Mechanical Keyboard Club!

[Dr0y]

13 hours ago, HelpfulTechWizard said:

So, IDK if this is the best place to ask, but is the Reddragon K552 any good? It has "red" switches. The reviews seem mixed. Some think it's a great build, and sturdy, others say it breaks quickly. Does anyone hare have experience with it?

I have the outemu blue switches and those are horrible and really really loud ... I prefer the mx cherry blue over outemu blue any days ... That being said, I've never tried the outemu red but if they are even close to the blue well they will be loud even tho they are not clicky ... it's not the click that makes the switch loud in that case but every other noise that's coming out of them and specially the spring ping metallic reverberating sound. 

 

As for the build quality it's quite sturdy with basically no flex and the rubber feet are good enough so that the board don't move on the desk.  The case does tend to reverb a bit which contribute to the general loudness of the board. The keycaps are abs and if you have the rgb version it got ok lighting ... Last time I checked there was no software for that keyboard except on the Brazilian website. 

 

I paid my k552 35$ at canada computer and got the white version no led at all with swapable outemu blue switches.  If you don't mind loud keyboard go for it ...

[DailyProcrastinator]

10 hours ago, Nowak said:

Excuse me, Gateron, Outemu and Kailh are not "knock off" switches... especially when they're higher quality than Cherry's own offerings.

 

In this case, Outemu is fairly standard in cheaper boards. They aren't amazing especially compared to Kailh and Gateron offerings, but they're still better than Cherry MX lol

I realize that hahaha, but the typical gaming board almost always has Cherry MX "something", calling a switch red switches is an indicator that it is not that any of those. I am aware that most clones are superior, but Outemus in particular seem to be defined as 'cheap' Cherry MX clones. Switch feeling is so personal anyways, for gaming they are probably fine. My mistake for calling them 'knock off' haha.

 

I still recommend an overall higher quality board. Quality control and the lack of warranty would be my concern. That said might be hard to beat for the price.

[Nowak]

35 minutes ago, TheDailyProcrastinator said:

I realize that hahaha, but the typical gaming board almost always has Cherry MX "something", calling a switch red switches is an indicator that it is not that any of those. I am aware that most clones are superior, but Outemus in particular seem to be defined as 'cheap' Cherry MX clones. Switch feeling is so personal anyways, for gaming they are probably fine. My mistake for calling them 'knock off' haha.

 

I still recommend an overall higher quality board. Quality control and the lack of warranty would be my concern. That said might be hard to beat for the price.

I did look up the board, and it did identify the switches as being made by Outemu. A common Cherry alternative in cheap boards.

 

tbh I'd recommend Hexgears more, especially now that the Impulse board I reviewed last year and have since sent to my boyfriend has hotswap.

[kelvinhall05]

16 minutes ago, James Evens said:

Outemus aren't higher quality

Agreed, Outemus are the worst clones, especially their clickies.

17 minutes ago, James Evens said:

 it is clear that cherry has more advanced production technology.

Not saying much lol, they are also shit, just slightly less so.

[Nowak]

Perhaps I shouldn't have included Outemu as a "higher quality" switch maker than Cherry x3

 

That being said, Cherry ain't much better.

[Dr0y]

So I ordered some kailh box white ... can't wait to get them and try them in the gmmk ... Hope the click won't be too annoying and that I will like them ... I really wish to like clicky switches and I hope those are the ones that will make me like them. 

 

Also ordered some krytox so I will finally be able to lube my switches, will start with the cherry mx blue in my anne pro 2 that I will desolder. 

[kelvinhall05]

1 minute ago, Dr0y said:

So I ordered some kailh box white ... can't wait to get them and try them in the gmmk ... Hope the click won't be too annoying and that I will like them ... I really wish to like clicky switches and I hope those are the ones that will make me like them. 

 

Also ordered some krytox so I will finally be able to lube my switches, will start with the cherry mx blue in my anne pro 2 that I will desolder. 

BOX switches are fucking amazing, you won't be disappointed.

 

 

should've ordered box navy tho smh, get those finger gains

[geo3]

4 hours ago, Dr0y said:

I will finally be able to lube my switches, will start with the cherry mx blue

You shouldn't lube click jacket switches if you want them to still click. Maybe just the spring. 

[Letgomyleghoe.]

Quick question what leds are compatible on the dz60 or for the matter of fact any pcb? Or does it matter at all which size or type of led I go with?

[kelvinhall05]

Two types of people:

Spoiler

 

[Dr0y]

On 9/16/2020 at 1:20 AM, geo3 said:

You shouldn't lube click jacket switches if you want them to still click. Maybe just the spring. 

I'm not sure I still want them to click ...

 

Order is supposed to arrive next monday. 

[jiyeon]

25 minutes ago, Dr0y said:

I'm not sure I still want them to click ...

 

Order is supposed to arrive next monday. 

What's the purpose in using clicky switches if you don't want them to click?

[kelvinhall05]

28 minutes ago, Dr0y said:

I'm not sure I still want them to click ...

 

Order is supposed to arrive next monday. 

We've come full circle!

 

MX White is the predecessor to MX Blue. The "click" jacket was originally intended for hysteresis, and MX Whites were filled with lube to suppress the click noise. However, when demand grew for clicky switches, Cherry removed the lube and it became MX Blue.

[Dr0y]

4 minutes ago, sowon said:

What's the purpose in using clicky switches if you don't want them to click?

Cause they were not supposed to be clicky, they were supposed to be linear as the vendor told me ... but they were blue ... and the mx cherry blue are a bit annoying to my hear so that's why I'm not sure I want them to click anymore.

