Okay, so I’m just starting out into the world of building keyboards and I was wondering if anyone with actual experience could give me any advice on where to buy parts. I was also partially wondering about the credibly of Gateron and KBDfans, if anyone could help that would be great.
Videos
This is not to hate on KBDfans, just don't do what I did.
Anyways my first keyboard was the now discontinued tofu65 2.0 for like 240 Ish dollars (pre-built and costed a fortune for me). My friends told me it was really good and I was new to keyboard, so I got it. Let me just say, for 240 dollars you could of got you like a really well built keyboard if you had the time. Moving on, when I got this keyboard a couple of weeks later, I was mad disappointed, tried every mod and new key caps (could not hot swap cuz it was soldered), but it just was really mid for $240.
Also, I went to Shenzhen city in China, where the digital malls were at and found people selling them for like half the cost but unbranded. Also pretty sure KBDfans is based in China and they just overprice it for the international shipping.
I just wanted to give a shout out to KBDFan's I placed two orders with them! One thought there website directly One thought Aliexpress I just got my second order today and am very pleased.
These where the first 2 times ordered anything from China and was a bit nervous but they where extremely helpful! They where ultra fast to answer questions. They got the product's shipped quickly! very very pleased. I just thought I would mention it. I won't hesitate to do business with them in the future.
Also worth mentioning there Aliexpress store seems to have even greater selection of items then there website directly.
Can confirm. KBDfans is (are?) awesome - great products and excellent customer service (in my experience, at least).
I've spoken to them before and they even told me about how they try really hard not to copy anyone else's work because they know users/enthusiasts here in "The West" (EU, NA, etc.) value originality and hate plagiarism or blatant intellectual theft.
They were pretty sad that sales for their "Sad Train" (☞ﾟヮﾟ)☞ ☜(ﾟヮﾟ☜) all-over dyesub PBT weren't as good as they'd hoped, especially since they hired a designer to pick the colors and work on it. I showed them a few of the most popular sets of 2016-2017 - GMK Yuri, GMK/SA Oblivion, SA/DSA Hyperfuse, GMK Muted, XDA Canvas, etc. - and they sighed, "Yea, we know.. but we have to be super careful not to make anything that even closely resembles any of those because people will call us copycats/thieves."
My respect for them shot up tenfold after that conversation. Really explains why the TINA has such a ridiculous bottom half and why the DDMicro/DDNano features those crazy corners and angles on all sides of the case (to separate those two from the Viper and Fjell respectively).
I understand there's some drama regarding the PCB for the NIU Mini (allegedly stolen from mechkeys.ca) but the board looks nothing like the Mechmini 1 or 2. Not sure what happened behind the scenes, but I doubt KBDfans intenionally tried to rip off somebody else's work because it just doesn't seem consistent at all with KBDfans' direction as a company. I mean.. they're the first major Chinese vendor to move all of their stuff over to the open source QMK (later revisions of the KBD75, TINA/DZ60, NIU Mini, etc.) out of respect for Winkeyless and his Bootmapper client.
The rate they've been releasing brand new stuff has been insane too! Instead of just running GB after GB of SA or GMK keycaps or selling popular and proven keyboards over and over and over again (maybe funding innovation every once in a while before locking the creators from selling/distributing their own work), they try to keep it fresh with all sorts of fun and novel stuff (e.g.: Space Invaders Topre PBT Dyesub keycaps).
And of course, their prices are reasonable. Really hope they stick around and keep up the good work.
Funny story: They randomly asked me whether Arabic is "religious." Super confused, I asked why and whether I'm understanding them correctly. They said their Arabic PBT dyesub GB wasn't doing so well and was wondering if it's because of the growing anti-Muslim sentiment in the US and whether they should pull it from the store before offending/alienating US customers.
:(
My only regret in this hobby is not finding out about them sooner. Fast shipping, great quality, and amazing prices.
Hi Everyone, last month I made my first major purchase from KBDFans, and I wanted to warn everyone about their quality standards. I bought a D65 from them with a gift card I (happily) received for Christmas. Came to about $285 overall. Less than half the cost of a Cyberboard, but not chump change either. It arrived quickly and the package was in great shape. When I opened the packaging, I noticed a screw floating around in there. I didn't think anything of it at the time. Just figured it had fallen out of one of the bags of hardware that came with the kit. The case and everything was in great shape, and I loved the red anodized color.
