At the start of this year I had the chance to work with Massdrop to check out their version of the community designed ErgoDox. When doing that review I especially enjoyed building the keyboard myself. So when I saw that Massdrop was developing their own keyboard the Infinity, I had to get my hands on it. Well like most things working out the bugs takes time so while we got a first gen infinity keyboard, we did have a few problems that pushed us back to checking out the second drop’s version. Needless to say this review has been a long time coming, but I’m excited to finally show everyone about my experience with the Infinity from start to finish.
Product Name: Massdrop Infinity
Review Sample Provided by: Massdrop
Written by: Wes
Picture by: Wes
Affiliate Link: HERE
While you can read the full backstory for the Infinity on Massdrop at this link I did still want to talk a little about it. If you follow any of the mechanical keyboard communities you have most likely seen MANY different custom keyboards be designed and have small group buys. But typically when it comes to a custom keyboard you are limited by a few different PCBs or you have to hand wire the keyboard. Massdrop set out to put together a keyboard of their own as well. To do this they paired up with a few key people in the keyboard community (Jacob Alexander (HaaTa), Gennadiy Nerubayev (Parak), Brandon Muzzin (OverKill), and Jacob Rus (Jacobolus)) as well as putting their voting system to use. They let the community post up their design ideas and then vote on them to come up with a base key layout and from there they started to design the Infinity.
To keep costs down they designed the baseplate to also be the case with a unique bent design. Later on after community feedback they did add in an option for a standard baseplate as well. For the PCB they had to design a PCB that could support two different styles of bottom row, one US standard and the other a Japanese layout. For a controller rather than using the Teensy they used a chip based on the MCHCK and they switched the framework over to Keyboard Layout Language (KLL). KLL asks more like a keyboard BIOS and provides a standard firmware for all future Massdrop builds. That is because KLL is ambivalent to layout changes. It is also the reason they went with the Infinity name because the keyboard can be programed with an infinite number of layers. This allows for an extreme amount of customization when using the Infinity Configurator or through command line.
Massdrop actually just finished up the third drop recently and with that they introduced a few big changes. For the first time you can actually get one with the key switches already soldered on if you can’t solder. They have also introduced a few more key switch options beyond the Cherry and Mitias switches that the first two drops had. Now you can also get Gateron and Kailh switches as well if you prefer them. The biggest change however was them dropping the bent frame design that made the Infinity so unique and they introduced their own injection molded cases in black, white, and clear. You can also select one of the many custom case options as well if you want. For our testing I won’t have the chance to check out the new case, but I did get to see two of the other options.
Specifications | |
Keyswitches available | Cherry MX, Matias, Gateron, or Kailh switches |
Cases available | Default plastic injection molded case in black, white, or clear. You can also pick from an Aluminum TEX 60% case with the thin uniform lip, an Acrylic 60% case with a fat front lip, or the Vortex Metal 60% case. |
Dimensions |
11 ½ inches wide 4 inches deep Around 1 inch tall depending on case and keycaps |
Number of keys | 63 |
Keyboard Layout | 60% with short spacebar and 1u backspace |
N-Key rollover | Yes |
USB Cable | Removable, 2 foot long |
Keycaps | Optional blank black PBT DSA keycaps from Signature Plastics |