Split Bluetooth Keyboard

Why?

  The reasoning behind this project is simple. I'm constantly on the quest to improve my desk setup, and I really liked the idea of a mini keyboard on my desk that could control music, volume, screen brightness, and maybe even display my computer's CPU temp and other stats.

What?

• Custom PCBs

• ESP32-S3 Microcontroller

• Keycaps

• Key Switches

• Diodes

• EC11 Rotary Encoders

• Misc. Resistors + Capacitors

How?

  To make this project I utilized many of the skills I learned building my keyboard project, the most important of which were diode matrices and CADding PCBs. However, this project was more complex because of the two dials and the screen. As such, I needed to code my own firmware for this project (whereas for the keyboard I used the QMK firmware tool), which took a good amount of time. Additionally, I used the ESP32-S3 microcontroller but ran out of GPIO pins, so I utilized a PCF8574 I2C GPIO expander IC, which required much more difficult surface mount soldering than I've ever done.