Advantage360 (Base Model)

It's been about twenty years since I first used a Kinesis and haven't used one since. For the past 14 months I've been using a Moonlander split keyboard. It's a decent keyboard, but the options for tenting are very poor unless you invest in more hardware purchased from their site. They do offer excellent support, though. I'd had the keyboard for about six months when the right side thumb cluster hinge broke. They sent me a replacement for free. Back to the Kinesis. I write A LOT. I'm a full-time author so I bang out hundreds of thousands of words per year. I'm in my mid-fifties, and fingers and wrist hurt all the time because of poor ergonomics and cheap keyboards. The Kinesis Advantage 360 is kind of amazing. It has true tenting, and the concave nature of the pieces means you can comfortably rest your palms on the outside and only move your fingers. Since I have used a split ortho board for over a year, this was not a huge learning curve. The keys are laid out well, but I had to change a few. I like the CTRL and ALT on the left side on the bottom row. I moved those keys using the ZMK software which is not really friendly. You have to have a Github account, fork builds, and then use the key mapper to generate new firmware. Each piece of the keyboard them must be connected via USB. Copy the corresponding builds to each piece and then swap key caps. I'm happy with the four or five keys I moved and have this looking almost exactly like my Moonlander layout. Bluetooth has worked perfectly on my PC. I've had zero issues so far. I hit a key in the morning and my PC wakes up. I leave the backlighting off. After two weeks of heavy use, the batteries are still going strong without a recharge. I purchased the palm pad separately. Why aren't these included with this very expensive keyboard? Come to find out, they might not be needed depending on your hands. I find them okay, but I will probably switch back to using the palm rests without the pads. They are comfortable and all, but I'm making more typos with them installed. This is a very expensive keyboard, and it will not be for everyone. There is a learning curve. When I initially switched to a Moonlander, my WPM dropped to about five words per minute. I'm a slow and not very accurate typist, but after this short amount of time I'm up to about 70 WPM with a 98% accuracy rate. This is fantastic for my old hands. Overall, this is a technical board that requires an understanding that the interface software is far from user friendly. Remapping keys will be challenging. I find that the key caps get oily from my fingers rather quickly, which is a weird thing to write, but it's true. So far this has not affected my typing, but I feel like I need to wipe them with a cloth a few times a week. Lightly textured key caps would have been perfect on this thing. Even with these negatives, I feel this keyboard beats the Moonlander by a mile. This is a true ergo keyboard and so far I love typing on it. The Gateron brown switches feel really nice. Negatives aside, this is the best keyboard I've ever owned. I look forward to many years with this thing.

This is an excellent product, the build quality aligns with its price and surpasses it. The typing experience is incredible once you get used to it. You can achieve a "flow state" typing that is so pleasant is incredible. Not to mention my wrists pain got away from two weeks of using it. The Bluetooth problems are a thing of the past and the programability is super easy with clique and the latest update which already came with the shipped product from the factory. The pink switches are amazing, I was afraid that they would be too easy to press but they are not.

I purchased the Kinesis Advantage 360 keyboard a few weeks ago, and I am confident that it will be my go-to keyboard for a long time. The keyboard is incredibly comfortable to use, and I was able to easily customize the keys with the Kinesis graphical keymapping tool. Although the build quality is decent, I felt that the default ABS plastic keycaps that came with the purchase were of low quality. Fortunately, replacing them with Kinesis PBT keys made a significant difference. Initially, I had a Bluetooth connection issue, but after troubleshooting, I haven't experienced any problems since. Although the keyboard comes with a higher price tag, I believe that it's worth the investment. If you work on a computer a lot, just like with investing in a high-quality chair, it's essential to prioritize ergonomics and comfort. I recently started feeling a tingling sensation, soreness, and sometimes minor pain in my wrists while typing on a regular keyboard, which led me to research ergonomic keyboards. I'm thrilled that I found the Kinesis Advantage 360 because it has significantly reduced my discomfort and improved my typing experience. But even if you don't have any problems with your wrists/hands, I still think this is a great keyboard to consider. It took me about a week to get used to the keyboard layout, but with daily practice, typing at least thirty minutes to an hour each day, I was able to return to my average typing speed of 90wpm. Three weeks in, I feel like I am in total control of this keyboard, including all the special symbols, without even looking at the keys. I have never felt this level of control with a regular keyboard. While I changed the mapping for the hotkeys, I left the key mapping alone for the majority of the keys. Some of the special symbols, such as equal/plus, back tick/tilde, and curly brackets, were challenging to get used to, but with plenty of practice, I have significantly improved. It's worth noting that it's normal to experience some frustration when using a keyboard like this, but I believe that anyone can come to appreciate it with practice. There is a good chance that you might run into Bluetooth connection issues with this keyboard at some point, but be aware that this is a normal thing for any type of bluetooth electronics. For me, after troubleshooting, the Bluetooth issue has not returned yet, but it is very infrequent and minor enough that the benefits of this keyboard outweigh the potential downsides.