 

I still want to try some other clicky and that's why I ordered box white. 

[jiyeon]

6 minutes ago, Dr0y said:

Cause they were not supposed to be clicky, they were supposed to be linear as the vendor told me ... but they were blue

Should've probably asked a refund then. I personally hate clickies but if you're up for sourcing other clickies, Kailh Box Jades and other box switches which use a clickbar have much more pronounced and sharper clicks than traditional Cherry click jackets. Box Whites are a fine choice.

[Dr0y]

Just now, sowon said:

Should've probably asked a refund then. I personally hate clickies but if you're up for sourcing other clickies, Kailh Box Jades and other box switches which use a clickbar have much more pronounced and sharper clicks than traditional Cherry click jackets. Box Whites are a fine choice.

It's a keyboard I bought on local ads, my sister picked it up for me cause it was a 2 hours drive just to get there and another 2 hours to come back home ... the price of the gas would have killed the deal  ....  my sister live close to that place and it didn't bother me to wait for one or two months for her to come visit.  By that time there was no way I could get a refund. 

[geo3]

1 hour ago, Dr0y said:

I'm not sure I still want them to click ...

 

Order is supposed to arrive next monday. 

If you're going to open, which you have to to lube them, might as well do a stem swap at that point. 

[Dr0y]

1 hour ago, geo3 said:

If you're going to open, which you have to to lube them, might as well do a stem swap at that point. 

swap them for which stem ? ... can I order just stems and is it that much less expensive than complete switches ?  Is it worth putting stems in those housing ?

[u4ea]

Upgraded my Womier with a new keycap set, NP profile. 

Love it but gets dirty pretty easily during gaming sadly. 

[kelvinhall05]

So I finally got around to converting my PC8801 a few days ago. I removed the multiplexer because I don't want to be using jank-ass Arduino code and would rather use QMK which I know how to use and I know works. I can interface directly with the matrix from there, and I mapped it out so all I had to do was wire it to a controller and set up a keymap. I had some Pro Micros lying around, but since it is a 12x8 matrix, I need 20 IO pins which the Pro Micro doesn't have...sort of. The two onboard LEDs, TX and RX, are controlled by two more pins that can be accessed and used as normal IO if you remove the resistors before the LEDs and solder to the lower pad:

Spoiler

The problem here is that these pads are very small and hilariously fragile. So I go ahead and wire it up nicely, and I didn't break the pads. Yay! But as soon as my dumb fucking ass tries to slightly nudge the Pro Micro to a more aesthetically pleasing spot (keep in mind, it worked fine the way it was)...those two pads sheared right off.

Spoiler

(you can see in the pictures above how the Pro Micro is sitting slightly above the keyboard PCB. I tried to tuck it underneath like I had it originally)

 

So I go and spend another hour redoing all my work, this time putting some hot glue over the wires to hopefully give them some more structural support.

Spoiler

But clearly that wasn't enough, because it happened again! ffs...

 

 

So I gave in and ordered a Teensy. Pains me to do so because they are overpriced as fuck (seriously, almost 30 CAD for something with barely more functionality than a $5 Pro Micro?), but I guess I can actually finish this project now...

[Dr0y]

@kelvinhall05  This is so much work and it's sad to see that it ended up not working in the end ...  I hope the other one will be more resistant than that one. 

 

 

[kelvinhall05]

2 minutes ago, Dr0y said:

@kelvinhall05  This is so much work and it's sad to see that it ended up not working in the end ...  I hope the other one will be more resistant than that one. 

 

 

It will be, because a Teensy has enough through-hole IO. I've done this trick with the SMD pads in the past and it works fine, you just have to be extremely gentle with it which I wasn't.

[kelvinhall05]

Teensy came in today and I spent this afternoon wiring it up and splicing USB connectors onto the original cable. Sure enough, it works great! I am a little sad because, as I expected, I don't like the layout at all, and the switches don't feel that great after typing on it for some time. I don't like cleaning clicky Alps because of their tendency to double-click unless I somehow keep track of which click leaf and slider goes with which housing, so I guess I'm stuck with this for now. Maybe at some point I can clean them, but honestly I see myself selling this board before that happens.

 

Anyway, here is a pic of the cable:

Spoiler

And of the wiring:

Spoiler

I've managed to clean it up a bunch by moving the controller over a bunch and putting the columns on headers instead of using long wires.

 

Lastly, a typing demo:

 

[kelvinhall05]

Oh, and the finished board. How the fuck could I forget that? lel

[the pokemon kid]

42 minutes ago, kelvinhall05 said:

Teensy came in today and I spent this afternoon wiring it up and splicing USB connectors onto the original cable. Sure enough, it works great! I am a little sad because, as I expected, I don't like the layout at all, and the switches don't feel that great after typing on it for some time. I don't like cleaning clicky Alps because of their tendency to double-click unless I somehow keep track of which click leaf and slider goes with which housing, so I guess I'm stuck with this for now. Maybe at some point I can clean them, but honestly I see myself selling this board before that happens.

 

Anyway, here is a pic of the cable:

  Hide contents

And of the wiring:

  Hide contents

I've managed to clean it up a bunch by moving the controller over a bunch and putting the columns on headers instead of using long wires.

 

Lastly, a typing demo:

 

Restoring alps only really goes so far. Once dust has gotten in then it usually does unrepairable damage to the sliders and they just remain scratchy. Which Alps are these? Blues, Ambers or SMK?

The mod looks ace though, very clean wiring!