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geekhack Community => New Members => Topic started by: Mohfuu on Thu, 28 August 2014, 07:29:03
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Hi everyone
I've been lurking around here and trying to absorb as much knowledge about keyboards as I can because I've been considering acquiring a taste for mechanical keyboards. I'm a nineties kid and my parents (dad engineer and mom economist) were pretty early on with the whole computer thing, and I have vague memories of typing commands into DOS as a child on what was probably a buckling spring keyboard (I assume from my limited grasp).
Of course nowadays these membrane keyboards are being peddled with every PC purchase and seem to have become the standard outfit. I don't exactly hate membrane keyboards because I think I've just begrudgingly gotten used to them but I do miss keys that have a bit of bounce/resistance too them.
That being said, I'm a gamer, but I do a bit of typing as well, I don't think I would like linear switches and I know I don't like clicky, if there is one thing I like about membrane it is the silence. I have a friend that uses a mechanical keyboard (not sure what kind of switches) but every time my gaming buds and I are on Skype, he always gets **** for using that keyboard (I have to admit it annoys me as well).
So I'm wondering, is there anything out there that is as silent as possible and resembles buckling spring? I just want something that feels very tactile with as little noise as possible.
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Welcome to Geekhack!
You might want to look into the following:
- Floss modding a buckling spring board
- Stock MX Browns, Stock MX Clears or modified Clears
- Matias quiet switches, dampened cream Alps, Orange Alps, or Salmon/Pink Alps
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Welcome!
I second the suggestion for stock browns. They are nice and quite to type on, but not linear. I myself have tried the floss mod on a Model M, and it did make it much, much quieter. However, during the process I accidentally caused some damage by pulling the caps off without a proper key puller - so lesson there, always use a keycap puller! I'm still kicking myself over that one.
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Thanks for the guidance, and please excuse my late reply.
Is there any place you would recommend I learn more about Alps?
I've been trying to understand as much as I can about MX switches and I've also come to the conclusion that I'll either go for Browns or Clears but I think I might be leaning more to Clear simply because they're just a bit heavier, would I be correct in assuming that the Clears are slightly louder simply because they're a bit heavier?
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Welcome to Geekhack!
For a fairly definitive resource about Alps, you can look here: http://deskthority.net/wiki/Category:Alps_switches
And there is GH's Alps Appreciation Thread (http://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=45456.0).
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Thanks Rowdy.
This is pretty comprehensive and awesome, I wish I had known about this sooner.
Looks like I'll be reading a bit more before I finally make up my mind.
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Hello fellow new member. Unfortunately I can't give you advice since I'm pretty new to this as well, but it's nice to see other people's interest in the same thing.
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Thanks Rowdy.
This is pretty comprehensive and awesome, I wish I had known about this sooner.
Looks like I'll be reading a bit more before I finally make up my mind.
With all the Alps options, do you really think you will be able to make up your mind?
Most people don't even get to try all the MX switches (about 8 or 9 of them),m never mind the dozens and dozens of Alps variants! :p