Andy, you helped me out last week via DM, so my approach may not be news, but here’s my 2 cents:
I’m in the process of building what’s basically the 5x6 in your picture there.
I’m not interested in the OLED on the left, since I’ve found that I never look at one anyway.
I love the new encoder hole on the right! Although I would do one of those scroll wheel inserts instead of a rotary knob. That makes the trackball setup feel a little more conventional. (Dammit am I going to have to reprint my right side again?)
I’m using flexi pcbs that have their own hotswap sockets, so I’m not using the hotswap-in-case design. Just the default cherry holes. It actually makes changing cases easier since I can pull the pcbs off the bottom and the switches out of the top to move them.
I’m personally not at all interested in wireless. I don’t want to have to track batteries and pairing. I tend to change keyboards out for gaming, and I have a dock for my laptop so it’s easier to just have it plugged in.
With a dactyl, everyone’s got their own preferences so I can’t imagine how hard it must be to find something that suits a majority. But thanks for trying!
I built a Sofle RGB a couple years ago, and loved it so much I built a second for work.
Then I made a dactyl manuform mini (6 x 4) because I could make the key layout pretty much match the Sofles.
I didn’t really like dactyl at first, with Amazon’s cheapest XDA keycaps, but when I replaced them with something more interesting, CSA they were called, I was a lot happier.
If I had used quieter switches on the dactyl, that would be my work keyboard. But as it is I’ve got my work Sofle tented to maybe 15 degrees or so and really love it!
I don’t see any good reason to change, and wind up swapping between the Sofle and the Dactyl at home depending on the application. Dactyl is terrible for gaming, but way more fun if I’m doing a long coding session.