Market for new mechanical keyboard

[TheRevTastic]

So I'm currently looking to move on from my Razer blackwidow ultimate that I got back in 2012 and wanting some suggestions for keyboards.

 

My only requirements are:

 

RGB (I like colors don't judge me)

Quiet

Mechanical

 

One of the ones I've been keeping my eye on is the Corsair K95 RGB with cherry mx.red switches.

 

I would really like a quiet typing keyboard with the mechanical feel for a few reasons, tired of hearing the click noise in videos I record or when I stream and it annoys my friends in discord (I dislike using push to talk for some reason)

[seon123]

Do you have a budget? Do you want tactile or linear switches?

Edited July 5, 2019 by seon123
Something something

[TheRevTastic]

15 minutes ago, seon123 said:

Do you have a budget? Do you want tactile or linear switches?

I do pretty much 50/50 for typing and gaming (typing is coding and just reddit and discord and some word documents). I'd say linear though as I do play some games that need the switches for actions in the game.

[HanZie82]

Have you ever felt the Logitech mechanical ones? 
They are a bit lighter and more silent too.

https://www.logitechg.com/en-us/innovation/mechanical-switches.html

[manikyath]

i have the corsair K95 with browns.. its in fact my first fully mechanical keyboard, and boy is it a disappointment.. if this is what mechanical keyboards are like, i'm going back to rubberdome once this thing kicks the bucket.

 

- the keycaps randomly pop off while typing

- the keycaps are ALL wearing around the edges, making light leak out and the edges feel rough.

- the software is awful.. it does have a lot of features, but seeminly half of them dont even work, and everything is so convoluted you can barely find the other half.

- the wrist rest, for inexplicable reasons, is slowly bending up in one corner..

- the cable to it is fatter than the power cable running my entire desktop, which is appareantly because of the passtrough.. which would be reasonable if it wasnt usb 2.0...

- some of the macro key functions are implemented REALLY poorly, i dont understand why a keyboard sending keystrokes via a macro ever has the option of not working like normal keystrokes.

- OH MY GOD MY KEYBOARD IS RAINBOW PUKE. every time the keyboard loses connection with the software, be it a software update, restarting your computer, shutting down your computer, it goes into rainbowpuke mode. if the pc is off the backlight goes blank.. until you accidentially bump a key, and it then goes rainbowpuke mode, again. 

 

its so infuriating i may actually end up getting a streamdeck (or spinning my own macro board..) and tossing this still quite new keyboard on the shelf in trade for *literally anything* else.

Just now, HanZie82 said:

Have you ever felt the Logitech mechanical ones? 
They are a bit lighter and more silent too.

https://www.logitechg.com/en-us/innovation/mechanical-switches.html

i'm so annoyed i cant find a logitech mechanical keyboard with macro keys...

[seon123]

56 minutes ago, TheRevTastic said:

I do pretty much 50/50 for typing and gaming (typing is coding and just reddit and discord and some word documents). I'd say linear though as I do play some games that need the switches for actions in the game.

 

1 hour ago, seon123 said:

Do you have a budget?

 

[TheRevTastic]

23 minutes ago, seon123 said:

 

 

Oops forgot to respond to that part, I'd like to spend anywhere from $150 to maybe $250.

[TheRevTastic]

1 hour ago, HanZie82 said:

Have you ever felt the Logitech mechanical ones? 
They are a bit lighter and more silent too.

https://www.logitechg.com/en-us/innovation/mechanical-switches.html

I have not but I can go down to the micro center near me and test them out, they have Logitech on display but not corsair

[Firewrath9]

perhaps try a das keyboard 5Q, heard those were great. I hate romer-g and razer green switches, much prefer kalih box switches and cherry mx.

[HanZie82]

7 hours ago, Firewrath9 said:

perhaps try a das keyboard 5Q, heard those were great. I hate romer-g and razer green switches, much prefer kalih box switches and cherry mx.

Well in the OP it was clearly stated that noise level is a factor so that why i said Romer-G might be a good choice since they are so much quieter then most Cherry switches.

[seon123]

19 hours ago, TheRevTastic said:

Oops forgot to respond to that part, I'd like to spend anywhere from $150 to maybe $250.

Check out the GMMK, Massdrop Ctrl Massdrop Alt and Gemini Dusk/Dawn. You can get silenced switches like the Gateron Silent Red or Zeal Healios. Check out KBDFans, Novelkeys and ZealPC. 

