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  Fits in nicely with old cassettes and floppy disks. [credit: 8BitDo ]

The Commodore 64 introduced a generation of future computer geeks to personal computing. The 8-bit system first launched in 1982 and was discontinued in 1994. During that time, it made its mark as one of the first and most influential personal computers, and many still remember the computer fondly .

A Commodore 64. (credit: Bill Bertram/Wikimedia Commons )

Gaming peripherals maker 8BitDo wants to bring that nostalgia to people's fingertips and this week announced the Retro Mechanical Keyboard - C64 Edition . 8BitDo is careful not to use the name "Commodore" outright. But with marketing images featuring retro Commodore gear in the background, press materials saying that the keyboard was "inspired by the classics," and certain design cues, the keyboard is clearly a tribute to the '80s keyboard-computer.

8BitDo starts with the sort of beige that you only see on new peripherals these days if the gadgets are trying to appear old. A rainbow stripe runs horizontally and north of the function row, like on Commodore's computer. There's a power button with a bulb popping out of the keyboard case ready to illuminate when it receives the signal.

Enlarge (credit: Aurich Lawson)

Your keyboard is the thread that connects you to your computer. The way a keyboard feels—from the sensations of each key pressing down and resetting to the build of the board’s chassis—has a direct impact on your typing experience, affecting accuracy, speed, and fatigue.

We’ve dug into the joys of quality keyboards and the thrills of customization at Ars Technica before. But what really makes one type of keyboard feel better than another? People say membrane keyboards feel mushy, but why ? And what about keyboards with cult-like followings? What makes decades-old IBM keyboards or expensive Topres so special?

In this guide, we’ll look at how some of the most popular keyboard categories work and how their differences impact typing feel.

Enlarge / Penk Chen's Rasti Computer, built with 3D printing, Framework laptop internals, and a deep love for the first laptop that went to space. (credit: Penk Chen )

If I had to figure out what to do with the insides of a Framework 13 laptop I had lying around after today, I might not turn it into a strange but compelling "Slabtop" this time.

No, I think that, having seen Penk Chen's remarkable project to fit Framework parts into a kind of modern restyling of the Grid Compass laptop, I would have to wait until Chen posts detailed build instructions for this project... and until I had a 3D printer... and could gather the custom mechanical keyboard parts. Sure, that's a lot harder, but it's hard to put a price on drawing unnecessary attention to yourself while you chonk away on your faux-used future laptop.

The Rasti Computer, which Chen writes is "derived from the German compound word 'Rasterrahmen' (grid + framework)," has at its core the mainboard, battery, and antennae from the highly modular and repairable first-generation Framework laptop . It takes input from the custom keyboard Chen designed for the chassis, with custom PCB and 3D-printed keycaps and case. It sends images to a 10.4-inch QLED 1600×720 display , and it all fits inside a bevy of 3D-printed pieces with some fairly standard hex-head bolts. Oh, and the hinges from a 2012 13-inch MacBook pro, though that's possibly negotiable.

Enlarge (credit: Scharon Harding)

When I tell people I prefer using mechanical keyboards , I often hear that they're too expensive. Even people in tech circles have told me they can't find a quality mechanical keyboard for a decent price. Is $28 decent enough for you?

That's how much the Keychron C3 Pro is going for on Amazon right now. It's a sale price that could change, but the keyboard was still only $35 when it released in September . Since September 21, I've been using the budget clacker as my primary keyboard, and it has kept up with my busy workload—writing about 17 articles for Ars Technica and more emails than I care to recount. Expensive mechanical keyboards often come with all sorts of perks worth obsessing over, but the C3 Pro proves that sometimes, cheap is good enough. Mechanical keyboards don't have to be a luxury peripheral.

Meet the C3 Pro

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  The C3 Pro is Keychron's lowest-priced mechanical keyboard. [credit: Scharon Harding ]

Keychron's C3 Pro is a tenkeyless (TKL) mechanical keyboard, so there's no numpad. If you can get past that, you're left with an affordable keyboard offering a typing experience that's superior to any membrane or mechanical keyboard in this price range.

Enlarge / Marcin Wichary's photos of an Olivetti Praxis 48 electric typewriter. (credit: Marcin Wichary)

It's the 150th anniversary of the QWERTY keyboard, and Marcin Wichary has put together the kind of history and celebration this totemic object deserves. Shift Happens is a two-volume, 1,200-plus-page work with more than 1,300 photos, researched over seven years and cast lovingly into type and photo spreads that befit the subject.

