Having taken delivery of a beautifully sculpted object, the Freewrite, I believe it was worth the wait, and the money, in every way. I’ve built both hardware and software, and I know that it is unbelievably difficult to get a piece of hardware (including aluminium, plastic, PCB, components, assembly, testing, and the list of items goes on) constructed and shipped globally. Rightly, getting this construction process completed has been the focus of the Astrohaus team over the past year.

During the many months of waiting for delivery of my Freewrite, I have purchased Cherry mechanical keyboards from both WASD and Das Keyboard (costing US$150 and more), and I use them during my day to day work and pleasure. There is nothing even remotely close to the pleasure of having Cherry MX switches under your fingertips (I prefer Clear and Brown varieties).

These mechanical keyboards can work with a Chromebook (costing US$300 or more) to produce a functionality similar to the Freewrite. But, then there are two pieces to be transported, and the whole package is not a single writing tool. Spending the time to juggle the pieces of the drafting package leads to further distractions, and the result is not substantially cheaper than the Freewrite.

The Astrohaus software game has been mediocre, as this article notes. Hopefully, getting the hardware out the door will allow them to focus on the many minor software shortcomings. As it is just software, it should be easy for them to provide OTA upgrades of the Freewrite to remedy the situation.