Mechanical Keyboards- Justify this please?????

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Serious Hardware/Software Crap > Mechanical Keyboards- Justify this please?????

General Specific: Jun 22, 2007; I had one of those, but the front wheel fell off and I had to get rid of it.

I assembled my first custom keyboard this weekend.
Phantom PCB/Plate, Kailh Gold switches, and a black aluminum case that didn't come close to fitting together until I cut and sanded a spare Mini-USB cable plug to size, because the back part of the case is almost flush with the top of the internal Mini-USB port.
This was my first time doing any actual soldering and it wasn't bad once I got the hang of it.
I eventually need to swap out the 100 ohm resistors for the Caps/Scroll Lock LEDs with something stronger because they're as bright as flashlights.

# ¿ Sep 6, 2017 18:54

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# ¿ Apr 26, 2024 20:31

General Specific: Jun 22, 2007; I had one of those, but the front wheel fell off and I had to get rid of it.

I got a V60 Matias Mini a while back (https://www.massdrop.com/buy/35911) and it's been a great keyboard to throw in a backpack and use at work, but the spacebar is warped enough (despite being ABS) that I can't get both stabilizer clips to stay down.
Is there any reliable source of keycaps for ALPS stems? Or am I going to have to harvest an AT101 for a PBT set and memorize the Fn shortcuts?

# ¿ Feb 14, 2018 20:35

General Specific: Jun 22, 2007; I had one of those, but the front wheel fell off and I had to get rid of it.

A friend lent me his dev/tty set to check out.

These are an SA profile variant, with thick PBT and dyesub legends. They have a great feel and sound, and the build quality is very nice, but the spherical shape of the caps takes some getting used to. It feels like the surface your fingers actually touch is fairly small with well-defined dished edges compared to other keycap profiles, so you don't really slide around much between keys as you type.
It's not totally evident from the picture but the number row and especially the Esc/F key row are very tall, and the curve is optimized for having a good wrist rest, since it also curves up on the bottom more than usual.

On Kailh Gold stems the keys wiggle laterally quite a bit, especially the taller ones. This sort of profile seems like it would be great on something like the Box switches, if they actually reduce lateral movement like I've heard they do.

# ¿ Mar 5, 2018 16:19

General Specific: Jun 22, 2007; I had one of those, but the front wheel fell off and I had to get rid of it.

pgroce posted:

Typing on these right now, on a New Poker II with Blues. There's definitely wiggle, but not more than with the stock caps for the Poker, afaict. I have a White Fox coming with the new Hako True switches, which are Box variants, so it will be interesting to compare. (They'll also let me experience the vertiginous heights of the function keys.)

Worth noting: If you don't like the curve on the bottom, the set also contains duplicate keys for the bottom row with a flatter profile.

When I first got the set, I put the space bar on backwards by accident. I left it like that for a while and may switch it back, it felt surprisingly nice to have a space bar that curved down sharply.

This is my first aftermarket keycap set, and it's pretty much spoiled me for the old caps on the Poker II, which are much thinner PBT. I'm tempted to pick up another copy of dev/tty, the drop is open again. I'm mostly likely going to wait for financial reasons, though. In my perfect world there's be another run of Dasher and I could pick those up and have two different retromod keyboards at home and at work.

Yeah, the wiggle isn't anything particular to these caps. It's just as noticeable as I expected with regular MX stems and taller than normal caps. I find it a bit crazy that these are both PBT and a nonstandard custom mold, and they're still cheaper than the proliferation of $150 ABS sets. I've been contemplating joining the second drop of these to build an Ergodox with them.

e. Hopefully they've got production sorted out and this drop won't take half a year to deliver.

# ¿ Mar 5, 2018 18:15

General Specific: Jun 22, 2007; I had one of those, but the front wheel fell off and I had to get rid of it.

Eric the Mauve posted:

Keep working at it, my young friends, and one day you will graduate to God's Only Switch, the buckling spring

Someone could earn a fortune by making a standalone MX stem/PCB-compatible buckling spring switch.

# ¿ Apr 2, 2018 01:50

General Specific: Jun 22, 2007; I had one of those, but the front wheel fell off and I had to get rid of it.

I have a Plum 87 and it feels like the switch/stabilizer positions are slightly off from the Cherry layout; I can fit a Tai-Hao PBT spacebar but it sticks down when pressed. The same spacebar works fine on a regular Cherry switch/stab setup.

# ¿ May 18, 2018 15:05

General Specific: Jun 22, 2007; I had one of those, but the front wheel fell off and I had to get rid of it.

Exit Strategy posted:

I grew up on a combination of beamspring and buckling-spring IBM keyboards and good Alps-switched Mac keyboards. My home machines were Macs for an embarrassingly long time.

When XDA Oblique launched, I jumped on that. Dixie Mech tells me they're packing the sets up and getting ready to ship this week.

I decided I should make a set for my home board, too, but didn't want to spend another hundo-plus.

Behold, I have access to a CO2 laser:

I'm leaving this set black-on-black. Another set of PBT DSAs have been ordered from SP to make a "final" set that'll have light-grey epoxy fill.

This makes me wonder what a keyboard would look like with ornate woodcut style legends on the keycaps:

# ¿ Apr 10, 2019 16:43

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# ¿ Apr 26, 2024 20:31

General Specific: Jun 22, 2007; I had one of those, but the front wheel fell off and I had to get rid of it.

pgroce posted:

Pretty much my exact experience with the Navies. There�s something about them that generates fatigue, but the action is worth it, and makes my Poker II with Blues feel wobbly and cheap.

FWIW, I put lighter weighted NovelKeys click bar switches (forget the color and I�m phone posting) on some of the keys I hit with my pinky, but I don�t feel like they are any easier to press than the ones with Navies, even with my other fingers. (The Jades on the space bar and control keys do feel harder though.)

There may be something to the idea that the click bar switches are perceptually harder to press even though the force applied is lower. Cue someone building �psychoergonomic� switches and this hobby getting one step closer to audiophile pseudoscience.

Maybe it's the difference in friction/force required between clickbar and jacket switches when the switch is pressed at a slight angle (as opposed to straight vertical testing with a force curve measuring setup).

# ¿ May 11, 2019 15:19

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Serious Hardware/Software Crap > Mechanical Keyboards- Justify this please?????