Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks
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@fbmac said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
layout of my country
Only after I have seen the needlessly different layouts used in various countries, did I appreciate the fact that my country uses the US keyboard layout with ALT+<character> for special characters.
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@accalia said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
@fbmac said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
I had used several mechanical keyboards when computers used to be beige and use crt monitors
if you had a mechanical keyboard of that era you had a buckling spring mechanical keyboard. they're better than membrane keyboards that you get for $20, but not by much. try a proper switch based mechanical keyboard. Trust me there's a world of difference between one of them and a crappy old membrane keyboard.
Bzzzt, wrong!
Cherry used to make different kinds of keyboards and still does, while this particular type is indestructible1; it's aptly described as "typing on wet newspaper".
Most likely though @fbmac had an even shittier rubber-dome keyboard or had one of those sponge-foam filled ones. Only pricey IBM's came with "decent" keyboards out of the box, and that would likely have been for the old farts as the model M was already a cost-cutting operation compared to the original PC.
1 Through normal typing, that is.
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@JBert I'm not sure how to describe my keyboards of old, as all computers here in that age were Frankenstein computers assembled at home or by the smuggler you bought it from. We just called them keyboards.
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@JBert Also, I have no reason to think those keyboards to be shitty, they were excellent as far as I know. And noisy, I'm almost sure they were all mechanical.
There are shitty keyboards sold here for like 3usd, but these didn't exist at that time. I think these are the shitty membrane keyboards you're thinking.
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@fbmac said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
@JBert I'm not sure how to describe my keyboards of old, as all computers here in that age were Frankenstein computers assembled at home or by the smuggler you bought it from. We just called them keyboards.
I've never owned an official IBM PC either, the earlier ones were either from a local clone brand or later hand-built from parts.
There were cheap(er) keyboards in the 80's and 90's so it's impossible to compare to the present revival unless you happened to have one of the "classics".
@fbmac said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
@JBert Also, I have no reason to think those keyboards to be shitty, they were excellent as far as I know. And noisy, I'm almost sure they were all mechanical.
So why did you get rid of them, or were they starting to go yellow instead of beige?
Either way, noise doesn't mean it's mechanical. I have a few rubber dome keyboards in storage which make a decent amount of noise when you released a key due to the key flying upwards and hitting its top plate (it has to hit something, otherwise the keycap would fall out when you hold the keyboard upside-down). Only the expensive keyboards ($150 and up) dampen that noise by having some extra foam or rubber in the right spots.
Point is: if you didn't have one of the expensive computer brands, your keyboard type would be up to pure luck and hence it's impossible to compare with today's keyboards.
At the end of the day, paying more just means you know what you get rather than leaving it up to chance. If you have a keyboard that works for you, fine. For an analogy: I prefer to ride a decent bike instead of some dilapidated thing I found in a ditch or one I bought from some dealer who doesn't know where he got it from or how it works.
The only modern thing I can't wrap my head around is backlighted and "rainbow" keyboards. Seriously, if you need light then just invest in a $10 lamp, if you need more color then you can just drape a rainbow flag on your desk.
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I have a $100 keyboard with scissor switches - are these any good?
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@coldandtired said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
I have a $100 keyboard with scissor switches - are these any good?
scissor switches.... if you're describing what i think you are describing then...
scissor switches, at least the ones i think you are describing, are really just membrane switches that use wire scissors to balance the key and reduce off sides activation. they're better than straight membrane switches, but not as good as a solid set of pure mechanical switches.
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@coldandtired said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
I have a $100 keyboard with scissor switches - are these any good?
If they're decently constructed they can last for quite a while, but you have to be used to the short travel, the sudden "dead stop" and the potentially high force required to use them.
Other mechanical switches may require less force but need to be pressed further down, and if you're used to a scissor switch you may actually accidentally press lighter switches if you let your hands rest on the keys. So you should be fine as long as your keyboard doesn't squeak and you're so used to it that you never feel like you get tired hands when typing on that particular keyboard.
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Everything credible I've heard about the ergonomics of typing has focussed more on this kind of stuff:
than on the type of clicking sounds that your keys make. I mean, it might well be the case that if you've got an ideal workspace, and your typing posture and form is flawless, that you might be able to benefit from a good mechanical keyboard — though as has been mentioned, it seems like they tend toward ‘cool’ designs rather than good ergonomics, way squarer and higher than regular keyboards, so I have my doubts. But for most people, you'd probably see more gains from being mindful of your posture and focussing on efficient, accurate touch-typing than from buying yourself another flashy toy. Anyway, that's my opinion, thanks for listening.
