Ping noise on the CM Storm Trigger

variant · 21 Jun 2012, 10:20

This is my first mechanical keyboard and almost immediately I noticed a pinging noise when I type. I have read that it isn't uncommon on mechanical keyboards. However, some of the keys are louder than others. A few to the point that It can be very annoying. I have been tempted to RMA the board because a few of the keys are really loud, but I am worried that they are all are similar and I would just be wasting time trying to get one that is quieter. Would it be worth RMAing? Does the loudness of the pinging vary from individual keyboard to keyboard? Is there anything I can do to quiet some of the pinging without violating the warranty of the keyboard? Would dental bands, o-rings, HK's soft-landing pads reduce it?

Any help would be appreciated.

fossala · 21 Jun 2012, 11:03

dental bands or landing pads will not reduce it. It is something you have to live with unless you get a mans keyboard with topres!

P.S. long time since I saw a post on PING! Sure ripster will pop in here soon.

variant · 21 Jun 2012, 11:20

fossala wrote:dental bands or landing pads will not reduce it. It is something you have to live with unless you get a mans keyboard with topres!

P.S. long time since I saw a post on PING! Sure ripster will pop in here soon.

I think some of the pinging comes from the fact that I bottom out which causes vibration as well as the vibration from when the keys spring back up. Would the dental bands, etc help in this case by softening the key bottoming out and reducing how far the key has to travel back up?

There's no way I can afford a $235 keyboard.

fossala · 21 Jun 2012, 11:54

I was kidding about the topre. The only way I "cured" pinging switches was to swap them out with new ones. Pinging is normaly caused on key release, this is why o-ring/pads don't help.

variant · 21 Jun 2012, 11:55

fossala wrote:I was kidding about the topre. The only way I "cured" pinging switches was to swap them out with new ones. Pinging is normaly caused on key release, this is why o-ring/pads don't help.

Then would it be worth RMAing the keyboard for a replacement?

fossala · 21 Jun 2012, 11:56

No, it's not a defect. It's the nature of mechanical (cherry/alps type) switches. People that rma pinging keyboards are driving up the price for everyone.

ripster · 21 Jun 2012, 15:31

Like I said at OCN you NEED to post this at Geekhack for maximum sympathy.

http://www.overclock.net/t/1272418/mech ... t_17527965

Edit: Oh you DID!
http://geekhack.org/showthread.php?3270 ... post618527

You should try HERE next:
http://www.reddit.com/r/keyboards/

ripster · 23 Jun 2012, 17:37

I LIKE this guy.

Persistance pays.

Sometimes...
http://www.overclock.net/t/1272701/mech ... t_17547349
http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?p=1 ... 1038865062

WTF Didja? Insulting British Cars...
http://geekhack.org/showthread.php?3270 ... post620240

You racist?
http://www.carthrottle.com/40-rapper-st ... ance-cars/

Oh, damn. Sorry for stereotyping rap...

This I believe the Brits call "Hobbit £ap"

And Variant, try here for some sympathy...
http://www.reddit.com/r/keyboards/

ChuckFinlay · 23 Jun 2012, 23:48

On every forum, I click on all threads with "ping" in the title just because I want to see a ripster reply

didja · 24 Jun 2012, 05:50

ripster wrote:WTF Didja? Insulting British Cars...

We had a Rover and it was the biggest mistake ever. My little VW GTI I drove at the time had more usable cargo capacity than the LR did. $45 wiper blades that were complete crap and you had no choice but to buy them from the dealer due to their proprietary connectors. Leaked oil at 65k miles. Dealer wanted $1400 to replace a wheel ABS sensor which required replacing the entire hub assembly, I said screw that just clear the code and I'll see what happens - light never came back on. Rear seat couldn't even hold baby car seats facing backwards. Turn a corner and it dang near flips on it;s lid. Odd tire size requires specific brand that are 3x price that they should be. Noises and lights all the time.

But speakers? KEF Reference and B&W Nautilus are as good as it gets. Brits can build speakers.

So can Americans..
JBL Everest - Designed by Americans specifically for smaller Japanese listening spaces.

Limmy · 24 Jun 2012, 14:26

You can reduce the sound by putting some foam material under the PCB, so that the foam would build tension between PCB and the bottom case. (At least, this method worked for me on my G80-3700 numpad. I didn't think PCB mounted boards would ping, but it did. The fix didn't completely get rid of the sound but it reduced it significantly. If I put more foam inside, I might be able to eliminate it, but I am content with my current fix, so I wouldn't bother.)

However, this fix would void warranty in your case because disassembling it would damage the warranty sticker. The pinging/ringing sound is pretty much unavoidable (yet very annoying to some people) in most mechanical keyboards with springs, so if you are bothered by it and not willing to fix it, I think it would be best to return it.

ripster · 24 Jun 2012, 18:08

Plus you're encouraging Variant to post at yet more forums.

He has his best chance at Geekhack to get sympathy.
http://geekhack.org/showthread.php?3270 ... post620873

hamza_tm · 29 Jun 2012, 15:45

My God Variant... I thought I was bad

Now I see what the dude on GH meant "I think you're taking this too seriously" damn straight!

Point 1: After all the reading I'm pretty sure its your keyboard, especially as the Trigger is manufactured by iOne and their QC has had tales of sucking.
Point 2: Get a new keyboard, sell this and buy a Keycool or whatever. You can try an RMA first though.

ripster · 29 Jun 2012, 15:48

I like Variant. He reminds me of KL and that guy that sprayed Insulation Foam into his Filco.