When unscrewing the case in order to put the pcb/plate assembly in, I found that the screws were extremely tight and required a lot of force to remove, making a nasty squealing sound when coming loose. When putting it back together, I noticed that one of the screws just seemed to turn and turn with no resistance whatsoever. My guess is that, whoever put the two pieces of case together before packaging the board over-tightened all of the screws, and one of the screws to the point that the case threads were stripped. When I flipped the board back over, the non-tightening screw fell right out. I tried another screw that worked fine in the other holes, but it just turned like the other screw had. So I contacted KBDFans.
It seemed obvious to me that a company that caters to this hobby and which is reasonably respected would consider a stripped screw hole to be beneath their standards of quality. I wouldn't buy a B or even C stock board with a stripped screw hole in the case. But they just kept asking me to send different videos and pictures, saying that they needed to prove the problem to their manufacturer. Finally, after five or six rounds, I just asked them flat out if any of this would lead to me receiving a replacement case piece. Their response was simply, "Sorry, this is not covered under warranty." I guess they had been asking for pictures and videos in hopes that I would just give up and go away.
I don't know if anyone else has had such a disappointing experience with KBDFans, but I thought that the community should know that their standards of quality are very low. If you buy a board from them, and it arrives defective or damaged, they will not help you. I would recommend caution in buying from them, especially if it's one of their own branded products.
Edit: Please let me know if you think I'm overreacting. Would you be okay with a board that was sent to you with a stripped screw hole?
Edit 2: I don't mean to suggest that KBDFans is a bad company. It's been suggested that my thread title is too much, and I get that. I spend a lot of time on Reddit and Discord, and I haven't heard anything negative about KBDFans before. I just wanted to say that it seems like, if you're unlucky enough to get an item with a problem from them, you might be stuck with it.
This is not a conventional review of a product per se. It is a review of the customer service provided by KBDFans.
To start off I can never go with a normal keyboard again and have been using the same tofu96 since I bought it second hand in 3 years ago. Ever since a nice user named elvin sold me his tofu96 with holy yok pandas I’ve been in love with custom keyboards. Especially those with numpads.
Now I understand some may like the minimalist 40%-60% approach, I love my numpad. When I spilled ginger ale on my board last night and it started throwing random characters when typing in succession after thoroughly drying it off I was gutted to say the least. I was frantically trying to fry it off and as I type this it’s still sitting in rice.
In a last ditch effort before going second hand again and buying a 2nd hand tofu96 again I reached out to KBDfans-Jennifer as stated to on the Kbdfans discord. I begged her to see if I could send it in as a repair.
SHE DID ONE BETTER.
She stated their were two pcb’s left in stock (probably the only two left in the world) and that if I provided my email and added myself to the notify me list on the link provided she would open it for purchase for me as a replacement.
It didn’t stop there.
Me not being the most knowledgeable about the actual building of a mechanical keyboard, I didn’t know exactly what parts would be needed and I didn’t know what was best. She then sent me MULTIPLE links to every product I’d need to do a full pcb swap, showed me how I could purchase everything including switches, film/lubing service, PC plate, and more so that it could be shipped fully assembled and they’d include additional case screws to remount it.
I then asked one of the most daunting questions, what was the lead time of something like this to be built and shipped. Her answer “1 - 2 BUSINESS DAYS”.
This has by far been the most amazing customer service I’ve received and will now be purchasing two more 65% boards as gifts and recommending them to every person in my 100+ user office.
I am writing this as a thank you to KBDfans. I didn’t know how to say thank you more than the 20+ times I said it directly to Jennifer.
It is rare to find a company with the success Kbdfans has show any real human like traits to someone who purchased something second hand 3 years ago. Kbdfans has a customer for life now and is a model for how customer support should be done and how customers should be treated.
Thank you KBDfans and thank you Jennifer, you’ve made my holiday and restored my faith in small to mid size businesses.
