My experience has been a bit better than yours. I had the same concerns you've raised here and opted for a more standard layout and got a Mistel MD770, a lesser known brand but it was important to me that the layout is familiar and it has F keys and honestly it's been great, had it for about a year now. I use it on all 3 OSs too. I'm now looking to buy another one for the office as it's too much of an effort to carry it and I've been looking for other keyboards but there aren't (m)any that have standard layout (no columnar stuff), split, pre-built, F keys and ideally hot-swappable switches. The closest is probably dygma raise but it doesn't have F keys which is unfortunate. I think I'll end up buying another MD770.
Doesn’t like it
Almost. I own a Mistel MD770 which does a very similar arrangement. I strongly dislike the non standard home/end/pgup/pgdown positioning. Had you asked me how often I use those keys, I would have said hardly ever. Now that I have to suffer that layout, I have realized they are crucial for my typing/usage patterns.
Likes it
Why would I invest the time, effort, and incalculable risk involved in adopting and depending on a boutique experimental keyboard system? Why do all keyboard projects either mindlessly adhere to antique conventions or hopelessly diverge into zaniness? Why is it so difficult to find a multi-platform split keyboard with no gimmicks, standard layouts, and sane defaults. I will buy a back-stock of 10 when I find it. The closest thing so far is the Mistel MD770 so I own 2 of them.
Likes it
> Why do all keyboard projects either mindlessly adhere to antique conventions or hopelessly diverge into zaniness? Why is it so difficult to find a multi-platform split keyboard with no gimmicks, standard layouts, and sane defaults. I will buy a back-stock of 10 when I find it. The closest thing so far is the Mistel MD770 so I own 2 of them. Try finding what you are looking for but with an ISO layout. Which is why I am thinking about buying a second Mistel MD770.
Likes it
Like smoyer said, I strongly suggest split hands. Way more ergonomical. I have two Mistel MD770's, one or work and one for home. I really like the keyboards but I think as long you get something that splits you'll be fine.
Neutral
Thanks for sharing this! I switch between a mistel md770 split Bluetooth keyboard and a kinesis advantage.
Doesn’t like itDoesn’t say they own it
The Mistel MD770 is quite unergonomic. It has positive tilt (bad for your wrists) and only very small amount of tenting. There many keyboards that are more ergonomic from companies that have been around a long time (e.g. Kinesis).