Mechanical Keyboards...

The sound of bottoming out can be easily mitigated with O ring. Thee come in a variety of thicknesses. I have heard of some gamers who will have brown switches for every key, except the WASD keys. Those will be reds.

 

Orings do nothing for the return stroke though.

A slider with soft bumpers - like MX silent, but there's better - is way more effective.

 

I'm lucky that my wife doesn't complain about my keyboard. Well, usually.

 

You can't just drop this and not mention the name

 

Oh sorry.

Its a guy called Gazzew, and he worked with Outemu to make a line known as Boba switches.

Look for Bobagum Silent Linear.

 

After using Browns for a while (from both Cherry and Gatreon), I have now settled on the Clears. I use Cherry Clears in one keyboard (vanilla Keychron K6 with swappable switches) and Halo Clears in another (Drop ALT). I also use MT3 profile PBT caps on both. For the Keychron, I had to open it up and put some Neoprene in there to dampen its plastic case.

 

@batriq and others

I use a Leopold keyboard with Cherry Browns and like it, although I find it is too common for me to double tap the intended key or to register an adjacent key due to the force required to activate.

I know clears take a bit more force to register. Has anyone had this issue and did it improve when moving to clears?

 

The one with consistent pressure or the one where it's heavier in the middle?

 

I couldn't agree more, I do have a love of Topre, love it so much, I have seven of 'em, including my fav, the Realforce 104UB 55G....keyboards on left and down are:
CoolerMaster Nova Touch TKL (with Miami keycaps)
Leopold F660C (I also have the F660M which is the Cherry MX version of same keyboard)
CoolerMaster Nova Touch TKL (with very colorful Galaxy themed keycaps)

On right and down:
Top two are HHKB Pro 2
Topre RealForce 103UB 55G




I did say seven, but there're just six in my pic above, I'd totally forgotten about my Topre Type Heaven, I'd taken the pic below after keeping my other keyboards, was using the 104UB at the time...


Yes, I know, I only have two hands, why so many keyboards (not counting my Cherry MX keyboards, together with the Topre keyboards, I think I have about 20), it's a damn bad habit of mine sliding down the slippery. Same goes with my headphone collection, and my watches....


Anyway, I'd ordered some artisan and PBT keycaps for my Ducky YotS, Fire 69 and 78 Edition, will post pics after I've swapped out the keycaps.

 

Yes, I do not have an issue with double tapping using the Cherry Clears. For the space bar, I use a Halo Clear switch. The space bar I use is PBT and quite thick, and with a Cherry Clear, the switch didn't reset fully or often resulted in double taps.

 

There's a huge Mechanical Keyboards group at work, so pre-pandemic I tried a Topre keyboard. Keys felt fine, but it had black-on-black keycaps -- yuck -- and it was a tiny 60% thing.

The guy who owned it said there wasn't a 104-key version, so I've continued to use my Das 4 battleship. But this Realforce 104UB you're talking about looks nice.

Only thing is, I hit the keys really hard, so Das and Model M work for me but lightweight flexy keyboards don't. How solid is the frame of that Realforce?

 

Wish I could, but I'm in Asia, the shipping fee alone would kill off any price advantage or discount I could give. Although the vast majority of my Topre are 45G, as mentioned, the Topre RealForce 103UB 55G is my personal fav. I'd referred to it previously as 104UB 55G but then realized mine is the 103 key version as there's no 104UB 55G (except in Korea I think). The 104UB has 4 keys on right of spacebar, as you can see, mine has only three keys (missing an additional Windows key as you can see directly above it on the Topre/Ducky Type Heaven.

You're prolly referring to the HHKB Pro 2 as in my 1st pic, I'd swapped the black keycaps on the black one onto the white one, and vice versa.

Please note that my RealForce is the 103UB 55G as covered above, the 104UB does not feature 55G weighted Topre switch. As for build quality, it's a solid board, I have a Filco Majestouch and various Ducky keyboards, It feels as sturdy if not more so than them. Topre Realforce keyboards usually come with dye-sub PBT keycaps and these last much longer than ABS keycaps which tend to shine quite easily. Here's a quick but old review article made in 2010 by c/net:
https://www.cnet.com/reviews/realforce-103ub-55g-black-review/

 

When I first started down on the slippery keyboard slope, I tried a few Cherry MX switches, found an almost instant dislike for Red as I tend to make more typos with it (yes, I acknowledge I suck at typing), fell in love with Brown and Black. I then realized that with the Brown, it was a short torrid affair and I soon fell outta love with it because it felt 'mushy' after a while. I then discovered Green, Clear and White, and loved 'em all. I have all Cherry MX Green keyboards and all Cherry MX Black keyboards, as well as some special Ducky keyboards with a mix of various Cherry MX switches in each, like the Fire 69 and 78 Edition.

AS for Clear, I like the greater force required to activate the switch, and have no issue with double tap as I do tend to strike the keys with a certain amount of force, hence my preference for heavier switch types.

 

I use a Topre keyboard, the Realforce R2 55g(I decided the r3 is a downgrade aesthetically) and it is easily the heaviest keyboard I've ever bought. Doesn't make me type faster but it does feel better and I am more precise. Im told there is a plate inside for rigidity.

 

Fear my l337 skillz, rocking Logitech G915 Clickys.

I actually couldn't care less about any of the gamer features, but really wanted mechanical switches and wireless, and there simply aren't a lot of options. And I've grown to love the short actuation and travel. Going back to my older Cherry brown and blue keyboards feels like suuuuuuch a looooooooong distance.

 

I think my issue with how I type is that I hit other keys and the low 1mm or so actuation distance coupled with a rather light force for the Browns causes problem. When I think back at all the decades of using keyboards it makes sense to me that I need greater travel and greater force to minimize errors. Or I need to use some typing apps to improve brain and finger coordination.

I did use IBM keyboards and sold IBM PCs, XTs, and ATs when they came out and did like those keyboards. But decades of cheap membrane keyboards with their higher force and longer travel to get the mushy activation must be hard for me to disassociate.

From my cursory research it seems that Topres might also have a low actuation travel distance as well. Is this correct and if so any alternates for longer travel?

 

For the reasons you listed, I built a Winkeyless B.87 Ex (unfortunately, they are on extended hiatus) with CherryMX Greens (~80cN) for my typing keyboard. I am a heavy typer and would fat-finger too many times on my gaming keyboard (Ducky One TKL with CherryMX Browns). I didn't have too many issues with double tapping by mistake. My typing gets heavier the more I get into the writing so I do not even notice the heavy force needed for the Greens.

I made a custom layout for my keyboard with CherryMX Greens for any key that I hit with all fingers except the pinky. The keys I hit with my pinky have Gateron Blues to make them easier to activate. I originally had CherryMX blues, but the quality of the blues were very poor, and I had to scrap all of them (not clicky or uneven spring force). The Gaterons were every uniform.

 

I bought 6 keyboard in town and brought them all home to try side by side. Ended up with an Apex Pro TKL! I really love it.

It's amazing how different each board felt despite very similar or same switches.