EDIT: my order was placed at 8:01pm 12/19 and it is currently 11:20 12/20 and DHL has my package. Not just a label created but they have my package and it is in transit. A FULL BUILD (minus 8 screws) stripped, built and shipped in 27 hours.
EDIT #2: As the situation has played out. I broke my pcb at 6pm on 12/19 and by 12/27 I will have a brand new, spec’d pcb with switches and all the extras. To put that in perspective in just 8 days they were able to source, build, ship and, deliver a replacement. FROM CHINA TO THE USA. Amazing to say the least.
EDIT #3: Will post update with pics when I receive the new pcb on the 27th. Also Jennifer is very grateful for the kind words everyone has shared!
EDIT #4 BIG NEWS: Currently writing this on the new board it came in 4 days early and man r silent ink's different. Thanks again to everyone at kbd. Ordered on the 19th (china) arrived in the usa and in my board by the 23rd. INSANE
After several expansions, I had promised myself not to buy any more keyboards… that didn’t work out.
I couldn’t resist buying the KBDFans Agar. The keyboard has an HHKB layout.
I went with:
Anodized Black (hotswap)
Alu black plate
Typeplus x YIKB screw-in stabilizers
HMX Sonja switches
GMK CYL Oblivion V3.1 keycaps
No foam
I normally use a Neo75CU most of the time, but I have to say the Agar might actually feel and sound even better.
Though I do really need to get used to the HHKB layout.
The keyboard isn’t wireless (I left the cable out for the photos).
TLDR:
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looking at either KBD75 v2 or v3 fully assembled’s - tray mount or top mount? (never soldered anything in my life)
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Any alternatives? Is Tofu84 75%?
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No idea which switches I want (only used cherry mix red and silver)
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layout (ISO etc?)
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with our without keycap option?
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any additional service worth purchasing etc
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not trying to break the bank, looking for low-mid range to ship to the UK.
Hello all,
as the title says, I’m in need of some (quite a lot) of advice for my intended KBD75 purchase.
I’ve had 2 mechanical keyboards in the past which were Corsair K65 TKL with cherry mx red and silver.
I want to downsize to a 75% board to compact things as much as possible while retaining the f and arrow keys.
Now I don’t want to break the bank, looking at low-mid range and just need help deciding whether to go for the v2 or v3, suggestions for switches as there are so many options (I liked the cherry mx reds) , preferred layout (ISO etc?), purchasing the option of the soldered board or with key caps included and any of the extra services which may be worth purchasing.
I live in the UK so hopefully shipping is possible too.
Any help would really be appreciated.
Thank you!
Beginner here, KBDFans had the best prices for cherry browns ($5 for 10), and I'm just making sure that it's legit.
Yes but it's going to take weeks
Could’ve saved both you and other redditors time by using the reddit search bar https://www.reddit.com/r/MechanicalKeyboards/comments/btmqda/i_cant_tell_if_kbdfans_have_legit_switches_if/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf
Hey guys so I'm looking at this fully assemble keyboard from kbdfans for around $314. Do you think it's worth it for this price without keycaps yet? Thank you!
Specs:
E-white brass plate
KBD67 rev2.0 PCB
QMK firmware
68S slow springs,
Cherry screw-in stabilizers
Zealios v2 67g switches.
Transcript: https://imgur.com/a/UWFRmaE
I ordered a black Tofu60 but the color is off (looks grey) & there are streaks & blotches all over the case. It looks like someone called it quits halfway through the anodization. I swore I got a C-stock case or something. I was fortunate enough to have another Black Tofu60 & a friend who also ordered a Black Tofu60 with me. I used these two as references in the photos so that they could see what a proper black Tofu60 looks like. It's very clear in the photos that one of these is not like the others. I've ordered many Tofu60s in the past (purple, grey, black & e-white) & I've never had any issues with color nor quality. So clearly this was a case where I just received a defective product & I assumed KBDfans would handle it appropriately. But they straight up denied everything, even with all the proof showing the defects clear as day.
