Hi, this is Wayne again with a topic “The best keyboard I’m not switching to – Kinesis Advantage360”.
Veteran viewers know that I have a bit of a history with ergonomic keyboards, but it all started with the Kinesis Advantage. 2. This is the advantage 360 professional there’s, also a nonprofessional which is basically a souped up version of that same keyboard. I saw back then so. The question is: what’s new, what does it come with and will I switch to it? I do currently use and have used for several years, a similar but different ergonomic keyboard inside the box.
We have two key modules with bubble: wrap for the children as well as a box of accessories. You get a key cap puller, but not a key switch puller more on that later, you get a USB, a Toc cable for connecting the keyboard to your PC. They even have Advantage 360 branded. Cable ties, pretty cool, maybe 6 ft long, I’m not 6 ft tall.
So you know I can’t grab that wide, a bridge connector, basically a piece of plastic: it’s has 360 on it and it holds the two key modules together. More on that later, some extra key caps with this model – these are shine through ABS caps on the nonprofessional they’re, actually uh double shot, PBT caps, weird that you get different key caps, but that’s what the $ 30 difference gets. You baby and a quick start guide. Let’S look at the modules, don’t give these to your kids to play with, but they’re so fun. These are so awesome. They have a great weight to them them. They have very high quality Plastics.
They don’t feel 3D printed at all like they look pretty modern. I remember the advantage too was like had a great ergonomic Innovations, but it’s kind of just a weird like 80s feeling keyboard, even though it wasn’t, but this is nice now, let’s talk about the features, first of all, it’s split, and that gives you a lot of Flexibility, because you can put it them close together, you can put them far apart, and this allows you to have whatever kind of ergonomic setup for your shoulders that you need. So you can turn them like that and have it like that, which is nice and that’s going to reduce, what’s called allner deviation, which is when your hands go like this. If you’re, like squished in on a Cordy keyboard kind of like that with a split keyboard, you can tilt them in put your elbows on the table. That’S great! It also gives you the freedom to put your mouse where you want believe it or not.
Some people may choose to spread the modules like this and put the mouse in the middle, and what that does is it prevents them from reaching way over here for Mouse which can cause shoulder and neck strain? That’S the name of the game ergonomics we’re trying to reduce, prevent or heal from repetitive stress injuries and there’s a few different ways you can get them all deviation shoulder strain. Another way you can develop an RSI is from having too much wrist extension. This is flexion. This is extension and that hurts and normally it’s because your hands are on your desk.
If your keyboard has those little legs on the back that make it tilt up, I used to always use those, but once I got educated, I stopped cuz. That’S extension. These you have the option of extending your wrist, because the wrist pad is built onto the key module itself. It just like forces, you look how neutral my wrist? Is there it’s just straight and not only that they sell an optional sold separately accessory for $ 25 and it’s attaches on with magnets? It’S so awesome and Slick, it’s very cushy and plush, and I actually recommend getting it if you’re in the market for this keyboard.
I probably would get the wrist pads they’re awesome. The next thing is pronation, which is when your hands are like this, the two bones in your arm, the radius and they all that they scissor and they pinch tissue. This is the one that I feel the most, and this is also the the way that this keyboard has improved for probably the most like I’ve used keyboards from urgod do, which are really cool, but their tenting system is so much more finicky. You got these little legs kicking off every direction that you turn and tighten, but on these they just have this one big stand with a button under it and what that allows you to do. Is you you to press the button and you can increase the angle or lower it just like that? There’S only one dimension to it. You you know, the extra Jank of the ergod dox allows you to put all sorts of different angles, but this is just up and down this way, which is UN pronating your arms unpinch that tissue, so I would probably tent it to the max look. That looks cool.
This has a cool profile if you guys could see what I see from this way like it’s neat and finally, what’s the deal with these contoured key Wells? Well, that is because your fingers don’t have to sit on the keyboard like that. They get to rest in a natural state like this, and not only that look how look at the variation in the key Heights. What they’re trying to do there is have it so that the keys are at a consistent distance from your finger as it sweeps in its range of motion.
It should be able to touch all those keys they’re. All right there see like this number key is farther away, but it’s also sticking out more, so my finger doesn’t have to reach AC crazy amount to get to it. It’S just awesome. They thought it through if you’re someone who’s suffering from an RSI or trying to prevent one, and that is your number one thing.
This is probably, or at least this brand is probably the Ergo keyboard to go with. They’Ve really thought it through, but that doesn’t mean I don’t have problems with it which we’ll get to in a bit. But first thanks to ug green for sponsoring. This video meet the revvo do Max 213, a 13 And1 connectivity solution with 13 ports, including USBC, an SD card reader and a 2 .5 GB ethernut Port. It’S a great companion for any workflow, its two Thunderbolt 4 ports. Let you enjoy blazing fast file transfers at 40, GB per second, along with stunning 8K or dual 4K 60 HZ display options. You can even keep your devices powered up with 90 wats fast charging universally compatible with major Apple windows and tablet devices. The revok max 213 is built to increase productivity, no matter what setup you have get yours today at the link below.
Let’S continue the Journey of Discovery here, you can see there’s a power on switch for each one, there’s also a USBC port for each one. If you’re wondering what that bridge accessory does, I think if you click it onto the tin boom and then you’ve just got one unit, that’s pretty cool, but I like it to be a little turned in, so I probably wouldn’t use this keyboard does not come with A dongle, it’s Bluetooth, which is okay. I do like to have a dongle, a little lower, latency and just kind of simpler setup. Just leave that thing in your computer.
