The Best Thing I Bought This Year: A Portable Mechanical Keyboard

A keyboard cleanable for barside writing.

As a writer, I return nan devices of my waste and acquisition comparatively seriously. I’m not crazy capable to driblet $3,600 connected a keyboard, but I besides find typing connected a MacBook for extended periods of clip profoundly unsatisfying — and distracting. So this spring, I started looking into distraction-free penning setups, which included an e-reader / writer and a mechanical keyboard. 

I started with the Boox Palma 2 because its E Ink surface and constricted connectivity could make it a coagulated distraction-free solution if paired pinch a bully keyboard. After a batch of research, nan keyboard I settled connected was nan NuPhy Air60 V2, pinch nan company’s heaviest tactile Moss switches and nan gorgeous NuFolio lawsuit successful “nostalgic tan,” which is really much of a bold yellow. 

Now, I americium nary connoisseur of mechanical keyboards, but I find nan Air60 V2 to beryllium delightful to type on. Its low-profile keys don’t person nan aforesaid recreation and feedback arsenic my regular keyboard aliases my vintage IBM Model M, but it is still an tremendous betterment complete my MacBook’s scissor move keyboard. The Moss switches connection decent-enough thock, but they’re not truthful large that I would debar utilizing nan keyboard successful public. It mightiness beryllium a spot overmuch for a quiet cafe, but I’ve sat and worked connected articles and short stories while seated astatine a barroom and decidedly didn’t consciousness self-conscious astir it.

The expertise to brace it pinch 3 devices intends I tin move nan NuPhy betwixt my individual laptop, my activity laptop, and nan Boox pinch ease. It besides comes pinch a 2.4GHz wireless dongle, but I’ve had small request for it.

I often bring nan Air60 pinch maine to get immoderate penning done connected quiet nights erstwhile I’m bartending. (Come spot maine astatine Flagship Brewery Tuesdays and Thursdays.) If I request to usage my laptop, nan Air60 is designed to fresh perfectly complete a MacBook keyboard while leaving easy entree to nan trackpad. But much often I’ll bring nan Palma 2. The NuFolio acts arsenic a guidelines arsenic good arsenic a keyboard cover, and nan Palma’s flip lawsuit hangs perfectly complete nan top, creating a bully small self-contained penning setup that is perfect erstwhile I don’t want (or need) entree to nan internet. 

I moreover move to it astatine location sometimes. When I decided to commencement penning fabrication again for nan first clip successful astir 20 years, I installed Obsidian connected nan Palma and, paired pinch nan Air60, it became my go-to. As personification who often relies connected timers to enactment connected task, I recovered nan NuPhy and Palma a panacea for my attraction struggles. Part of that is because I really look guardant to typing connected nan Air60. The feel, nan sound, moreover nan colour strategy are each profoundly satisfying successful a measurement that nary laptop keyboard could ever be.

It’s not a cleanable solution. The 64-key layout is awesome for portability, but it tin beryllium a spot cramped — I make a fewer much errors typing connected nan Air60 than I do connected a much generous keyboard. And its shallow perspective tin beryllium a spot uncomfortable for extended periods of sitting astatine a desk. But it’s really cleanable pinch a opinionated table (or a bar) aliases moreover while resting successful your lap.

I wasn’t judge that nan NuPhy was going to beryllium a wise usage of my constricted costs erstwhile I bought it earlier this twelvemonth (I was conscionable complete a twelvemonth heavy into unemployment and relying connected diminishing freelance assignments). But 9 months later, it’s go an indispensable portion of my penning routine.