If you think the fake Blues are too tactile, DON'T get the Kailh box switches. Get the Leopold with MX Blues and don't look back. See you in 20 years.
Also, lube the stabs on anything you get, as well as you can, makes a big difference.
Box Royals, these are tactile not clicky, but might interest you, not always easy to find a board, but they exist.
Ah yeah, I heard I need to do this but this brings up another question for me. Where do I get Krytox 205g0? I know this is the most commonly recommended lube for switches and stabilizers but I cannot find it anywhere. I have seen 205g2 on Amazon but the reviews mention that it is much thicker than g0. Are there any alternatives that are easier to find.Krytox is good for plastic on plastic (switches and stabs), get some Super Lube from Amazon or your local auto parts store for plastic on metal (stabs). Krytox can be gotten from keyboard specialists and sometimes Amazon, but I'm not sure it's worth the price. I tend to use RC racing lubes which are easy to get locally. Those guys are super competitive and if Krytox was something magical they'd be using it, that said, it's very likely they are just under a different name. I've been meaning to look into it.
I am a little confused because I heard that Box Royals are way more tactile than Box Whites, and Box Jades are somewhere in between the two. I've heard very good things about the jades but I think I want something that isn't super tactile.
Are "modern" Cherry MX blues considered better than old ones? My old board was from around 2011, I think. So I am not sure if this is pre-retooling or after.
Sorry for all these questions, I really appreciate you guys helping me out with all of this advice.
Don't even worry about that stuff. Sincerely. Get the Leopold with MX Blues and don't look back. You know you like them, and Leopold makes good boards. Don't even lube the stabs. Buy it and forget about it.
I have used Outemu blues and they're my preferred Blue clone because they're louder and more tactile than Blues. You want MX Blues. Just get them and get them in a great keyboard.
Ignore the retooling. It's incredibly minor and not worth thinking about unless you're prepared to invest a lot of time and money and make this a hobby.
Let me give you an insight into the people on this forum, by talking about myself.
I have 25 different IBM Model M keyboards. Is there a difference? Basically, no. And you know what I did yesterday? I just bought a new one for no reason at all other than I didn't have a 122 Key 2nd Generation RJ-45 connector terminal board.
If that sounds like what you want to be, then by all means, try to create yourself a custom board with the ideal switches. To us, this is a hobby. To you, you're buying a tool.
What I am hearing from you is basically "hey I really loved my 2010 Honda Accord and I'm wondering if I should buy this 2020 Honda Accord or build some weird **** in my garage from China that probably won't work." We love the weird **** from China that probably won't work. We live for that. You want to drive a car/type on a keyboard that's good.
Buy the Accord. Buy the MX Blues in the good keyboard. They're the gold standard of keyboard switches because they're workhorses and bland. All we want here is something different. Any time something new or different comes out, we like it. Nobody cares about the MX Blues because they're the default, or they aren't perfectly polished, or the sound, or the smoothness and stuff. That's hobbyist bull****. Don't worry about it. Buy them and be happy. There's a reason they're the #1 switch. They're good for almost everyone.
As for Funkmons recommendation about the Leopold, it's not a stupid idea, you won't go wrong, the question is can you do better.
I disagree about the stabs though, noisy, rattling stabs have no place on a nice keyboard. He doesn't mind because he's on a Model M, you can't hear or feel anything over those switches.Show Image(https://cdn.geekhack.org/Smileys/solosmileys/laugh.gif)
I'm actually surprised by the general dislike of Outemu blues. I find them to be almost indistinguishable from Gateron blues, feeling much more consistent and crisp than MX. I certainly do not discount claims of their eventual lack of consistency though, as I have not typed on them extensively. I do have at least one board with them that has shined caps and wearing legends from the previous owner though, and they still feel much better than Cherry blues to me. I can certainly see how some may dislike how they sound, or their increased tactility, as that's all preference.
There seems to be a lot of confusion here on Kaihua's (Kailh's) box switches that should be cleared up. With Kailh's click bar switches, there are something like at least 3 different thicknesses of click bar available in stock form, with others being produced as replacements by stores like SPRiT (https://www.spritdesigns.com/product-page/clickbars). The jades and navies have the thickest OEM click bars, thus they're colloquially labeled "thick clicks". This makes them the most tactile clickies of the family, and probably of any modern switches manufactured. Box whites are on the low end of the spectrum in this regard. Their tactility is literally less than that of a Cherry MX blue. In terms of tactility, I would certainly put them below even that of box royals, and maybe even MX clears. The advantage they do have is that that tactility is very smooth, crisp, and consistent. Box clickies have a lot of flexibility in that regard, besides their feeling and sounding crisper and smoother than any other modern clicky I have yet experienced. I have yet to have had the pleasure of trying them, but I imagine that box pinks may be the closest member of the family to Cherry blues in terms of overall tactility, and will certainly sound much nicer to people who dislike high-pitched clicks.