The keyboard is available with multiple different switch types from the store, however they’re, not hot swappable, which is sad, you can’t put any key switch you want on here. You do have a little bit of a selection, these ones that comes with these Browns they’re, not Cherry MX, Browns, they’re, Gaton Browns. It’S one of those things. These keyboards uro keyboards often have a hefty price tag, and you kind of just wish that you got everything under the sun for that price like and hot swappable key switches is just cool to have and if I’m spending so much for a keyboard, it’d be nice. For it to be not just my Ergo keyboard, but also my Enthusiast keyboard, like let me put freaking pandas in here, but alas, I would say that’s a through line of my criticisms for this thing. Overall, during filming Kinesis added the advantage 360 signature to their lineup, where an aftermarket Outfitter called upgrad keyboards.com will build you a 360 or 360 pro with purportedly any switch.
You want and cool other upgrades as long as you’re willing to wait up to 6 months. One thing that I love to have in an ergonomic keyboard is thumb clusters, which is what you have here. Their philosophy at Kinesis is why let your little pinky do so much heavy lifting on a keyboard when your thumbs are way stronger, stronger. Let them do repetitive tasks like space bar back space Delete and why not Chuck, in some other lesser known, Keys, like page and up and home and end. I really like that approach. I will not use an ergo keyboard that doesn’t have thumb clusters, it’s just so sweet the keyboard that I have at my desk.
I personally use space and backspace and Delete and Enter all on my thumbs and having backspace in particular, on the thumb rather than I used to use my pinky up here like reaching over there uh so much better, highly recommend. However, you will see that there’s other elements of this keyboard layout that are non-standard, for example, where’s the caps lock button. Is it right here beside a no that’s escape? The philosophy of Kinesis is like they’re trying to make the most ergonomic keyboard possible.
They want to have everything within reach of of the home row and, if there’s keys that are not within reach, then they go on to a second layer. You hit some key press and then you’re on a layer that has all your numpad, for example. If I show you the K, key, there’s a second Legend on the bottom of it, indicating that it’s the number five, which is super cool, got your F keys on a layer underneath the number keys and that’s all gravy. If you get used to it, I don’t want to get used to it. I never ever want to switch layers. I want more keys um and that’s because I don’t have an RSI, I’m using ergonomic keyboards to prevent rsis and because I don’t actually have an injury.
I’M willing to like sacrifice some ergonomics for extra productivity um, so my reference would be if they made a. I would love for them to make a keyboard that also had F Keys up here and just maybe just a couple more keys, so they don’t have to do things like move Escape down to over here and caps over here. What were they thinking, and I hate these arrow keys that are divided? You see they got you’re supposed to go way down here and use these fingers for the left and right arrows and use your whole other hand for the up and down arrows. I don’t like that. I want to see all the arrows in a normal cluster in a normal orientation, because you spend years working in retail, getting muscle memory for the arrow keys gaming, getting muscle memory for the arrow keys to relearn stuff, like that is brutal in the case of hotkeys.
I want to use the same muscle memory I already use on my laptop, which I might be using. While I also have this keyboard in my life, you know we’re Multi-Device people, you got to switch between and I have no problem. Switching between ortholinear keyboards, like this. With the up and down keys and using my thumbs and then going to my laptop, it’s different enough that I actually don’t have a problem.
Switching between, but switching the muscle, memory of hot Keys is a big deal. So why not just reprogram the keyboard? That’S easy to do on most keyboards right. Indeed, you are right, except for this keyboard, this specific keyboard. If you get the advantage 360 nonpr, that’s a USB version.
You plug that puppy in it actually has a different and much easier to use keyboard. Reprogramming software. With this particular Pro board, they’re, like hey you’re, a pro uh you’re such a pro that instead of having a nice gooey um, that’s just like on our website for you to reprogram your keyboard like a ergodox. Might you actually have to go to their GitHub and Fork their GitHub in order to reprogram this thing, which is doable and they have an instruction guide on how to do it? It’S just not like.
I just don’t get it. On the one hand, is there customer people who are like are not keyboard enthusiasts, but just need ergonomic keyboards to service their injuries. If it is, why are you expecting those people to go and be power users on your git repository? That’S two different users. I don’t get it.
I think that all their keyboard should have easy, remapping um, since it’s so important on a on a smaller non-standard layout, where you’re going to want to customize it your way, especially with thumb clusters, make it easy for us guys. Another issue I have is that it’s not RGB um seems like a stupid thing. Again, it’s an ergo keyboard. Why does it need it? It does have a backlight on on the pro model. There is a global white backlight, which you can turn up and down. You hold down the mod button and arrow down and up you see that going off and on y I can see it up here, but why not have that RGB for a price of $ 480? What, yes, it’s $ 480! The non-pro model is $ 450.
So that’s my thing: you guys it’s very expensive and you can’t put a price on health and that’s their aim is solving your health problems. It’S almost a medical device. You can probably write it off, so it’s cool. I just wish it was be. It went beyond that and could be also my Enthusiast keyboard so for those prices like yeah, throw in some RGB and like cuz, why not it’s cool that you can have five different profiles for attaching Bluetooth. It’S cool that there’s multiple layers of keyboard. Um profiles, you can connect to it or program into it Beyond just the standard three uh profiles that are included. It’S cool that it has this easy to use tenting system and it’s cool that it’s like the most ergonomic thing ever, but I just wish they had like a a middle ground keyboard that had all these benefits, but just like an extra row keysys over here.
Maybe some macro keys on the side and and let every user have the cheap and easy non power user reprogram ability. And then it would be my perfect keyboard and I would put it on my desk. But until that day, I’m stuck using the truly ergonomic cleave keyboard with its Optical switches, and you know it’s flat it it’s it’s, not everything I want. I want it plus this smashed together and like an external keypad, I’d, probably put like a little keypad in the middle here or something like that, but anyways thanks for watching guys. If you like this video, maybe go down memory lane and check out all the other.
Weird uro keyboards we’ve covered over the years. .