Finding a company that recognizes the importance of community is rare these days. For Christoph, the Managing Director at GMK, finding ways to better serve the community is just something that comes naturally to him.

When asked about the community, Christoph stated "Due to the increased number of keycap group buys, we are in contact with a lot of community members. From day one we were impressed by their creativity and love for details which matches perfectly with GMK's corporate mission. It was just the next logical step to team up with the people who really care about the community. "

Teaming up directly with the community is precisely what Christoph did in early 2016 when he invited me, T0mb3ry, Wodan, Zambumon, and Photekq to join a Think Tank to assist in creating a brand new GMK keyboard.

Before going any further, let me introduce everyone that worked on this project!

Wodan - Master builder of keyboards and defender of the ISO realm. Wodan is a walking keyboard dictionary and currently owns my favorite keyboard of all time. (https://deskthority.net/photos-f62/round-6-the-cappening-t15386.html I'll let you guess which one ;)

Photekq - Designer of multiple cases with a strong engineering background and way of thinking. He has an immense technical knowledge of keyboards that we put to use constantly.

T0mb3ry - Designer of Yuri and Carbon, and someone that has a very clear of idea of what defines a custom. Saying he pays "attention to detail" would be the understatement of the year.

Zambumon - Designer of Chocolatier and Nautilus, multiple cases, and a master of rendering keyboards and keycaps. I personally bounce a lot of things around with him just because he also has a very good grasp on the community and what the community likes/dislikes.

Livingspeedbump - "We just needed someone with a beard." - Zambumon. "The octopus of the mechkeys community (because I have hands in so many projects with so many people at any given time)" - Christoph. I designed Jukebox and Honeywell as well, but really just supported the other brilliant members of the team!

Christoph - Managing Director at GMK, drinking buddy, dear friend, master of keycaps, community supporter, community pillar that nobody knows by name or sight (proven by the fact that he flew all the way to the Norcal meetup and nobody knew who he was!).

In reality, there were no assigned roles. We all gave input and feedback on each aspect of the keyboard, and naturally seemed to let people that were very passionate or knowledgeable about certain features or details take lead on those parts. For being such a diverse group of people from all over the world we worked together seamlessly, making the whole project an immensely enjoyable endeavor.

The idea behind the C70 is actually quite simple: design a fully custom keyboard with enthusiasts directly aimed at enthusiasts. One big difference between the C70 and others custom boards is that we wanted to offer a fully assembled board, allowing people that may not want to build their own board the chance to get a custom board for a decent price. Of course there were a million considerations that came up during the design process, many of which I’ll go over here. First, let's take a look a all the features of the final product:

• Rugged aluminum housing, CNC milled, one piece design, high quality anodization

• Angled design (8 degrees)

• Bezel integrated LED indicator lights

• Aluminum plate with cut-outs to allow switch-top removal

• Cherry PCB Screw-in Stabilizers

• Custom GMK double-shot keycap set (ABS)

• Swapable Connector PCB for switching from USB-C port to Micro USB (no soldering required)

• Additional Accent keycaps included

• Weight: approx. 1,200g (without cable)

• Scope of supply: C70 keyboard, Accent keycaps, USB-C to USB 3.0 cable, key puller

• Kit and ISO versions will be available directly from UNIQEY in the first quarter of 2018

The basic idea for the layout of the C70 was to design space saving keyboard with a brand new layout. In today’s market that is easier said than done, as new layouts seem to appear overnight and keeping track of them all can be difficult.

We started the project by creating a philosophy to back up the new keyboard. Wodan summarized our ideas well, stating "For the layout we wanted to deliver the smallest possible layout with a dedicated navigation cluster. We also wanted to bring a full custom quality keyboard to people that have previously been too afraid to touch keyboard kits."

We started with a 60% layout, which is the by far the most common compact layout, and then slowly starting addressing issues we each had with that layout. Zambumon mentioned “For the 60% side of the keyboard, we all had something very clear: 1.75U shift and Fn. There's really no justification for a 2.75U key on a 60% keyboard, where space is a premium and a function key is needed. The placement of the function key right under the Enter key, is way more comfortable than any other, as it allows you to reach almost the same keys that you'd reach normally. Additionally, and this is a personal preference, it reduces the amount of stabilized keys on the keyboard.”

In regards to the layout T0mb3ry stated, " Its an elegant solution for a small layout. It looks similar to 65% layout but i would rather compare it with 75% layout. The C70 layout comes very close in its functionality to TKL layout. However C70's layout features small details which separates it from other compact layouts with arrow cluster. Those details are the stepped caps lock and the right split shift. My favorite feature is definitely the balanced Winkey bottom row, which is derived from the vintage winkeyless layout, but includes the winkeys for additional utility. Given these details it's clear the layout was designed by enthusiast for enthusiast. "

A notable difference between the C70 and other space saving keyboards are the dual columns on the right hand side of the keyboard. Another feature that may not be immediately noticed is the SSK/Realforce style numpad layer, which allows for quick number input.

One of my personal favorite design features of the C70 is the utilization of a stepped caps lock key and a winkeyless style bottom row. Some of the most beautiful keyboards ever made like the Kishsaver, Cherry 1800, and SSK utilize variations of the Winkeyless bottom row and stepped caps key. These physical layouts have been adorned by enthusiasts since the very first custom keyboards came out, with many including the stepped caps and true winkeyless bottom row. In regards to the C70, the larger 1.5u mods help to break up the bottom row a bit and provided cleaner look, than say, shoving four 1u keys to the right of the spacebar.

Some people may be wondering “well, what about the right Windows key?” Fear not, because the next major feature of the C70 has you covered.

One of the few things that we never had heated discussions about was the need for this keyboard to be fully programmable. That was a must feature right from the start. Even though this was something decided on very quickly after the project started, it has taken the longest to implement. Creating a user friendly, yet powerful GUI was extremely hard and time consuming. I believe we have done just that with UNIQEY Control - GMK's new custom keyboard configuration software.

Spending the time to get the GUI right was extremely important because making a programmable keyboard where it is difficult to create layouts or buggy to flash is one of the most frustrating experiences a consumer can have with a keyboard. We also wanted to make sure no programming knowledge would be needed to take full control of the C70, making the keyboard accessible to as many people as possible.

There are huge benefits that will come from the creation of the software beyond the C70. For starters, the Q100 will be able to use the software and will become a fully programmable keyboard (I have already tested this, it is awesome!). Any future GMK keyboards will also utilize the software. Finally, just the fact that the software will be designed, maintained, and utilized by GMK specifically for UNIQEY boards means the user experience should be much more streamlined than some third party programs that try to work for numerous keyboards by numerous makers.

Designing the case was not a feature we were all in agreement with from the start. In fact, we probably had more arguments over the case than any other design element of the keyboard. Getting the angles correct, the bezel the correct width, the height correct took hours of discussion.

The C70 made it's first public appearance at the sold out NorCal Mechanical Keyboard meetup at the NEST HQ in Palo Alto in 2017. I flew out from North Carolina and Christoph flew all the way over from Germany. Cherry also sent representatives over from Germany with a film team to document the meetup:

Massdrop was able to deliver the keyboard to customers within a few weeks of the expected shipping date, which is really good considering the sheer complexity of this project. Partyschaum on Massdrop posted some great pictures of his unboxing experience: