I bought this thing about a year ago for like 17 bucks off eBay. At the time I thought it looked cool but I was pretty disappointed by the quality of the switches and the keycaps so it was a no brainer that I would eventually do a pretty big mod job on it. I took Covid for me to finally get around to it. Most of the ideas for this I got off Walker's keyboard science.
First thing I did was give it come extra weight with some tire balance weights. This is one of the best idea's I got off Walker. Honestly, I do it to almost all of my plastic keyboards now. It just makes them feel and sound sooo good.
Next, I had to figure out what switches to put in them. I'm not usually a fan of linear switches but I felt like this build called for it. It originally had Cherry MX Reds which are some of my least favorites. They are scratchy and far too light. So I wanted to put good linear switch in it but didn't want to waste my best switches in it since I consider this to be a kind of crappy board.
SO, I figured, I've got the leftovers from building my Holy Pandas, why not use those? So, I give you the... Trash Halos? They are actually a halfway decent switch to type on. I think the leftover springs I had were 62g. After lubing them with Krytox 1514 VPF oil they actually felt pretty great. Don't get me wrong, they're nothing like tealios. If you listen closely, you can still feel some scratchiness but as you're typing they're about as smooth as you could reasonablly ask. Maybe 85 to 90% as good as tealios?
Next, I thought why not glitz it up with a bit of gold spray paint to make the plate pop? I love the look of a good brass plate. Actually turned out quite well. I thought about spray painting the case too, mostly cause I hated the logo, But I couldn't think of anything that would look good.
Here's the part that was new for me. I can't remember what Walter used but I had gasket maker laying around and put it between the switches between two sheets of plastic wrap. This is the part I was most skeptical about. How much difference could it really make? But I figured I'd go for it. In the end, I think it helped a lot with the sound and feel. The board has a super nice popping sound I don't think I've heard before unless I'm watching Taeha type. Then I squished the PCB on it and let it dry with a few clamps on it.
While that dried, I stuck a layer of drawer liner in and picked out my keycaps.
I knew I needed something to go with the (in my opinion) ugly DSI logo and perhaps the "bloody mess of carnage" that was drying between my new, erm, trash halos.
For me there was only one choice...
Hey, wait, this is actually starting to look kind of cool...
Dang! Did not expect that!
Ok, so this thing looks, sounds and feels pretty sweet. Hmm, maybe I should have actually put some good switches in it...
Ok, now that I've used it a while, these switches actually feel pretty... um, great! I'm very surprised. Not quite lubed tealio level but pretty dang close.