u/AndyMacFly

I'm using a Phenom split with a concave keywell and dual trackballs. The stock tenting angle wasn't enough for me, so I designed and 3D‑printed wedge stands to tilt each half to ~25°. This keeps my wrists neutral and reduces forearm pronation.

With that much tilt, the keyboard sits high above the desk, so ordinary wrist rests don't reach. I printed custom armrest pedestals that support my forearms at the right height – no more floating arms.

On the firmware side, I mapped the left trackball for mouse movement and the right one for scrolling. Works great in CAD.

Years ago, I decided to learn touch typing. It took me a few weeks, but I got there. Back then, I thought scissor‑switch keyboards were the most comfortable – so I found a compact, slim one. Over time, though, I realised something was off – my wrists were constantly in an awkward position. That’s when I discovered the Microsoft Sculpt ergonomic keyboard. It became my daily driver for a long time. I had one at work, another at home, and when one broke, I replaced it without a second thought. But when the third one died, I took it as a sign – time for a change.

I dived back into the world of ergonomic keyboards, and fate led me to splits. It felt like a breath of fresh air – the promise of a whole new level of comfort.

I didn’t want to settle for a plain split with straight rows. No half‑measures: the board had to be as comfortable as possible, with minimal finger travel and equal reachability for every key.

My first choice was the High Plains Drifter v2 from Ergohaven. It was large enough that the jump from 104 keys to 60 wasn’t too painful (I’m all for experiments, but it has to be enjoyable, not self‑torture). At the time, it seemed to solve every problem – trackball option, staggered rows at different heights to reduce finger strain. Finally, I could work without moving my hand between keyboard and mouse – just rest my hands in one spot and do everything with finger movements. I was thrilled.

I used that for a whole year. But deep down, I knew there was room for improvement. And apparently the gods were listening – the team released a new model, the Phenom. It kept all the strengths of the previous one but got even better: the keywells are now concave in all directions (a spherical dish). And you can mount two trackballs (that was actually the main reason I upgraded). Now I can use one ball for the cursor and the other for scrolling – which turned out to be a game‑changer in CAD.

But this post isn’t really about that. Please don’t take it as an ad – I have no affiliation with the company. I just want to share my personal mods for this keyboard.

Splitting the board isn’t enough. A spherical keywell isn’t enough. After years of using a vertical mouse, I realised that the keyboard halves shouldn’t sit flat on the desk – each side should be tented at around 25°. So I designed some sturdy stands to lift them to that steep angle. Now my wrists don’t twist as much when I type.

But that created another problem: with that much tilt, the keyboard sits quite high above the desk, and ordinary wrist rests don’t cut it anymore. Then my inner engineer went into overdrive. If my hands don’t reach the rests, and there’s a 3D printer sitting idle in the next room – well, arm “pedestals” were exactly what the doctor ordered. Now my arms aren’t floating in the air, they don’t get tired, and they’re perfectly supported.