 Okay, so this is the Data Hand Personal. It's a keyboard. It's weird. There's no getting around that, but it's weird for a reason. It's more ergonomic, more comfortable, and can even make you a faster typer. Or so they claim. So did Data Hand Systems go out of business because this is an awful idea? A bad product? Or is this bizarre board from 1995 the absolute best input device you can't buy? Here's something you can buy. Our sponsor, Seasonic, and their power supplies. Never skimp on getting a quality power supply for your current or next computer build. Check out Seasonic to find award-winning power supplies, and try out their wattage calculator to find out which one will suit your needs below. Like many modern ergonomic keyboards, the Data Hand takes a split-board approach. It has two modules that can be freely positioned however you like, according to your own personal neck, connected by an 18-inch D-sub cable that you'll have to buy an extension for if you want to take advantage of the quarter-inch threads on the bottom of the modules, like if you want to mount them to your chair or to the included lap lander. At its core, the Data Hand aims to reduce the amount of movement and force required to register a keystroke. It's designed so that your hands are resting comfortably on these cushy palm rests, placing very little strain on the carpal tunnel muscles. And instead of having your fingers curling and contorting in unnatural ways to reach the keys, the Data Hand has individual wells for each digit, where each keystroke requires only a half-inch of travel for your fingers. And each finger can press down or in any of the four cardinal directions. The switches are optical, with the keys relying on magnets to snap back into place. They're super sensitive though, to the point where accidental key presses are really hard to avoid, and sometimes even when your hands are just resting on them, you'll suddenly get a bunch of S's going across your screen. More on the learning curve in a minute. But as for ergonomics, having each finger do less work while moving in many directions other than one repetitive stroke is a definite plus. Each module can be adjusted for different hand sizes by raising, tilting, or rocking the key wells, and by choosing between small and large palm rests at the time of ordering. So it's ergonomic as heck, but can it help you type faster? It seems like it could in theory, but the question is, how long would it take you to get there? It should be used to control a giant mech. Yeah, there's PS2 on the other side of that. Okay. We're going to lttstore.com. That's my task? I want to go to monkey type. That's delete, that's restart. No, this is, oh, that's back. This is incredibly difficult. How do I get to blue mode? Ah, there's another typo. Oh God. Over. No, no. I did it. Well, that's a terrible mouse experience. Can I stop now? Yeah, I never want to use that again. Despite it being a completely different typing paradigm, the designers did try and make it familiar. The layout is derived from the QWERTY layout, with most key clusters corresponding to letters that you're used to hitting with that same finger. However, it's not a perfect translation and you can see why. T, Y, N, and B on a regular keyboard are kind of in no man's land. So these had to be moved to other random fingers, which definitely takes some getting used to. Same goes with symbols. Enjoy learning to type in apostrophe with your left hand's middle finger. Then you've got the thumb clusters. They've got modifiers for switching layers, not unlike pressing shift on a QWERTY keyboard, except there's four layers. Granted, one of those is a mouse, which is awful. Please God, no. But at least there are people who need it. But when combined with the A typical layout, all of this makes the whole thing pretty damn alien when you first sit down with it, to be frank. Jesse, who typically types up between 120 and 130 words per minute on a QWERTY and got to around 40 words per minute on an Ergodox after a day of usage, tried the data hand and after a half day, their best score was just three words per minute. You just can't have someone on your payroll typing that slowly. It's bad. In Data Hand's own advertising, they say that it only takes a short time to get up to speed on the Data Hand, but a short time is relative. This guy, who ran a Data Hand as his daily driver back in 99, said it took him over a month to get up to speed, and that was after actually taking time off work to get used to it. That's a pretty steep cost, but then again, you can't put a price on health. Except in the States. So let's say you're sold. Should you rush out and buy your very own Data Hand? That's tricky because the company stopped selling them in 2008. Well, how about secondary markets, eBay, Craigslist, maybe Reddit? If you're lucky. The boards are out there, but they can be hard to find. We only got this one because someone donated to us completely out of the blue after being interested in it for years. But maybe there's another way. A small but very dedicated group is looking to revive the spirit of the Data Hand with their own projects, like Ben Groover's LOL Board, an open source keyboard you can 3D print and build yourself. Here's Ben typing at 120 words per minute on one, which is three times faster than the average person can do on a standard Korty, all without wrist extension and ulnar deviation. I have to admit, part of me really wants to get into this, but maybe the Data Hand failed for a reason. Without a public statement from the company or a reply to my LinkedIn message to the founder, we can only speculate on what led to this curious keyboard's demise. But what we do know is that this device targeted a relatively narrow demographic and cost between five hundred and thirteen hundred dollars, depending on which model you bought and when, which is really expensive, even for ergo keyboards, which are often in the four hundred dollar range today. This means that Data Hand relied on a limited number of sales with one core product, plus a few wacky accessories like the Data Chair. But in my opinion, the learning curve must have been a big contributor to the low demand. You needed some serious issues to justify investing the time and the money required for this ultimate ergonomic solution. But today, today, maybe you just need to be a nerd. For my part, I'm really interested in this concept, but I'd like to see some changes, like perhaps an integrated trackball mouse for the people who need it instead of this Cartesian bull spit. I hate the mouse and maybe a more optimized layout that doesn't even try to be Korty because it's already ridiculous to learn anyway. So you might as well just use something that, I don't know, puts all the vowels on your strongest fingers or something. But for everyone else who needs an ergonomic solution that's not so life changing, just get an Ergodox Moonlander or something, you know? Thanks to Squarespace for sponsoring today's video. You need a website, but don't have the know-how? Well, Squarespace makes it easy. There's a wide selection of award-winning templates, all optimized for mobile, so it looks great on all your devices. 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