[Arm-netbook] Building your own keyboard

[Christian Kellermann]

* Christopher Havel <laserhawk64 at gmail.com> [170526 21:47]:
> Quick note... the Pro Micro is a new revision of the older Arduino Micro
> and has fewer IO pins, IIRC. It may not have enough pins for these
> purposes...
> 

Yes the naming is weird, you need to watch out for the ones actually
carrying an Atmega32U4.  As for the number of pins this depends on
the size of keyboard you want to make. The arduino is fine for 60%
Keyboards.  For bigger boards you'd either need a GPIO expander or
another controller board. Code for both is available, most people
go with the Teensy++.  Also as a personal preference I'd take mini
usb plugs over micro plugs any day. The latter aren't soldered
*through* the board anymore but sit on pads and the physics of that
plug makes it likely to damage the plug while fiddling with the
cable.

> OF COURSE Chinese eBay factories/sellers jumped on the new one. You can
> still buy the older ones if you fiddle with keywords well enough (or sort
> through fifteen million pages of crap) but be prepared to pay a wee bit
> more than you used to be able to get away with... ~$10 instead of about
> half that IIRC.

The pro micros suitable for said keyboards are around 3 USD...

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