SignalRGB Keyboard Wall Blog

Written by Robbie Pollard

Built by Chris Miller https://chrismillerstuff.com 

1. Introductions

This blog will document how Chris Miller in collaboration with SignalRGB recently built a keyboard display wall. This will be more of a guide for you to base your own projects off of and may be used as inspiration and as well as give insight to some problems you may encounter in your own designs. We will give details on products used and will provide links at the end of the blog for some of the specialty materials used. 

2. Preparations

The keyboard wall will require some planning before you start the project. Planning is mostly on what keyboard you plan to use and what size you want to make the wall based on the size of the keyboard. This project is used at tradeshows and also includes a built in kiosk to control the wall but you may wish to forgo this addition. We started with a 3D render in Fusion 360 to plan out the dimensions of the wall and pay out how we want the wall to look like. We broke the wall into 6 sections with 5 sections set aside for keyboards and a single section set aside for the kiosk. One major thing we planned for is the wall is designed to be shortened and lengthened depending on the size of our booth at different tradeshows. 

3. Materials Used

This section will be broken into smaller subsections. We always recommend buying extra beforehand in case you lose some bolts or damage them. 

  1. We use 2020s extrusion for the frame. 36” for legs and 84” for vertical. https://8020.net/2020-s.html 
  2. We use the https://8020.net/2567.html for the 45 degree supports.
  3. We use 1/2” plywood for all panels.
  4. We use the Element V2 for the keyboards but have since sold out, can be done with any ARGB keyboard with per key LED control but will need dimensions changed.
  5. And we 3D printed all the brackets for the keyboards. Which will need to be changed on a per keyboard model basis.
  6. STL files for the keyboard brackets. Also has autocad files for the base panels. https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1yjGiT4GoSct8ABbWDVRsOW4wFXy0p810?usp=sharing 

4. Keyboard Preparations

We used the WhirlwindFX element V2 keyboard for this project. Since the wall is made of devices used to interact with computers on a core level we needed to disable the keyboards from working to ensure the display cant be tampered with. We did this by flashing custom firmware to the keyboards that disabled their keys. We found people love coming up to the wall and just pressing random keys as they are mechanical keyboards and this will save you from a lot of heartache later on.

5. Assembly Instructions

5.1 Frame assembly 

A. Arrange 36” leg and 90” upright on floor, aligning 4 holes in leg with thread

tapped end of the upright.

B. Slide the tee-nuts on the 12” long, 45 degree extrusion bracket into slots on the top surface of the leg and the front surface of the upright.  Do not tighten screws yet.

C. Insert 4x 2-½” x ¼-20 machine screws through the four holes through the leg and into the upright.  Tighten these screws now.  Extrusions should pull into roughly square. 

D. Tighten the four black screws on the 12” long 45 degree extrusion bracket.

Repeat for as many panels needed.

5.2 Panel Assembly

  1. Identify front and back sides.  4 metal threaded inserts are visible on the front side.  When viewing the front side, the ¾” keyboard cable holes are on the right side.
  2. Insert 1-¼” x ¼-20 screws into the 16 unthreaded keyboard mounting holes from the back side.   
  3. Install the bottom row of brackets.  Bottom panel can use a full bracket, middle and upper panels need a top half bracket
  4. Slide two keyboards into the bottom brackets, routing cables through holes at the right end.
  5. Place two full brackets on the screws and tighten.  Cable should be hidden in the slot on the back of the bracket.
  6. Repeat steps above until top row on panel
  7. Install the top row of brackets.  Upper panel can use a full bracket, middle and lower panels need a bottom half bracket.

5.3 Attaching the panel to the frame

  1. Take two frame pieces and attach six 90 degree adapters to the inside of the rail using the T-nuts.
  2. Placing the bottom panel on the frame attach the panel to the frame with 2x 90 degree adapters on each side but do not fully tighten the screws. Once the segment has all the panels do not fully tighten until the next segment is added.
  3. Once you have one fully assembled segment add another frame piece and 3 panels until the wall is the desired length or fully built. Only tighten the screws fully on a segment once the segment next to it is fully added to ensure the panels will attach and align properly. 

6. Adding the Kick Boards

Once the main wall is added you will need to attach the kick boards. These will keep people from tripping on the frame and also ensure the wall is straight. Note, the kick boards are not load bearing and should not be stood on. To attach the kick boards take the boards and attach 4 bolts to the corners with T-nuts and slide onto the front rails. It may require a mallet to fully seat the boards as well as toeing in or out the frame. Once fully seated, tighten all 4 screws.

7. Attaching the Kiosk (optional)

Once the main keyboard wall is fully assembled you can attach the kiosk. This step is not required and is something we did to control the wall. The steps used are identical to attaching the normal panels with the added step of adding a small shelf for a keyboard    and mouse, this was done using similar 90 degree supports for the frame with holes cut in the panels to allow for them and attach to the middle panel itself. We also added two televisions to the kiosk so people can see the effect playing on the keyboard walls clearly. We have convenience ports cut on the bottom panel for cable routing the computer to the keyboards for control. The Computer is the only thing that sits on the kick boards.

8. Attaching the Signage (optional)

We have some signs that sit on top of our wall but are purely optional. Our signs attach to the frame using some aluminum L brackets and screw into the sign and bolt onto the frame with T-nuts. Attach the L brackets to the signs and using a small ladder on the back side slide the signs onto the railing and tighten the nuts. 

9. Wiring

To connect everything to the PC you will need lots of externally powered USB 3.0 hubs. We have 120 keyboards on our wall and our USB hubs have 8 ports each. Which means we need 15 USB ports on the controlling PC. We used some dual USB controller PCIE expansion cards but will eventually talk about the PC in another blog. The hubs must be externally powered to prevent usb power overload on the PC and will also need varying lengths of USB extension cables. But with some time you can plug in every keyboard into one PC, we recommend doing this last as while one person is plugging in the keyboards, another person can add the keyboards to the controlling software to make that much easier later on. We attached the hubs with velcro strips to the walls back and used velcro strips to cable manage the keyboards. The hubs will need 2-3 power strips to plug into and should not be plugged into each other, so you will need 2-3 wall outlets to supply the wall with power. 

 10. SignalRGB

We controlled the Keyboard Wall using SignalRGB. The software allows for individual control of each key on the keyboard and also allows for screen mirroring using the “Screen Ambience” effect. This will allow you to turn the Keyboard Wall into a computer monitor. The keyboards will need to be individually added in the layouts and can take a while to sort which is why it is usually best to sort them while plugging them in from experience. 

We also recommend enabling the HD mode of screen ambience in the app to ensure the best picture for the wall.

Overall This project is a lot of work but is very fun to set up and watch peoples reactions as they realize the display before them is made up of mechanical keyboards. It takes a while to set up and is not easily moved but definitely is worth the hassle.