Take care of your wrists
Key Takeaways
Clicky keyboards are hot.
They look cool, they sound great, and theyre a lot of fun to use.
Ive owned or reviewed plenty of them, and I still keep a few under the couch.
Charlie Sorrel / Lifewire
But I rarely dig them out anymore, because theyre just too painful.
What is a Mechanical Keyboard?
Picture a computer from the 1980s, or an electric typewriter like the IBM Selectric from the 1960s.
Charlie Sorrel / Lifewire
Those keycaps can also be pulled off and replaced.
Ergonomics
The keys take a little getting used to.
The first few days can be frustrating.
Charlie Sorrel / Lifewire
If you ever swapped your mouse or trackpad to your non-dominant hand, this feels the same.
The discomfort is in the head, not the fingers.
But persevere and it will seem quite comfortable.
It all depends on your own setup, and the state of your carpal tunnels.
Mine arent happy with an extended use of clicky keys.
But more pressing than the keys, themselves, are the ergonomics of the keyboard as a unit.
I find they are, almost universally, too tall.
I opted for the latter, but its still too high with some keyboards.
Expensive Habit
The other downside of mechanical keyboards is theyre expensive.
Im using my trustyFilco Majestouch 2, which I really love.
That may be a mechanical model, but it might equally be a simple modern keyboard.