That dumb fuck forgot to take the keys off FIRST.

: FLA_3169.jpg (240.45 KiB) Viewed 13085 times

But at least he was kind enough to send to me when I asked him for them. FOR KEYBOARD SCIENCE! Solvent and plastic glue tests.

Persistence pays.

Limmy · 29 Jun 2012, 16:34

You are calling the kind person who donated his boards for science a dumb fxxx. That is not nice..

ripster · 29 Jun 2012, 19:00

You had to be there for the Summer Of Ping!..............

What WAS that guys name................he and KL were just obsessed with that whole thing.

I tried to find his video at YouTube with no luck.

LOL, give this guy some ludes!

Limmy · 29 Jun 2012, 19:22

Why would you ignore the annoying sound if there is a way to fix/reduce them? That is so passive. I like the attitude of people designing their own keyboard housing and plate trying to address small issues. Proper engineering is done by those people who care about the little details not by people who ignores small issues. Of course cheaply made/engineered product will have the small issues unaddressed.

And there is chance that the sound may not be noticeable by some people if sound frequency is high enough. It is probably why some people notice it and are bothered by it and some don't. I am pretty sure this topic would been discussed, right?

ripster · 29 Jun 2012, 19:26

Yep, this has been discussed to death in my opinion.

Limmy · 29 Jun 2012, 19:55

I heard the new Leopold 700R was designed to reduce the pinging/ringing sound. I noticed that the metal plate was bent outward allowing the plate to be pressed against the upper casing (A similar design is used in Realforce). There may be other factors that affects sound such as thicker caps(thickness of caps measured at 1.3mm compared to 1mm~0.8mm of Filco).

: source: http://www.kbdmania.net/xe/3561140; 700R left, Filco right.jpg (569.98 KiB) Viewed 13033 times

I haven't experienced the effectiveness of the design in reducing the sound myself. However, I observe two things in Korean forums:
1. I don't hear much complaint about pinging sound in 700R when I hear complaints in Groove(Korean version of CM storm; produced by Costar; effectively same as Filco). Both were introduced in the market about the same time.
2. I see forum posts that 700R has much less pinging/ringing sound when compared with Filco. The posts were from people who own the two boards.

So I am inclined to think new design was an effective fix and there is a way to reduce ping sound.

ripster · 29 Jun 2012, 21:50

Don't think so. I see plenty of ping complaints from multiple plate designs. But plate resonance from the spring ping is the key to PING!

Conical springs in the Topre ping too despite a boatload of screws. Much LESS obviously but the same sound if you press and let the key snap up (who TYPES that way anyhoo!)

<mp3 would be here if I wasn't on my iPad>

Limmy · 29 Jun 2012, 21:56

What multiple plate designs do you know of and how are they different?

ripster · 29 Jun 2012, 22:15

Lots, just look at the black widow internals for example.

I don't think the 700R is immune and KBDmania may be a BIT biased.

Brian at Elitekeyboards said he got Leopold RMAs for pings.

You worry too much Limmy, it's summer! LAST Summer was the Summer of Ping!

Limmy · 29 Jun 2012, 23:01

There are two points I would like to make.

1. I have managed to reduce ping/ringing sound by putting in some foam material in the void and it successfully reduced the sound. The method worked on Cherry G80-3700 and Filco numpad. I have put the material beneath the PCB for both boards and between the metal plate and the PCB of Filco numpad(plate mounted).

2. I heard stories about 700R being able to manage ping/ringing. (I haven't personally used them so I wouldn't say more.) I don't know why you have an impression that the stories are biased(you don't even read Korean), but I think you are the one who is biased in my personal encounter with you. It seems you have an imaginary character in your mind like the one in your Hooke's law joke pics. It turns out that imaginary character is not representative and it was PURELY imaginary. The joke was non-sense and was from your lack of understanding of the theory. (You thought all the spring must have the same spring constant and designing springs with different material was non-sense, right? That is wrong. Even if you design a spring with same material, the spring constant can be different.) Well, enough of the springs..

I agree that no matter how you design the board It is going to ping, but it is magnitude that matters. Your Filco with blues pinged like crazy when I heard the sound samples, btw.

Did people have ping issues with Black widow?

ripster · 29 Jun 2012, 23:30

Sure, just google black widow keyboard ping.

http://www.overclock.net/t/1139494/thre ... t_15268665

http://forum.overclock3d.net/showthread.php?t=36950

Oh, maybe not, you'll have to wait for Geekhack to come back

Limmy · 29 Jun 2012, 23:34

I did when you mentioned BW, but I don't see any that it does. I see only one relevant link, but when I search for word "ping", it mentions ping of ducky keyboard. So, where is the complaint?

Limmy · 29 Jun 2012, 23:37

Google searches are not really affected by GH server failure. Search result in GH comes up fine when I search for "Filco ping"

Limmy · 29 Jun 2012, 23:42

ripster wrote:Sure, just google black widow keyboard ping.

http://www.overclock.net/t/1139494/thre ... t_15268665

http://forum.overclock3d.net/showthread.php?t=36950

Oh, maybe not, you'll have to wait for Geekhack to come back

The two links are saying Black widow pings less than Das and Ducky.

Black widow's plate is screwed to the bottom casing, and it has similar philosophy in design as 700R. Sound could be reduced by restraining the material that is making the sound. Of course, the sound comes from vibration hence any thing that hinders the vibration will reduce it.