Mechanical Keyboard Sound Isn't That Simple
Figure 1: I couldn't think of a more literal way to represent this article if I tried... Looking back just a few years ago, there’s no doubt that the huge influx of people that joined the hobby at the peak of the COVID pandemic were drawn to keyboards by way of YouTube, TikTok, and other audio-visual content platforms. Even as the output from these content creators has waned in recent months, their collective impact and legacy on the keyboard hobby is rather firmly etched in the history books. As a result of all of their sound tests, build logs, and opinion videos, the message is clear to any new person joining the hobby: mechanical keyboards are all about the sound. Thock this, clack that. Whether it’s keyboards, keycaps, or even singular switches, seemingly everyone new to the hobby meticulously pores over each component of their keyboard not in an attempt to figure out how it will feel in hand, but how it will sound as they’re furiously grinding their way out from...
Mar 27, 2024
- Are you interested in nonstandard layouts? Do you want an ortholinear board (like a Planck), where keys are in vertical rows instead of staggered? Or how about a split ergonomic keyboard (like an ErgoDox)?
And that's not even getting into things like case materials, plate materials, switch mounting styles, case profiles, etc.! Plus all the hojillion ways you can mod your switches, case, keycaps, etc. None of these are questions anybody else can really answer for you. To help you get started on figuring it out, though, I'd recommend checking out online MK communities. The MK subreddit has an impressively extensive wiki (including information on all of these features as well as reviews of various keebs and places to buy things) and a friendly community. It also tracks upcoming meet-ups for various cities. If you're on Facebook, look for mechanical keyboard groups for your region (you'll have the best luck in large cities). These groups often also have associated Discord servers. Oh, and you'll also probably want to look into some Mac-specific stuff, since all my mechanical keyboard experience has been with Windows, though I think it's primarily a concern of aesthetics (i.e., the keycaps will have Windows-specific text on them but still function fine on a Mac). Personally, my new baby is a hotswap version of the KBD67, which is a 65% board I'm just getting ramped up on as I dig into QMK so I can get the firmware really customized for my needs. It won't permanently replace the (much cheaper, not customizable, but adequate) full-size keeb on my desktop (at least not unless/until I get a separate numpad), but I plan to use it whenever working remotely and also when working at my desktop anytime I don't need the numpad. I can't say enough good things about my experience with my KBD67 so far, but at $189 just for the base DIY kit, it might be a bit steep for a first keeb. If you've got money to blow, though, you might want to go for it, because thanks to the QMK firmware it will be pretty adaptable to whatever you need it for. The hotswap option also makes it attractive as a first keeb, since you may want to try out different switches. The one caveat there is that the hotswap version of the KBD67 has a split backspace, which not all keycap sets support with their default kits, and some don't support at all, though the SA Laser kits are fine for it, though, including the Cyberdeck monokit. Exactly what this means gets into more nitty-gritty stuff about keyboards, specifically about the width of different keys. A typical square key, like a letter, is 1 unit, or 1U. The backspace on a 100% keeb is 2U, but some smaller keebs will split that into two 1U keys. A common way of making use of that layout change is to swap the 1.5U backslash/pipe key to backspace—which the standard 2U backspace keycap obviously then can't be used for—and then use those two 1U keys for backslash/pipe plus something else. If you look at the layouts for the various kits here, you'll see that each one labels the size of each key larger than 1U in the lower left corner, and that kits will often contain different-size version of the same keys (e.g., both a 2U and a 1.5U backspace). Hopefully this massive wall of text was helpful! Feel free to ping me if you have follow-up questions, and I'll do my best. (I'm pretty new to the hobby myself... just, uh, also autistic.)