stop slurping and backing of Cruelworld by "long tenured reliable community members" or ProjectKeebs liquidating entirely. Really puts a sour taste in my mouth just getting robbed. At least you hopefully dodged Xondat! RIP x60.

@MakerMods

3 ай бұрын

Oof, are we scambros?!! 😭 luckily my 378 actually got delivered, and it’s one of my favorite boards 🥺 tbh I think cruelworld’s situation left a much worse taste in my mouth because from the perspective of someone who might have bought in for their first high end board because of the constant reassurances from “reliable” community members, only to get screwed over, would have made me quit the hobby entirely. The whole situation sucks, and I was able to “fix” my PCB myself, but most people wouldn’t have the ability/tools necessary for a $600 board lol

@tinypickle

3 ай бұрын

@@MakerMods yeah just lies upon lies and almost stifling any dissent in the discord. They even had a channel to spam prayer emojis people were coping so hard. The entire premise for the higher price was also that he had fronted the materials and it'd be done in April and I think maybe it was still months if not a year late

Promo*SM 🏃

I think people really need to calm down with the "the hobby is dying" nonsense. KKB is bringing GMK quality ABS caps to people at a lower price, there are a few great PBT keycap manufacturers in China, there are so many amazing custom keyboards coming out at every price point, and in every layout. And there are plenty of damn good switches at rock bottom prices. How can anyone look at the hobby in its current state and say "it's dying." It just seems like total ignorance when people spout off that nonsense. It obviously sucks that there were vendors that were bad at running a business, but a lot of them closed up shop responsibly too. And there have always been exit scams, for gods sake LZ who was on Team Redline got royally screwed over by the people he was working with and almost got banned from running buys on GH himself too because of the scam they pulled.

A lot of copium have been taken in this video

I highly rate your videos and opinions but I don't fully agree with your take here. Keyboard hobbyists and gamers are being driven further apart not closer together and that is a terminal condition. The hobbyist community apparently doesn't care about important gamer preferences like north facing LEDs, input latency, per-game stored profiles, media keys and BIOS mode. As a result the gamer community (hundreds of millions of potential customers) is looking to Wooting for leadership where the future is optical or magnetic switches. The mechanical keyboard scene has willingly and knowingly failed gamers and that is why it will die.