Sound also varies greatly, if that matters. The jades and pinks (and maybe some of the less common variants) are satisfyingly bassy, which you do not see in other modern clickies, besides maybe Matias?
I'm actually surprised by the general dislike of Outemu blues. I find them to be almost indistinguishable from Gateron blues, feeling much more consistent and crisp than MX. I certainly do not discount claims of their eventual lack of consistency though, as I have not typed on them extensively. I do have at least one board with them that has shined caps and wearing legends from the previous owner though, and they still feel much better than Cherry blues to me. I can certainly see how some may dislike how they sound, or their increased tactility, as that's all preference.
Oh for sure, it's definitely personal taste. I actually think it's a more common for people to prefer Outemu blues over MX blues based on what I've read in a bunch of reviews. It's just for me I don't really enjoy the extra tactility and sound all that much. I think my crappy board also accentuates the sound, it has pretty significant ping. On a better keyboard I might enjoy them more.
I will say that there is a consistency issue. The first board I got from Amazon had pretty significant key chatter from the get-go and I sent it back. The replacement had some key chatter as well and I kind of made my peace with it and used it anyways. It's not horrifically common but it's something I've never experienced in 7+ years of using the Razer keyboard with the MX blues.
QuoteThere seems to be a lot of confusion here on Kaihua's (Kailh's) box switches that should be cleared up. With Kailh's click bar switches, there are something like at least 3 different thicknesses of click bar available in stock form, with others being produced as replacements by stores like SPRiT (https://www.spritdesigns.com/product-page/clickbars). The jades and navies have the thickest OEM click bars, thus they're colloquially labeled "thick clicks". This makes them the most tactile clickies of the family, and probably of any modern switches manufactured. Box whites are on the low end of the spectrum in this regard. Their tactility is literally less than that of a Cherry MX blue. In terms of tactility, I would certainly put them below even that of box royals, and maybe even MX clears. The advantage they do have is that that tactility is very smooth, crisp, and consistent. Box clickies have a lot of flexibility in that regard, besides their feeling and sounding crisper and smoother than any other modern clicky I have yet experienced. I have yet to have had the pleasure of trying them, but I imagine that box pinks may be the closest member of the family to Cherry blues in terms of overall tactility, and will certainly sound much nicer to people who dislike high-pitched clicks.
Sound also varies greatly, if that matters. The jades and pinks (and maybe some of the less common variants) are satisfyingly bassy, which you do not see in other modern clickies, besides maybe Matias?
Ah, I was confusing Box Royals with Box Navies. But man, that description of Box Whites makes me really want them again. I love how they sound from the videos I've seen. And them being even less tactile than MX blues sounds like something I'd enjoy as well.
I was finally set on getting the Leopold with MX blues but I'm kind of undecided again... I wish more mainstream boards had box switches. I had the same sentiment two years ago when I bought the Outemu board and I figured I'd use it as a holdover board til box whites became more readily available but it seems like I have not waited long enough.
A filco Majestouch2 TKL in switch of your pref on amazon the mx blue version is $127.80 right now...
I absolutely love my MT2 TKL (costar stabilizers so pwn' the cherry stabs on the leopold ..but that is "subjective") if you think you like cherry stabs better get the leopold or a Ducky.. if you are "sane" (joking) and prefer costar stabilizers then get the Filco and spend a bit more on a pbt key cap set for it..
I have $40~ Vortex PBT double shots on my MT2 and I love it.
I have to admit the GMMK thing does absolutely nothing for me personally... but meh.
my Filco ~5.5 years old now and going strong.
In their stock form I actually quite like Costar stabilizers on the Das Pro 4 I swapped box navies into, vs other boards I have with Cherry stabilizers. I may be an alien.Costar tend to rattle more, on a noisy keyboard that doesn't matter too much but on something quiet it sounds terrible.
In their stock form I actually quite like Costar stabilizers on the Das Pro 4 I swapped box navies into, vs other boards I have with Cherry stabilizers. I may be an alien.Costar tend to rattle more, on a noisy keyboard that doesn't matter too much but on something quiet it sounds terrible.
They're also much more of a hassle to install and remove keycaps.
It's not the end of the world but why deal with it if you don't have to?