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@ben_lubar said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
My keyboard is this one:
I use it to annoy people on voice chat by typing at 120dB.
120dB? Wow. That's some fast typing!
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@fbmac said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
@accalia you just have too much money in your hands
Not after buying those keyboards!
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@JBert said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
if you need more color then you can just drape a rainbow flag on your desk.
But then the insufferable in your office would be stopping by to talk about how evil straight cis people are, then prattle on about wage slavery, how Abe Lincoln was a liberal.
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@Polygeekery said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
But then the insufferable in your office would be stopping by to talk about how evil
straight cis peoplemembrane keyboards are, then prattle on aboutwage slaverycherry MX purple switches, how Abe Lincolnwas a liberalused a mechanical keyboard.There, back on topic
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@Jaloopa said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
people never manage to do a job that involves a lot of typing without using mechanical ones.
Literally everybody at my company does ok.
@FrostCat said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
All I can say is that apparently I was one of those people who hit the keys fairly hard an didn't even realize it, until I got my mechanical keyboard, and my fingers started feeling better after a few days.
So mechanical keyboards help if you're a gorilla who just wails on the keys as hard as possible and also lacks the self-awareness to stop doing that when you start experiencing pain.
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@FrostCat said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
It's more like, someone who was gelded at birth thinks he doesn't miss sex. How would he know?
Like I said above, I've used both types of keyboard and the mechanical keyboard I used was the amazing genuine article IBM Mark M everybody raves about.
And yet I still think mechanical keyboards are bullshit.
I also think your problem was you type like a gorilla, and while a mechanical keyboard might "help" with that, you could also just stop typing like a gorilla in the first place.
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@blakeyrat said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
Literally everybody at my company does ok
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@boomzilla said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
Actually, I kind of miss the volume buttons.
That boggles my mind too. These "vastly superior mechanical keyboards" are laid-out like no ergonomics research has been done and no extra keys have been added since 1982.
Is there a place I could buy a mechanical keyboard that isn't a straight rectangle? Or at least has the widened spacebar to ensure it remains under my thumb?
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I like straight rectangles. So-called ergonomic keyboards have always made my hands hurt. And the split ones are completely unusable.
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@accalia said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
paying only 20$ on a keyboard is PAYING FOR GARBAGE
so it seems you;re damned if you do and cursed if you don't.
i for one would rather be damned because i bought a good keyboard, than be cursed to type on literal garbage.Microsoft ComfortCurve. $20.
Not a rectangular nightmare. Durable as shit. (To give you an idea, I bought 3 ComfortCurve 2000 keyboards, and I haven't even worn out the first one yet.) Water proofed to some extent. Media keys.
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@Jaloopa Oh. Sorry.
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@mott555 said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
I like straight rectangles.
This laptop has one and my thumb naturally rests on the trackpad, it's shit.
The point of the "curve" in the Comfort Curve is unless your the world's tiniest human being, your hands are not going to be exactly parallel when reached out to your keyboard.
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@mott555 said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
So-called ergonomic keyboards have always made my hands hurt. And the split ones are completely unusable.
I have to have ergonomic keyboards (the split type) or else my wrists and forearms will hurt from just looking at a keyboard. If I spend much time on a laptop I will have to sleep with wrist braces on for a few days.
Mechanical keyboards might cause your fingertips to orgasm, but I won't know until they release an ergonomic version (that doesn't cost $650) that is comparable to the MS Natural 4000 or the Sculpt.
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@Polygeekery said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
Mechanical keyboards might cause your fingertips to orgasm, but I won't know until they release an ergonomic version (that doesn't cost $650) that is comparable to the MS Natural 4000 or the Sculpt.
Right; if this company was trying to make typing better, than why are they throwing away the last 30 years of ergonomics research and ideas?
Answer: because they don't give a shit. They're just selling mechanical switch bullshit to suckers, like the people in this thread. The keyboards are rectangular nightmares because that makes them cheaper. (Not that the sucker at the other end of the transaction pays less, though!) I bet all of those different "colors" come from the same big bin, haha.
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@mott555 Wow. Just from the .jpg I can tell that keyboard was designed by an alien overlord trying to wipe-out humanity.