Those keyboards use actually decent keycaps, and not the absolute garbage that comes with the Corsair K95. 

Edited July 6, 2019 by seon123
Something something

[Firewrath9]

11 hours ago, HanZie82 said:

Well in the OP it was clearly stated that noise level is a factor so that why i said Romer-G might be a good choice since they are so much quieter then most Cherry switches.

well the gamma zulu (same OEM (Omron) as Romer-G) is a brown ripoff, so it should be relatively quiet. There's always O-rings too.

[b emoji]

12 hours ago, HanZie82 said:

Well in the OP it was clearly stated that noise level is a factor so that why i said Romer-G might be a good choice since they are so much quieter then most Cherry switches.

No? They're not much quieter 
 

 

45 minutes ago, Firewrath9 said:

well the gamma zulu (same OEM (Omron) as Romer-G) is a brown ripoff, so it should be relatively quiet. There's always O-rings too.

Well one, it's not a mx brown ripoff, it shares no common parts with cherry switches, it has a totally different leaf,slider, housing design, heck it even has a different pin layout. It even has different tactile characteristics compared to mx (though it's quite a stretch to call romer g or cherry browns tactile), stop calling everything remotely tactile a cherry brown ripoff. You may as well call mx brown a beamspring ripoff. 

Also, romer g and the gamma zulu switch both use the b3k mount which doesn't allow for use of orings. Also, orings only dampen the downstroke, and makes the board feel terrible as it reduces travel and makes the bottoming out mushy and doesn't reduce the noise that much, silent switches and qmk/zeal clips are much better solutions. 

 

20 hours ago, Firewrath9 said:

perhaps try a das keyboard 5Q, heard those were great. I hate romer-g and razer green switches, much prefer kalih box switches and cherry mx.

220+ usd for a plastic keyboard with terrible switches, gimmicks and terrible caps that you can't replace with much higher quality ones with? I don't think that's great by any definition. Also if you hate romer g why'd you recommend it 
 

[b emoji]

1 hour ago, seon123 said:

Check out the GMMK, Massdrop Ctrl Massdrop Alt and Gemini Dusk/Dawn. You can get silenced switches like the Gateron Silent Red or Zeal Healios. Check out KBDFans, Novelkeys and ZealPC. 

Those keyboards use actually decent keycaps, and not the absolute garbage that comes with the Corsair K95. 

Don't get normal gateron silent switches, they have a weird sticking issue and are quite inconsistent. If you are getting the zeal switches you will need to clip the pcb mount legs as those pcbs dont support them

[Firewrath9]

3 minutes ago, b emoji said:

No? They're not much quieter 
 

 

Well one, it's not a mx brown ripoff, it shares no common parts with cherry switches, it has a totally different leaf,slider, housing design, heck it even has a different pin layout. It even has different tactile characteristics compared to mx (though it's quite a stretch to call romer g or cherry browns tactile), stop calling everything remotely tactile a cherry brown ripoff. You may as well call mx brown a beamspring ripoff. 

Also, romer g and the gamma zulu switch both use the b3k mount which doesn't allow for use of orings. Also, orings only dampen the downstroke, and makes the board feel terrible as it reduces travel and makes the bottoming out mushy and doesn't reduce the noise that much, silent switches and qmk/zeal clips are much better solutions. 

 

220+ usd for a plastic keyboard with terrible switches, gimmicks and terrible caps that you can't replace with much higher quality ones with? I don't think that's great by any definition. Also if you hate romer g why'd you recommend it 
 

Becuase some people like romer-g, and the 5Q has some cool features, but overall I'd reccommend a GMMK w/ Kalih Box Reds as those are imo the best switches out of the box. (hahahah)(without lubing or anything like that, I've heard box switches are hard to lube)

[b emoji]

1 minute ago, Firewrath9 said:

Becuase some people like romer-g, and the 5Q has some cool features, but overall I'd reccommend a GMMK w/ Kalih Box Reds as those are imo the best switches out of the box. (hahahah)(without lubing or anything like that, I've heard box switches are hard to lube)

They're more gimmicks than features, and for 250usd you would expect a lot more. Also das forum moderators are big assholes, they banned a dude once for recommending someone to use a free to use open source software for a feature das didn't provide, das said they wanted this board to be open source and driven by the community but their actions opposite this. Also box switches aren't necessarily hard to lube, but there is little incentive to as they are already factory lubed and there is little to no benefit to lube them.