It took me ~ a month to get used to the keyboard, but now I love it. Something that it pushed me to do is to use right fingers to type certain keys. Also I feel a bit more efficient after I started to use VIM motions with the keyboard almost everywhere - magic.

This keyboard is awesome! I've gone through a bunch of other keyboards over the years from cheap Dell ones, Keychron mechanical keyboards (great keyboards for normal layouts), Unicomp IBM Model M and was skeptical at first about this, primarily as I've never touch-typed.. can type fast with numerous fingers but mostly looked at the keyboard. This Kinesis has taught me to touch type too now, within a few weeks. I remapped a few of the keys due to programming needs, but it's so comfy and allows me to sit in a better position. It's not cheap, bit if you're looking for a split ergo keyboard, I'd highly recommend it!

Saved my wrists. Once you get used to it, the strain on your wrists and forearms disappear. A bit pricy but worth it if you type a lot. Would be five stars but it bugs out sometimes, needing to be unplugged and replugged in (macros stop working)

This keyboard is awful. Nearly 1000 dollars and you have to use a janky fork of a GitHub repository to change anything.

Points positifs : - Son poids, oui il est posé sur mon bureau et ne bougera pas de sa position, même si les touches sont massacrées de toutes forces. - La programmation avec l'application SmartSet, pouvoir re-mapper les touches des charactères spéciaux des petits doigts pour les doigts les plus habilles avec le système de couche, c'est excellence. Surtout que la configuration est sauvegardé sur le disque dure du clavier, donc on se retrouve chez soi même si l'on change d'ordi. - Les touches ortholinéaires + le setup concaves et le split, allègent les efforts pour écrire, réduisent les mouvements de bras non nécessaire, maintiennent la bonne position des poignets et bras. L'ergonomie est làlà. - Le feeling du contact avec le plastique, qui vient avec le temps, surtout quand on trouve la bonne position de main. On ne glisse pas. - La documentation, pour le re-mappage des touches, surtout que le logicielle n'est pas nécessaire. On peut le faire directement depuis les fichiers dans le disque dure du clavier. Qui, à mon avis est bien plus simple. - Le changement d'angle est solide et bien stable. - Puis le design. Points négatifs : - n'est pas hotswappable, mais bon... - ça prend quand même de la place sur son bureau, puis pour le déplacer pour le télétravail par exemple... - l'application SmartSet sur MacOs est buggy surtout pour la configuration des macros. Lorsqu'on est en mode re-mappage toutes les LEDs clignotes, on ne voit plus sur quelle couche on est; alors le clique sur la touche n'est pas toujours à celui que l'on pense... mais bon, je préfère utiliser la méthode manuelle : modifier les fichiers comme indiqué dans leur documentation, et on a vite ce que l'on veut. Les difficultés, au début, pour ce genre de clavier sont : - Les touches ortholinéaires : il faut se donner le temps, pour construire sa mémoire musculaire. Il faut juste pratiquer. Sur mon ancien clavier, ferry sweep 2, il m'a fallu 2,5 mois pour retrouver ma vitesse de croissière habituelle. Sur le kenisis, 1 semaine. - La position de sa paume de main : oui, il m' a fallu chercher un moment pour comprendre et donc trouver la position idéal. Le but dans les claviers dit ergo, est que la main elle-même ne bouge pas de sa position. Mon pouce doit toucher la touche la plus haute des touches à pouce et le petit doigt doit toucher aisément la touche la plus haute, opposée, du clavier. Cela donne la position de la paume de main. - Le split : mais bon en même temps on l'achète pour ça non ? Apprendre à taper du clavier, en utilisant la totalité de ces doigts est un game changeur ! De plus les splits keyboards, sont la garantie de ne plus avoir mal aux poigners et au coups... Conclusion : Il m'a fallu au moins une bonne semaine, le temps de retrouver mes marques pour que je puisse enfin dire. Je l'aime ce clavier.