Mechanical switch keyboards: Worth it?

That’s actually pretty cool, and if you’re a touch-typist, why not?

Yeah, replace that with a Zerg theme from Starcraft and I’d be down for $200. I mean, at least an IOU for $200. Which is just about the same thing!

My first thought was that it was Klingon. I think I might be forgiven for that:

A Klingon keyboard would be kind of cool. But in practice, even though I’m a touch typist, I seem to need the proper symbols in my peripheral vision.

Ah neat. I would go for an Ultima Runic Alphabet one if I could :).

Woah, as a replacement for my 1.5 year old Corsair K95 that had two of its LEDs die I ended up getting a K95 RGB, “noice.”

goes and checks his K95

damn

Hehe. How old is yours? I’d bought mine in August of 2013 and it first lost one of the macro key LEDs, then the ESC key LED.

Now I have to decide whether I want to use the K95 RGB or the K70 with MX Blues with audible click. I like the audible click and the tactile feedback but find the blues require a bit too much force to activate.

Hmm, the only thing I’m not liking about the K95 RGB is that it has no USB pass through. Luckily my monitor has four ports so I don’t want for any, but still, the older Corsair Vengeance K95 had such a port.

EDIT and update: In the end, I decided to stick with the K95 RGB with the Cherry MX Reds and send the K70 with the MX Blues back. I felt the Blues just required too much activation force for me and it was especially obnoxious when gaming.

Did anyone buy any cool mechanical keyboards lately? How’s the new razer’s new switch? Or that Gateron new comer switch?

Nope, my Filco from 2011 is still fine.

The ASDW printing wore off a while ago, but it’s not like we don’t know where those keys are by now.

For some reason C wore off as well, which is strange because I don’t play games where I need to crouch.

Yep, the ol Metallic Blue from 2011 is great for me, as well. Even the cheapo Topre-based keyboard work bought me last year is pretty old hat. . . but not a lot of room in the ol’ budget to blow on vanity keyboards at this stage ;)

Yikes, I can’t stand worn out keys. Get a replacement key caps. I think they don’t cost a bomb. That’s the beauty of a mech keyboard. These caps are replaceable.

Maybe you are typing the word “SCAD” a lot.

I’ve been using a Razer Blackwidow Stealth with the new switches. Just the basic version, with none of the flashy backlighting. It’s the first mechanical keyboard I’ve owned since my old clicky AT keyboard, so I don’t have a real basis for comparison with its contemporaries. I love it though; the keys/switches feel terrific, and the keyboard as a whole seems sturdy and well-made.

I didn’t know that Razer sold keyboards without flashy lights, which is a big kudos to them. Those lightnings are nice but the novelty wears off in a very short time, at least for me. And the keycaps for those with backlighting are painted on and fades easily - so, I’m curious as to the type of keycaps in your Razer. Are you able to share a photo?

My phone takes terrible photos, especially close-up. I can’t get a decent picture, sorry.

I can tell you that it looks exactly like the backlit versions in layout and style. The caps are black with white lettering. Every reference I can find about them says that they are laser-etched ABS caps. I’ve had the KB for about 6 months with no fading, for what that’s worth.

So my grifiti pad is starting to peel up on the edges. It doesn’t really affect comfort/use but just looks kind of bad. Is there any way to repair it? Maybe some sort of glue that won’t change the feel or make it hard?

Don’t have any magic tips on the peeling front, though I can say that after a couple of years of heavy use, I’ve actually started to wear way the corners of mine where my arms lie when typing. Mind you, it’s a slight slope down toward the corner that’s a little over an inch across at its widest point, so it’s not that big of a deal, but I guess, tragically, I must admit that Grifitis aren’t invulnerable.

On the flipside, $10-15 for what’ll probably be a 3-4-year product (for me) isn’t bad, all told.

So I decided to contact Grifiti with links to pics and just asked if they knew an easy way to fix them. They instead just shipped me new ones for FREE!!! They said they have a stock of ones with slight blemishes to the logo’s so they can’t sell them. I just got them and they look fine to me. How awesome is that!

Terror.

Spilled some diet Pepsi on my keyboard last night. Just. Horror. The Corsair R90 my wife got me for Christmas last year. THIS IS WHY I CAN’T HAVE NICE THINGS.

Thankfully, I unplugged it immediately from USB and brought it up to sink where I sprayed it down with water (I didn’t leave it under the tap or anything, I used the hose thingy) and then I used canned air and a dry cloth to dry it up, then I used a hair dryer.

I plugged it back in and things seemed fine. The lights were still working, every key worked, nothing felt sticky or “off”. Then the 5555555555555 dammit. Just kidding. The 5 kept being input, despite the key not actually being depressed (I was the one that was depressed). Both 5 keys seemed fine. I rebooted. Big mistake. Had a helluva time logging in. :)

I pulled out the canned air and sprayed and found it was still a little wet, so I tried the 5 keys and plugged it in, now the space bar was behaving the same way. Canned air again, and THEN everything seemed okay. I unplugged it and let it sit another hour or so, and it seemed fine and continues to behave normally, so yay for the resilience of mechanical keyboards!

Scary.

You sprayed a mechanical keyboard with water? Is that the recommended procedure? I’ve heard of doing that with cheapo membrane type keyboards.

But hey if it still works, congratulations!