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@Polygeekery said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
@mott555 said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
So-called ergonomic keyboards have always made my hands hurt. And the split ones are completely unusable.
I have to have ergonomic keyboards (the split type) or else my wrists and forearms will hurt from just looking at a keyboard. If I spend much time on a laptop I will have to sleep with wrist braces on for a few days.
Mechanical keyboards might cause your fingertips to orgasm, but I won't know until they release an ergonomic version (that doesn't cost $650) that is comparable to the MS Natural 4000 or the Sculpt.
I see no significant difference typing between mechanical and non-mechanical. It's just that the mechanical ones are still working perfectly 4 - 6 months later and the non-mechanical ones need replacement. I got tired of spending $50 a year on new keyboards and decided to get a $80 mechanical, and 5 - 6 years later it still types like it's new.
I have both, at home and at work. My main PC or workstation always has mechanical, while secondaries use whatever cheap junk keyboard I have lying around. Eventually I'll run out of junk keyboards and buy another mechanical.
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@mott555 said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
I found this, looks terrible though.
Looks terrible, uncomfortable and has a very strange key layout. Anything that deviates that far from what I am used to would annoy me to no end. I already get annoyed with laptops that move shit around on me and for Macs not having a standard Delete key.
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@mott555 said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
It's just that the mechanical ones are still working perfectly 4 - 6 months later and the non-mechanical ones need replacement.
What the hell are you doing to wear out a keyboard that quickly?
Do you seriously have to replace your laptops every 6 months because the keyboard on them is dead? Seriously? This Acer laptop is 4 years old, and its keyboard is fine. I don't like the layout necessarily, but it functions fine.
Or are you another gorilla-typer like FrostCat?
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@mott555 said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
It's just that the mechanical ones are still working perfectly 4 - 6 months later and the non-mechanical ones need replacement.
I have never worn out a membrane keyboard. Ever.
The key caps might get worn to the point that they cannot be read, but that does not really matter. The only reason I have ever replaced a keyboard was to get more features or a more ergonomic layout. Hell, a while back i was cleaning out some shelves and I still have an old white Logitech keyboard that has a PS/2 connector and some other old keyboards that are all membrane switches but still work just fine.
I am a case study of one. I don't doubt that you somehow managed to do it. It just isn't a reason for me.
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@accalia said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
@fbmac said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
I had used several mechanical keyboards when computers used to be beige and use crt monitors
if you had a mechanical keyboard of that era you had a buckling spring mechanical keyboard. they're better than membrane keyboards that you get for $20, but not by much. try a proper switch based mechanical keyboard. Trust me there's a world of difference between one of them and a crappy old membrane keyboard.
But the famous IBM Model M keyboard is a buckling spring keyboard, right?
From the old-style keyboards, I quite like the original Macintosh keyboard:
I think this one is a "proper mechanical keyboard" and I like it much more than the buckling spring keyboards that we had on the donated old pc's we had to use when I was a kid (although I think I remember that the Model M was the least bad of those). But I'm not really sure whether it is better than a normal modern "dome cap" keyboard.
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@Grunnen said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
But the famous IBM Model M keyboard is a buckling spring keyboard, right?
yes, it's better than a membrane keyboard, but not as good as a switch based keyboard
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@Polygeekery said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
I have never worn out a membrane keyboard. Ever.
Me either.
Queue the people from earlier in the topic telling us that we have secret problems with our keyboards that we don't know about.
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@Grunnen said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
From the old-style keyboards, I quite like the original Macintosh keyboard:
I typed on one of those for ages, I'm not sure what technology they used. You kind of had to due to the lack of keyboard with ADB selection. By the time they were shipping the G4 keyboard, though:
You could find much better in PC land. Ironically, Apple's adoption of USB kind of hurt their hardware business-- there was a heck of a lot less reason to buy an Apple mouse or keyboard with the PC ones worked just fine over USB, and most of them were better, cheaper. (That was before they went full brain-washed and were able to sell shit like a stand-alone trackpad for $80.)
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@loopback0 said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
Queue the people from earlier in the topic telling us that we have secret problems with our keyboards that we don't know about.
Oh right. I forgot about that.
We must have worn-out our keyboards but just never noticed.
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@blakeyrat said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
IBM Mark M everybody raves about.
I certainly don't.
