Classic-TKL mechanical keyboard hands-on: a fantastic newbie DIY package

There’s by no means been a greater time to purchase an off-the-shelf mechanical keyboard. It’s flat-out laborious to beat Keychron for worth, options, and format choices. Iqunix and Lofree are doing attention-grabbing issues with low-profile switches, and Epomaker retains doing Epomaker issues. But there’s nothing like placing a keyboard collectively your self.

The Ikea impact is actual, and package keyboards provide you with far more customization choices than prebuilts, if that’s your factor: you select every thing from the switches and the stabilizers to the keycaps.

And that’s how we arrive on the Classic-TKL, a bare-bones plastic keyboard package designed by Nephlock and accessible right now at NovelKeys that begins at $89 however seems, feels, and sounds significantly better than anticipated for the value. I’ve spent a few week typing on one after I constructed it, and I’m impressed.

The Classic-TKL is a retro-inspired tenkeyless board product of injection-molded plastic. It is available in black, retro beige, and a limited-edition clear, which you’ll be able to see on this construct video by Alexotos:

The excessive brow and title badge above the escape key give it that basic look, however inside, it’s completely fashionable. It has hot-swappable sockets that allow you to simply change switches, full RGB backlighting (which may be turned off), and a not-exactly-retro gentle bar below the navigation cluster. The keymapping and lighting are totally customizable with VIA. It makes use of a gasket mounting system, which implies the PCB is hooked up to the swap plate, which is sandwiched between the highest and backside halves of the case and cushioned with little silicone gasket socks. That prevents plastic-on-plastic resonance and reduces ping, that are sounds most individuals need to keep away from of their keyboards. It additionally ships with plate foam and damping materials on the within of the underside case.

And the bottom of the board, the place it contacts your desk, has a textured silicone damping mat, which additionally helps scale back resonance. 

The package ships with a polycarbonate (PC) swap plate, however NovelKeys additionally sells plates in aluminum, brass, or copper, which change the stiffness of the typing really feel and the sound of the board. You’ll want to offer your individual switches, stabilizers, and keycaps, however that’s not a ding; it’s a possibility to customise. It additionally signifies that an precise Classic-TKL construct prices greater than $89; don’t anticipate to purchase a bare-bones package to save cash until you have already got the opposite stuff. (This construct would value $276.50.)

NovelKeys loaned me a retro beige keyboard package, a set of Typeplus x YIKB stabilizers, HMX Purple Dawn linear switches, and the MTNU Dolch keycap set (which I hope to put in writing about in a future Verge story). 

Assembly is useless easy, particularly in comparison with the Bauer Lite package I purchased lately, which comes with a bunch of fiddly little items — bumpers and gaskets and toes it’s a must to connect your self. The solely tedious a part of the Classic-TKL construct is tuning and putting in the stabilizers, and how tedious that’s depends upon how finicky you might be. I’m medium-finicky, and I saved getting interrupted, so it took me about an hour.

After that, all you do is connect the swap plate to the PCB with a few screws, push the switches into the sockets, sandwich the plate between the 2 halves of the case, screw them collectively, and placed on some keycaps.

I’m positive you could possibly make the Classic-TKL really feel and sound unhealthy. You could make something sound unhealthy in the event you attempt. But the one I constructed has a fantastic, deepish, not-too-quiet sound, as befits a retro board, and it’s a pleasure to kind on even for somebody who normally prefers a 65 p.c board. (Why do I would like a Scroll Lock key?)

I don’t have many gripes with the Classic-TKL. It’s possibly somewhat tall within the entrance, so I wouldn’t use high-profile keycaps like MT3, however MTNU is ideal. It has a retro-appropriate Tsangan backside row, with 1.5u, 1u, 1.5u modifiers, and a 7u house bar; not each keycap base package will include the suitable keys, however most fanatic units will. The Classic-TKL additionally doesn’t have wi-fi, but when I needed to decide between straightforward remapping and wi-fi (which you typically do, for causes that aren’t price entering into), I’d go together with the previous any time. 

It’s not the most affordable good tenkeyless board you may get: the Keychron V3 Max, simply to select one instance, prices $74 bare-bones and contains preinstalled stabilizers and wi-fi connectivity with full remapping. It’s additionally not probably the most period-accurate retro tenkeyless package (that’d be the NCR-80, although from what I hear, it’s fairly hollow-sounding).  

Yet the Classic-TKL is an approachable bare-bones keyboard package with timeless beauty and fashionable facilities, and you may’t go unsuitable with that.

Photography by Nathan Edwards / The Verge

Updated Sept 18, 2024: added hyperlinks to sidebar