Except it IS a quality issue hello? One of these is not like the others. One of these is not like the others. To further prove my point, I never told them which case was the defective one. I intentionally left out that detail. So how else did she know that I was talking about the middle one if there is no defective Tofu in my possession?I really tried to be reasonable & I REALLY went out of my way to cooperate & show proof. Even after all the photos I took & how they CLEARLY show the defects, they still kept asking for more photos, which honestly sounded like they were just giving me excuses in hopes that I'd get tired & give up. At this point, I feel like no matter how many photos I provide in whatever lighting/angle they want, it doesn't matter because they want to weasel me out of $88 + some. They even sent me photos of Tofu60s from their warehouse & tried to convince me that the color in those pictures were the same as my defective one. Ironically, all their pictures were taken in the worst lighting I've ever seen (lol) and they even used Instagram filters (why?). Even then, their Black Tofus were still clearly darker than mine.
I posted the pictures in their Discord and even THEIR MODERATOR agreed with me that it's "super noticeable." This is a picture they sent me to prove that their warehouse stock is the same color as my defective unit. What's with the Instagram filter and poor lighting when I had to take mine in good light and used no filters to be as objective as possible? They claim to using no filter LOL. How are you gonna slap a filter on the picture, claim it's straight from the camera and then claim it "shows the black color?" And then use the shittiest picture I took to prove that the color in the filtered pic you took is the same as in the picture I took? What was the point in me going out of my way to take good pictures in even lighting? What was the point in even requesting good pictures in "natural" light?It's absolutely insane that I have to work this hard just to get even an ounce of customer support, especially when the evidence is CLEAR AS DAY. I never expected KBDfans to be so scummy. At worst, they'd lose like $35 in return shipping costs, which is nothing compared to losing a life-long customer (I've been a customer with KBDfans since July 22, 2018 and planned to continue being a customer for many more years). But I guess they don't care because they have so many customers anyway and make bank so losing one customer means nothing to them. Oh well.
I just want a FULL refund for a defective product, meaning the return shipping costs are paid for. That's it. Since when did it become the customer's responsibility to absorb the costs of defective products?
I feel sorry for anyone in the future who receives a defective Tofu because good luck trying to prove your case. I can only imagine how hard it would be for someone who isn't so fortunate to have extra Tofus laying around.
TL;DR - Anyone who's not blind can clearly see the color is WAY off and that the anodization was poorly done. KBDfans denies this and refuses to refund as a defective product even though countless of photos, in natural even lighting, next to two other Black Tofu60s, one of them being in same batch, were provided.
Edit 1:
https://www.reddit.com/r/MechanicalKeyboards/comments/ssdjfz/a_warning_about_a_popular_vendor
Seems like this is a common business practice. They beat around the bush, continually asking for pictures/videos, without any intention of refunding you in hopes you’d get tired and give up. It’s absolutely eerie that the person (and the comments) in that post felt the same way I did.
Edit 2:
They replied. I negotiated to have them refund me for half of what I paid for ($88 + $9.32 tax = $97.32 / 2 = $48.66) treating it as if they were selling a C-stock Tofu that needed paintwork for half the price. After reading some comments about China's zero COVID strategy affecting their imports and shipping costs, I understand that this might put their business in a tight spot and I don't want to hurt their business in hopes that this serves as a warning sign to change their business practices and that if they are in a tight spot, to be more transparent about it. Again, honesty/humility goes a long way. I'll use the refund money to cerakote this Tofu & I'll update if I receive the refund.Edit 3:
I hope they improve their business practices because we shouldn’t have to make a Reddit post in order to get proper customer service. If this happens again, I definitely think there should be an official subreddit PSA about this u/Omnias-42. It seems to happen more often than we think, it’s just that a lot of it goes unnoticed because not everyone has the time and energy to make a Reddit post about it.
Edit 4:
Looks like refund finally came in but how they gonna make me pay the PayPal fee -_- Goddamn KBDfans is so cheap. Yeah, I'll be taking my business elsewhere from now on.I didn't really want to rant here but I just want to warn people who consider buying Topre 9009 key caps from those guys.
I bought three kits from them several months ago (as a pre-order item) and received them like a week ago. In fact it was my first purchase from them. While trying to test key caps on my FC660C I noticed that the Shift from MOD PRO kit is crooked. It looks like a common issue for the whole batch/round.
