deskthority

Hey

I am about to order a GH60 and have yet to decide about the switches. I want an non-clicky, tactile switch.

Have tried the Cherry MX Clears: liked the bump, but the spring was too heavy for me, as I occassionally like to type light. Also, they felt like they had a lot of friction - didn't have the time to break them in over years.
The MX blues are another story, owned them for quite a long time, but I am getting annoyed by the high pitch noise.
The worn-in MX browns I tried from a friend were great. Liked them very much.

So I am inclined to get the original Cherry browns. But are the Greetech/Gateron better? I was told they are "smoother", but I wondered if I understand this term correctly. Does "smooth" mean "less pronounced bump" or "less friction, but nice bump"? I want the latter one. I have RSI and don't want to burn energy in friction but like my nice tactile bump.

Price is not a problem since I am going 60%. Only asking if there is a _better_ (!) alternative to Cherry, e.g. brown Gaterons.

Hope you can help me, please excuse my english.

Best regards
Max

I guess nearly everyone on this forum knows more about switches than I do, but I finally informed myself about zealios and they sound really nice, especially if you're into browns.

They look really interesting too! They probably can't be bought in Europe right away, can they?

No it seems not. Something I should consider in the future, before creating more confusion. Sorry.

No problem! Actually, there is a group buy in canada right now - if you're interested. I don't want to wait that long atm.

I have old Cherry MX blacks (from the 80s) - they are nice, smooth actuation (low-friction), although too strong for my taste.

I recently acquired a used board with Cherry MX reds - they are still a bit too strong for my taste, but they also move "rough" (kinda like there was sand in them), this is the kind of friction I think you don't want.

So after looking around a bit, I bought a batch of Gateron clears for the light actuation force - and they, coincidentally, also seem to run smooth, much smoother than the recent MX reds, and about as smooth as my old MX blacks.

HTH

I bought a switch sampler from UKKeycaps - I recommend you do the same. At the time of my purchase about 6-8 different switch manufacturers were available for sampling, and roughly 4 switch models per manufacturer. I went with a 24 switch sampler, and specified switches from many different manufacturers. It was/is a very useful tool because of the variety of manufacturers. I recommend you to try.

I love the spring weight and slight roughness of brand new MX reds. They are in fact my #1 switch ...
Even putting 45gr. springs into "Vintage MX Blacks" doesn't feel as good to me.
I just wish there was an easy way to harvest them in large numbers from cheap old keyboards
It is probably the little bit of feedback I get from the light scratch of the otherwise very light MX reds that I like so much. Maybe I'm just a sick weirdo but that's what floats my boat.

I put great hope into Gaterons and got three different batches of Gateron Reds. First batch was a bag of 120 switches from Corus Keyboards (Distributor) which I got in 2015. What a bag of turds. Put some OG Cherry caps on them (Nothing fancy!) and the keycap stems kept catching rim of the upper shell of the switches. Ended up replacing the upper shells of the red Gaterons with Cherry parts (perfect fit!) and the problem was gone!

Two other batches I got were part of keyboard kits I ordered. I changes keyboards/switches a lot and have really gotten a very fine sense for the different kind of switches/springs/lubing. First time I tried the newer batch Gaterons that came with my WhiteFox kit I was struck by their wobblyness. Very disapointing. Maybe I will go ahead and replace the upper shells with Cherry parts again and see how that helps ...

Wodan, I understand 100% what you mean, the scratchiness is a kind of tactile feedback also. That's why I can't love ultra smooth linears such as Gateron or Nixdorf.

You should check DanielTs collection thread. He also says stock Reds are great for him!
As for me, I prefer "old" blacks, they are nicely in the middle. Not as rough as stock, but not as "floaty" as the Nixdorf. Also much more available and affordable!

If you don't want to keep those silly old blacks I'll trade you them for newer stock red stems

Face, Zealios are honestly really nice but since you mentioned RSI I better tell you the truth here.
My 60% with smooth lubed 45g-light Zealios is the reason I got RSI in the first place.
Now I understand that correlation does not mean causation.
I had changed desks, I use exclusively 60% boards with the function key on the left, meaning the left hand always gets a workout, plus I game with my left hand on the keyboard. Also the pok3r case has a steeper angle than the Quickfire Rapid I used before that.
But still.
I use 35g, linears at the moment, because I still need to work and I cannot live without typing, and these give me by far the least issues. I added soft o-rings yesterday, maybe it helps but my keyboard has almost no travel now.
whenever I switch to anything tactile the pain comes back much quicker. Laptop keyboard, Zealios, MX Blues, Buckling spring, I cannot use any other keyboard at the moment because of their tactility.
This RSI in my wrist is caused by overuse of the tendons that move the fingers. Through repetitive motion and bad wrist posture they become inflammatory.
Adding tactility and resistance to overcome (tactile bump) is in this case a really bad idea.

You need to type as lightly with as little movement as possible, if you are silly enough (like me) to even type at all with such a condition.
Adding a bigger tactile bump is not what you need.
Also, if you have a wrist rest, throw it out unless you are gaming. Your hands should hover above the keyboard while typing at all times.

Today I put new caps (Classic Black mods and Hongul alphas from Originative) on a Satan GH60 with Gateron Yellow switches. The new mods along with lube virtually eliminated the rattly stabilizers. The Gateron Yellows are the first Cherry mx type switch that I have liked.

I have tried Cherry blue, green, brown, clear, red, and black, and nothing worked for me. I didn't like the artificial add-on click in the blues and greens. Nor did I like the grafted bump on the browns and clears. The reds I tried were too light and somewhat scratchy. Blacks were too heavy for me, as were clears.

For me, Gateron Yellows are just about right in weight and they are extremely smooth.

Gateron Blacks have the same actuation force as Gateron Yellows (50g), but the bottoming-out force of Yellows is a bit less than that of Gateron Blacks.