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@JBert said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
So why did you get rid of them, or were they starting to go yellow instead of beige?
They probably have gone the same place that my old 386/486 computers have gone. Some sleestaks must be enjoying the true old mechanical keyboard experience by now.
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@blakeyrat said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
@mott555 said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
It's just that the mechanical ones are still working perfectly 4 - 6 months later and the non-mechanical ones need replacement.
What the hell are you doing to wear out a keyboard that quickly?
Do you seriously have to replace your laptops every 6 months because the keyboard on them is dead? Seriously? This Acer laptop is 4 years old, and its keyboard is fine. I don't like the layout necessarily, but it functions fine.
Or are you another gorilla-typer like FrostCat?
Idk, I just use them and they don't last. I've tried Logitech, Microsoft, HP, and Dell. The Dell ones are the worst of the worst, I had one of those that lasted about three weeks and then the '5' key wore out. The HP ones aren't too bad as long as I don't put them on my main workstation.
As for laptops, I don't use them much. I have one personal laptop that gets used when I travel, probably once every month or two, so it just doesn't get enough use to wear out the keys. And that's just for goofing off on the Internet, not for any serious work.
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@Grunnen said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
From the old-style keyboards, I quite like the original Macintosh keyboard:
The Caps Lock and arrow keys are in odd places and layouts and has no function keys.
I am immediately reminded of these videos, which are unintentionally hilarious.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uK8Iba29UK8
The best part though: "This is a monstrosity. I think I would hang myself with my belt if I had to use this."
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@blakeyrat said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
That was before they went full brain-washed and were able to sell shit like a stand-alone trackpad for $80.
Seriously, if you ever used one, you would realize that they are worth every penny. If it would do everything on Windows that it does on OSX, I would have one on every machine. It is worth it, just to be able to so easily switch virtual desktops.
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@Polygeekery said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
@JBert said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
if you need more color then you can just drape a rainbow flag on your desk.
But then the insufferable in your office would be stopping by to talk about how evil straight cis people are, then prattle on about wage slavery, how Abe Lincoln was a liberal.
Just drape a Confederate flag over the other side of the desk to balance it out.
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@Polygeekery said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
@Grunnen said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
From the old-style keyboards, I quite like the original Macintosh keyboard:
The Caps Lock and arrow keys are in odd places and layouts and has no function keys.
I think there's also an extended version, but I haven't seen that one in reality. By the way, I seem to have a different edition where the key layout is a bit more sensible (e.g. caps lock) than shown in the photo.
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Why are we even arguing about keyboards, when the future is touchscreen?
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@Lorne-Kates Because typing on touchscreen sucks foetid donkey balls
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@mott555 said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
Idk, I just use them and they don't last. I've tried Logitech, Microsoft, HP, and Dell. The Dell ones are the worst of the worst, I had one of those that lasted about three weeks and then the '5' key wore out. The HP ones aren't too bad as long as I don't put them on my main workstation.
Man, what do you people do to keyboards?
We work in a lot of offices that just use whatever POS keyboard came with the PCs when purchased and there are tons of old shitty Dell keyboards around that are 10+ years old and still working fine.
I bought my MS Natural 4000 on October 15th 2014 and the only issue it currently has is that 15% of the "S" is worn off on that key. That is a solid 1.5 years of heavy usage.
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@Polygeekery I assume these people are the ones whose typing you can hear from the other side of the office, whatever keyboard they're using.
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@Jaloopa said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
I assume these people are the ones whose typing you can hear from the other side of the office, whatever keyboard they're using.
Their bosses measure office productivity with a decibel meter.
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@Polygeekery said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
Their bosses measure office productivity with a decibel meter.
Getting your management training at the steel mill has it's downsides
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@loopback0 said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
@Polygeekery said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
I have never worn out a membrane keyboard. Ever.
Me either.
I've worn out one keyboard, but it took me about 4 years. Oddly, it was the Shift keys that stopped working …
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@Polygeekery said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
It is worth it, just to be able to so easily switch virtual desktops.
That is handy.
In the office though my Macbook is connected to a standard Windows keyboard and mouse (by choice) so I'm used to just using Ctrl + Left/Right.
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@mott555 said in Mechanical keyboards, now available at food trucks:
The Dell ones are the worst of the worst, I had one of those that lasted about three weeks and then the '5' key wore out.
Are you typing with a hammer?!