Giving the fact that overall quality was not to my liking and the fact that I simply can't put them on FC660C because of crooked shift I decided to sell them on MM for a lot less than I paid and I warned all potential buyers about the crooked shift. As a result a person contacted me asking if they could cover HHKB without any issues. I started to inspect caps for HHKB and found out the HHKB shift from BASE kit is also crooked!
I notified the person, removed the listing and decided it was enough for me and I want a refund for that crap. I opened a PP dispute stating the merchandise was damaged. After not hearing anything from KBDFans (after two days) I escalated to a claim. The PP decision was that I needed to ship that crap back to China and pay shipping myself. You could imagine how expensive shipping from the US to other countries is assuming I paid $88 total. But money is not a point here. The point is that I have to spend extra to get my refund because they sent me a damaged product and not because I simply decided I don't like it.
I am no longer going to deal with those guys in any way, they are now blacklisted as a seller. But this is not a point. What I want to do is to warn people that the product you might be considering is a total crap. And you either throw it away or have to fix it yourself (with hot water, dryer or whatever your imagination creates).
Shame on you, KBDFans for not paying any attention to quality control and sending crap to people.
You should have contacted KBDFans before filing a dispute with PP. They would have sent you replacement Shifts. Or, if you insisted on returning the merchandise, they would have directed you to send it to their warehouse in Oregon, from which they pay for the shipping back to China.
Also, warping is a common issue with PBT, and the hair dryer fix is very easy and more importantly, it works.
Customer service across continents is not an easy thing, and we in the US would do well to adjust our expectations. That said, KBDfans puts a lot of effort into making it work.
So you got a faulty product, and your first move is to file a dispute instead of contacting the vendor? And now you're calling out the vendor on a public forum? Seems to me like you overreacted. Shame on YOU.
Yes, i am sorry，I saw the paypal dispute this morning, and I chose to return the goods to my address. If you have my warehouse in your country, you can return the goods to my warehouse, instead of directly sending them to China, because now I only provide the option of China for the address in paypal, or I can send you a shift again.
Shift has been bent, and I also found this problem. You can check the original HHKB produced in Japan, whose keycaps also have many deformation.
We have checked, because there is something wrong with the mold of dye-sub, which has destroyed the mold produced for the first time and made a new one. The second batch of samples arrived yesterday, I have checked, and shift has no problem
If you are not in a hurry, I can resend to you after the completion of the second batch of production, which is expected to be at the end of January or early February
Please contact me directly by email or discord
Thank you！
I'm debating whether or not I should buy my first custom board from them however I've heard they have been selling fake switches a while ago so I was wondering if anyone had experience with kbdfans
I really want to get in this hobby and I was looking for some hot-swappable keyboards and Taeha Types recommended this company KBDfans and I saw this one KBD67V2 MKII MECHANICAL KEYBOARD DIY KIT. I really like the way it looks and the price isn't too high for someone that is begging. (currently, I have the ducky one 2 mini charry MX brown)
They’re reputable and it’s a popular keyboard. A search of the subreddit will tell you that.
Also the KBD67 isn’t in stock at the moment, expect a month or two delay.
Exceptional. I'm currently typing on exactly that board and tbh it's the highest build quality of anything I've come across.
Hello r/MechanicalKeyboards ,
I'm sure that there have been reviews on here regarding KBDFans in the past, but, I've recently ordered a keycap set from KBDFans and it took 9 days to arrive, from CHANGZHOU, China, to the Greater Toronto Area, in Ontario Canada. The customer service was 8/10, friendly, informative, slow responses (time zones are different so I can't quite blame them). Shipping wasn't the best but certainly wasn't the worst I've ever seen.
It's a Polish website, uses the same name as KBDfans. I am wondering if its legit because the website looks incredibly unprofessional (seems to be made with something like google websites, though not sure if that still exists). The homepage for example is just an unedited template with "gray" images, you can check it out for yourself if you want. The prices are all in zloty, and seem quite cheap. I am in the EU, so that's why I was considering using this website. They have the TADA68 which I am a fan of.
If it is not a scam, I feel like their website could really use some work to give a more genuine feel (and make it more easy to find stuff as well, now everything they have is just under one page and although there are 'tags' it is still kind of annoying to see everything you want). Are they in any way connected to KBDfans?