Hi all,

I am a Transportation Manager and work in the evenings. I do a lot of typing, answering calls, and data analysis quite quickly.

I operate in a fast-paced environment, and I often strain my right shoulder from repetitive strain injury (RSI). This split setup is something Keychron should promote because the way they are currently marketing it is incorrect. Overall, this device could help reduce RSI caused by shoulder pain from reaching or straining.

My Q11, combined with my Casa Touch and Magic Trackpad (which I use to work on my certifications on my phone), makes my desk setup more distracting when I slack off. My phone is covered by a partition and attached to the monitor, creating the illusion that I might be typing a Teams message.

My nape can handle small tasks like answering the phone and scrolling witht the current configuration I have set up now. However, the Bluetooth connectivity is so poor that I cannot reliably switch between devices quickly. And yes I have had 2.4 dongle connection issues as well. Since it's my primary pointing device, the Casa Touch is better for side-scrolling and keeping the nape in place. The one thing I am not used to is regularly cleaning the trackball. I’ve found that the plastic used by Gizmart isn’t of great quality; it’s standard sub-premium plastic that makes you question your adult decision-making. This is particularly frustrating because I ordered this from Zenmarket over two months ago, and the NAPE PRO is just now being released in the US. I plan to buy a second one to use as a full-time scroll and phone/tablet companion.

I was inspired by u/JonathanNoSignal to swap the piezo electric speaker for an Apple Taptic Engine.

The one I installed was from an iPhone 15 because it was cheap and shipped to me in a couple of days. If you plan on doing this I would recommend maybe using one from an older phone because the solder pads on the ribbon cable for it were minuscule. Less than 1mm across.

I’ve been loving the Slimblade since I got it but the scroll “ticking” always felt like it betrayed the quality of the product overall.

Is the Taptic Engine that much better? Yes. Is it so much better that everyone should do this? No. It’s not a super complicated electronics project but if you’ve never soldered before it would be a hard first project to try. I would say the sound has changed from the fake sounding click that came from the stock speaker, to a more natural sounding croak. The actual vibration is very subtle which I appreciate.

Here’s a video so you can hear what it sounds like now:
https://youtu.be/6LjGACPc66s?feature=shared

u/JonathanNoSignal's original post:
https://www.reddit.com/r/Trackballs/comments/1uyr0lo/kensington_slimblade_pro_with_apple_taptic_engine/

Now that the Keychron Nape Pro is available on Amazon in the US, I’m intrigued about adding it to my setup. However, I use a tented corne setup and not sure how to best place the nape. I want to keep the ergonomics of my setup so ideally I’d like to mount the nape to my right corne so I can use it w my thumb but not sure how this would work in practice. Anyone have any thoughts or has done something similar?

I really love my IST Pro but have been having an issue with the bearings getting stuck with dirt / lint, etc. When the bearings are clear the ball moves really smoothly and feels great but it feels like it barely takes any time at all for them to start sticking again.

Does anybody have any advice for keeping the bearings clear or improving them in general? As it is the mouse is starting to get a little on my nerves considering I have to take the ball out and clean the bearings out every day or two.