Devil's advocate: My Uniteks are 30+-years-old and going strong. They were considered generic even then, and they have PCBs held to the lowest standard of QC that I have ever seen. My first K70 has seen 6+ years of almost daily use, and it is going strong. Some would have people believe that the LEDs and switches will start dropping like flies on them in less than a year.
I don't mean to diminish the obvious quality of revered brands, only the illusion that they're always the obvious choice.
Devil's advocate: My Uniteks are 30+-years-old and going strong. They were considered generic even then, and they have PCBs held to the lowest standard of QC that I have ever seen. My first K70 has seen 6+ years of almost daily use, and it is going strong. Some would have people believe that the LEDs and switches will start dropping like flies on them in less than a year.I too have some really old keyboards, but I've also seen quite a few reports of LEDs burning out, sometimes within a few weeks. Certain boards also seem to be prone to chatter, especially those with 1000 polling.
mine don't rattle on my filco (or enough to bother me.) and cherry stabilizers feel like the devils b*tthole....Costar work well right out of the box, just noisy. Quieting them is a challenge.
In their stock form I actually quite like Costar stabilizers on the Das Pro 4 I swapped box navies into, vs other boards I have with Cherry stabilizers. I may be an alien.Costar tend to rattle more, on a noisy keyboard that doesn't matter too much but on something quiet it sounds terrible.
They're also much more of a hassle to install and remove keycaps.
It's not the end of the world but why deal with it if you don't have to?
mine don't rattle on my filco (or enough to bother me.) and cherry stabilizers feel like the devils b*tthole....
Devil's advocate: My Uniteks are 30+-years-old and going strong. They were considered generic even then, and they have PCBs held to the lowest standard of QC that I have ever seen. My first K70 has seen 6+ years of almost daily use, and it is going strong. Some would have people believe that the LEDs and switches will start dropping like flies on them in less than a year.
I don't mean to diminish the obvious quality of revered brands, only the illusion that they're always the obvious choice.
fair enough.. my thoughts::: 30 years ago things built not that well were still built much better than things built not well now...
It isn't surprising that a K70 would last 6yrs.. but if you looked you'd probably find less people griping about failed Filco's than K70's?
For me I will always buy the nicest thing I can afford if it is something I'm going to use a lot.. personally I will also go out of my way to get a made in Taiwan keyboard vs a keyboard made in the mainland or elsewhere in asia.
Devil's advocate: My Uniteks are 30+-years-old and going strong. They were considered generic even then, and they have PCBs held to the lowest standard of QC that I have ever seen. My first K70 has seen 6+ years of almost daily use, and it is going strong. Some would have people believe that the LEDs and switches will start dropping like flies on them in less than a year.I too have some really old keyboards, but I've also seen quite a few reports of LEDs burning out, sometimes within a few weeks. Certain boards also seem to be prone to chatter, especially those with 1000 polling.
Certain processors and switches tend to be "noisy" and it doesn't take much to create false triggers, 1000mhz polling is asking too much from some of them so they trick it into ignoring any triggers after X number of ms. While this fixes it it defeats some of the reason for using 1000mhz polling so they try to keep it as low as possible and sometimes it bites them in the butt (the switches vary and can get noisier as they age). The right way to fix this is using a normally closed switch, this is how it's dealt with on machinery, unfortunately MX switches are only designed to be normally open, so were stuck using software hacks to fix a hardware and electronics flaw.
Bit of a sidetrack, but what's the appeal of GMMK? I've not kept abreast of new keyboard developments. Looks like the main selling point is hot swap switches? Is there more to it- what's build quality like?The appeal, it's a hot swap keyboard for $70 delivered (no switches or caps).
The appeal, it's a hot swap keyboard for $70 delivered (no switches or caps).
No idea on build quality (mine's across town), but it's probably on the lower end of decent board. I just want something to put switches in and try them before I solder them into something more permanent.
Not sure if anyone cares but I ended up deciding on the Leopold. Seems like the double shot keycaps are worth the price of admission alone based on what I've read.
I think at some point in the future I will try to get a switch tester with a bunch of different types and try building a custom, but for now having a nice solid board is more than good enough. Looking forward to getting it!
Not sure if anyone cares but I ended up deciding on the Leopold. Seems like the double shot keycaps are worth the price of admission alone based on what I've read.
I think at some point in the future I will try to get a switch tester with a bunch of different types and try building a custom, but for now having a nice solid board is more than good enough. Looking forward to getting it!
Not sure if anyone cares but I ended up deciding on the Leopold. Seems like the double shot keycaps are worth the price of admission alone based on what I've read.Awesome and congrats!
I think at some point in the future I will try to get a switch tester with a bunch of different types and try building a custom, but for now having a nice solid board is more than good enough. Looking forward to getting it!