Looking for a good deal on Cherry switches ..

[MrFex]

Hey,

I have keyboard with Kailh blue's and want to replace them with blacks. I've been looking to buy a bag of 70 or more black Cherry MX switches. One of the things I found was this site, a DIY keyboard that sells switches for $45 per 70 pcs.

https://shop.clueboard.co/MX-Switches-for-Clueboard-66-70-pack.html

Do you have better sources? I think this price is okay but perhaps it could be better. Also this vendor is from the US and I would prefer buying in europe because of shipping time and costs. Hope to hear from you guys,

Thanks

[SpAmRaY]

Edit: Sorry missed the Europe part...maybe someone familiar with that part of the world will chime in.

But for those CONUS

 www.mechanicalkeyboards.com

70 cherry MX switches are $49.50 with free shipping CONUS but they are only $0.50/switch IF you buy 100 or more, you have to add to cart then increase the quantity, they sell them by quantities of 10 which can be confusing.

[kohi]

or you could always find an old cherry board off ebay and harvest the vintage blacks in them? you'll probably end up with enough switches for a full keyboard and it'll be like $30 shipped (depending on where you live) if you're lucky. there might be some shipping from europe so keep a look out for them I guess


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[klennkellon]

you can guy gateron blacks (far superior to mx blacks) from https://mechanicalkeyboards.com/

[MrFex]

Edit: Sorry missed the Europe part...maybe someone familiar with that part of the world will chime in.

But for those CONUS

 www.mechanicalkeyboards.com

70 cherry MX switches are $49.50 with free shipping CONUS but they are only $0.50/switch IF you buy 100 or more, you have to add to cart then increase the quantity, they sell them by quantities of 10 which can be confusing.

Thanks. I tried this and indeed the switches are 0.50 usd if you add enough to your cart. I suppose the webshop could be more transparent about this. Because they have such amazing artisan keycaps I will probably get them there. Maybe throw in an extra Ducky shine keycap set. Thanks a lot for the tip!

As for re-purposing a vintage model, I thought of that hojunski. Thanks for the suggestion. I'd like to install some new switches though, this will be my first attempt at something like this, so baby steps

[MrFex]

you can guy gateron blacks (far superior to mx blacks) from https://mechanicalkeyboards.com/

Would you care to elaborate on that comment?! Is that a widely accepted statement? What are your personal experiences and why to you consider them to be superior? Is it the buttery smoothness I keep hearing about? Reason I am asking is because I *thought* Cherry MX Blacks were really good. I have a single board with black switches and I love them. I can't decide between brown and black. Time will have to tell.

Thanks for the reply. I might grab some of those to be able to compare. I noticed them at Corus-kb too.

[klennkellon]

you can guy gateron blacks (far superior to mx blacks) from https://mechanicalkeyboards.com/

Would you care to elaborate on that comment?! Is that a widely accepted statement? What are your personal experiences and why to you consider them to be superior? Is it the buttery smoothness I keep hearing about? Reason I am asking is because I *thought* Cherry MX Blacks were really good. I have a single board with black switches and I love them. I can't decide between brown and black. Time will have to tell.

Thanks for the reply. I might grab some of those to be able to compare. I noticed them at Corus-kb too.

Gaterons are much smoother than Cherry, especially MX Blacks which are considered to be the worst roughest and scratchiest Cherry switch.

If you took a NIB Gateron board next to a MX Black board, the Gaterons would be considerably smoother.

[kohi]

Gaterons are much smoother than Cherry, especially MX Blacks which are considered to be the worst roughest and scratchiest Cherry switch.

If you took a NIB Gateron board next to a MX Black board, the Gaterons would be considerably smoother.

yep, this ^
new mx black switches will be scratchy, which is why I suggested harvesting some vintage blacks which are really smooth.
new gateron black switches are a good alternative and are said to be as smooth as vintage blacks, and a bit cheaper as well? if you want them to be even smoother, you'd have to lube them with something like krytox 103.

[katushkin]

There is a deskthority thread where you can buy a large amount of cherry switches. They were a lot cheaper for me (UK) than buying from mk.com. I think they are shipped from Germany but I'm not sure. It's in the Group Buy sub-forum.

[MrRooks]

I agree on Gateron. Smoother than Cherry and less hassle than vintage which isn't any smoother, just carries the "vintage" title. The newer black bottom clear top Gaterons can be had on ebay and I think some other places.

[Keycap]

Searching for vintage MX Blacks is somewhat risky. Typically the average person will buy some cheapo Wyse board off of eBay and expect it to have vintage MX Blacks but the chances of getting a whole board full of them are very low. Most Wyse boards on eBay will have a mixture of both vintage and new MX. Plus, there's no stable proof that vintage MX Blacks are smoother.

I suggest going with Gateron Blacks. Cheaper, much smoother and you can easily find them in new condition.

[khirin]

I'm looking for MX Blacks too. Thanks for you guys info. Might be looking for Gateron Blacks instead.

[NewbieOneKenobi]

Given that time, too, is money, chances are your best option is to simply find a cheap keyboard or two to cannibalize. If you aren't exclusively after vintage blacks, there should be enough cheap offers from e-tailers on low-cost gaming boards (or point-of-sale boards; those may be even cheaper) and/or promo deals of all sorts.

[davkol]

7bit @ Deskthority: €0.65 per new MX switch

Or harvest from old keyboards, or post in the classifieds, because other people have done so.