You can preorder it now , and orders before October 4 (Wednesday) can still be shipped before Christmas, while orders on October 5 or later will have to wait until December or January. Preorders locked in before Wednesday also get a 160-page "volume of extras."

Wichary, a designer, engineer, and writer who has worked at Google, Medium, and Figma, has been working in public to get people excited about type, fonts, and text design for some time now. He told the Twitter world about his visit to an obscure, magical Spanish typewriter museum in 2016. He put a lot of work into crafting the link underlines at Medium and explaining font fallbacks at Figma . Shift Happens reads and looks like Wichary's chance to tell the bigger story around all the little things that fascinate him and to lock into history all the strange little stories he loves.

Enlarge / Keychron's new C3 Pro mechanical keyboard. (credit: Keychron)

It's not officially autumn, but any parent back to ushering their kid to school before starting their own day of responsibilities will tell you it feels like fall. Alongside the start of school are usually new tech product announcements . This week, I had my eyes on a new smattering of PC keyboards (as you may have heard , I could use an upgrade). But many keyboard announcements felt like more of the same.

Take Logitech's keyboard releases this week. On Tuesday, it announced the G Pro X TKL wireless (dongle, Bluetooth, or wired) mechanical keyboard . It's part of Logitech's high-end series of gaming peripherals, but those accessories tend to appeal to non-gaming power users, too. For example, I've had great success using some of Logitech's gaming keyboards for work, including low-profile ones that helped speed up my typing. That's not what you're getting with the new G Pro X TKL.

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  Logitech's G Pro X TKL in magenta. [credit: Logitech ]

Enlarge / FlatFootFox's TypeBoy with TypePaks installed. (credit: TheStuChef/Reddit )

There's nothing like that burst of anticipation when first sliding a game cartridge into its slot. Who would've thought someone would ever bring that nostalgic, uniquely tactile experience to a wireless mechanical keyboard?

Meet FlatFootFox's TypeBoy . With a name ostensibly nodding at the Game Boy, the wireless, split mechanical keyboard build has more in common with the Game Boy Advance than its purple and gray color scheme.

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  Two TypePaks. [credit: TheStuChef/Reddit ]

I've seen mechanical keyboards that pay homage to classic Nintendo consoles and classic console games . I've even seen keyboards that look like Nintendo consoles . But this is the first time I've seen a mechanical keyboard that requires a Nintendo game cartridge shell and slot to function.

Enlarge / Cherry's new MX2A mechanical switches (from left to right): Red, Blue, Brown, Black, Speed Silver, Silent Red. (credit: Scharon Harding)

For 20 years, Cherry's patent on mechanical switches made it the only player around. That patent's expiration around 2014, though, released the floodgates and allowed countless copycats and switches with varying levels of modification to the cross-stem design to pour in. Typically, consumer choice is a good thing, and there are companies making switches that offer much different (sometimes better) experiences than the switches Cherry makes.

But there are many mechanical switches these days that don't add anything to the market. Some rip off what Cherry already offers with a cheaper price tag or only help mechanical keyboard makers save money by not paying another company for switches.

Seemingly in response, Cherry announced its MX2A series of mechanical switches this week. The new switches are almost identical to the company's MX Red, Silent Red, Blue, Brown, Speed Silver, and Black counterparts. The differences are inside the switches. In most cases, I noticed improvements to the feel of the new switches, but are they enough to warrant the introduction of even more switches and, likely, confusion?

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  The keyboard comes with detachable "Super Buttons." [credit: 8BitDo ]

Iconic, impactful, and unforgettable, the original Nintendo Entertainment System ( NES ) changed the video game industry for good when it came out in the '80s. Originally released as the Family Computer, aka Famicom, in Japan, the landmark console still holds a place in people's hearts, whether it's through cherished maintained consoles, DIY designs , or old-school titles. Now that nostalgia can trickle down to your fingertips, too.

Today, 8BitDo, a gaming peripherals maker with a flair for retro designs, announced via Twitter a mechanical keyboard that will give '80s Nintendo fans the warm fuzzies. 8BitDo, likely aware of Nintendo's stringent legal team, doesn't outright state the keyboard's similarity to the original Nintendo console. And the product's name, Retro Mechanical Keyboard , is vague and unrevealing. But the colors, extra buttons, and color scheme names—N Edition (with NES colors) and Fami Edition (with Famicom colors)—are enough to bring you back to your '80s gaming den.

Both the N and Fami Edition have console-controller-looking "B" and "A" buttons where FN and Menu keys are expected. The keys, as like the rest of the keyboard's keys, are programmable without software or using 8BitDo's Ultimate Software V2.