Comment by krackers
6 months ago
You'll be happy to know that the InCase Sculpt is being sold again, if you can buy one before they sell out. They're nearly identical to the old MS Sculpt, down to the obscure bug with the keyboard matrix. The only difference that you can tell from a side-by-side comparison with new old stock is that the key caps feel slightly coarser, and less velvety. The palmrest is actually updated to the original, plusher MS sculpt design (it was changed in a later revision)
I ended up getting the mWave from Kinesis which seems at least 85% great. My problem with the InCase version of the sculpt is that for the price, it would have to be much better build quality than the original. Incidentally, I gotta give credit to Matias on the palm rest upgrade in their version; despite the rest of their troubles, the palm rest material is way better than the original.
Problem with the original, is that it's a perfect shape, but it wears down too quickly and becomes a paperweight if the dongle is lost. The price is insultingly high for the almost exactly original
Can you write a short review comparing to the sculpt in terms of shape and tactile feel? The mwave seems to have a more pronounced bump just eyeballing it. And as someone who is comfortable with scissor switches, whether on a laptop or MS sculpt, I'm not sure how mechanical ones would feel.
The switches are much lighter to the touch, and although I also prefer scissor switches, I've grown to like the mWave switches too. The lighter switch feel causes some typos, and I'm not yet as fast on it as even my MacBook keyboard, but there's always an adjustment period. They're also a little louder than the sculpt, but nothing remotely close to other mechanical switch types, and I think I might even say it's just a different type of sound, since I can type more softly than before.
The palm rest is a more comfortable softer pad than the the o.g sculpt, but I find for me it does get a little sweaty. I take Adhd meds during the day and drink a shit ton of coffee, so tend have very sweaty hands. I can't yet speak to durability, but the sculpt palm rest starts looking tattered around the ~2 year mark, while the Matias palm rest is a replaceable piece of rubber with a fantastic velvety feel (I use it when I'm at the office).
Connectivity is way better than the sculpt, but it's a little finicky when switching between devices on Bluetooth, which I feel I might just be doing wrong and haven't tried to learn about yet.
I find that the keycaps have low quality printed characters on the mac version, and when the backlight is on, some keys are hard to read or don't shine through properly.
My biggest problem with this keyboard is that it has a small right shift key, a normal size left shift key, and arrow keys that I find less preferable to the sculpt. The small right shift key means it's harder to position my shoulders in an ideal way compared to the sculpt for my ridiculously large hands, and I have to contort my wrist a bit more than I'd like. I also just can't feel my way around the board as easily, since I used the shift keys and arrows as anchor points.
As I've gotten used to it a little more, this is becoming less of an issue.
For portability, the overall build feels more solid than the sculpt, which would sometimes get stuck keys if I'd throw it in my backpack and get a piece of dirt in there or something. The better connectivity is a huge relief, since I don't need to worry about a dongle for wireless, and/or can use a usbc cable if the batteries are dead. It seems a bit shorter but chonkier, and maybe weighs less.
So that's my review. 8.5/10, since some of these lean toward preferences rather than quality. I'm not as confident touch typing with it yet, maybe 70% as confident, but I think I'll keep it and refine that skill.
Additionally, although the printed/etched characters on the keycaps are low quality, I'm glad there's mac variant. I did use the sculpt overwhelmingly on my mac, and had to remap keys, which I'll now do if necessary on my windows PC for the minority of time I'm using it there.