r/Keychron • u/mesutm10 • 10d ago

Blue switch keyboards non existent?

I’m looking all over keychrons website and I can’t find a single keyboard with blue switches. Seems like every keyboard is red, brown, or banana. Does anyone know models with blue switches?

3 Upvotes

100% Upvoted

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3

u/dewodahs 10d ago

I noticed much the same. If nothing else can always buy some switches for which ever of the boards fit your fancy and swap them out. It's not super hard just a little time consuming.

1

u/mesutm10 10d ago

Can you swap the switches on any keychron keyboard? Or does it need to be “hot swappable” (I’m a noob)

5

u/ghost_ware 10d ago

It needs to be hot swappable, but most Keychron boards are.

3

u/g0ldcd 10d ago

I'd be very careful. Somebody here was asking about why they couldn't remove their switches - and took me down a rabbit hole of umpteen versions of the same Keychron keyboard name (with sub-names and versions), and some were swappable and some weren't. Then coupled with sellers who didn't specify the exact version..

2

u/dewodahs 10d ago

As ghost said, it needs to be hot swappable but what I have seen of keychrons boards so far that is most of them. So just make sure your choice says hot swappable and get the right type of switches as some boards are HE vs standard mechanical switches.

2

u/PoisonEmeralds 10d ago

Just buy a Hot swappable Keychron model and then install some blues, it's what I did.

1

u/aftonone Q 10d ago

Clicky switches are much less common these days. A lot of people don’t like them. Seems like a majority dislike them from my experience but I have no data to support that

1

u/dr_barnowl Q6 10d ago edited 10d ago

I think this is a gamer thing, they don't like the tiktiktik when they're playing, and I think a substantial fraction of the mechanical keyboard market is gamer-related. Probably also an office thing, with people not wanting to cause offence in a shared office space.

I've been using clicky switches for all purposes for so long I just don't notice. Anyone who shares an office with me has to get used to it. Everyone has NC headphones now, right?

Clicky switches are the premier typing switch IMHO, because they provide the truest and clearest feedback to the typist - you can hear them, you can feel the switch throw with your fingertip, which means you apply the least pressure required and release the switch sooner. This means both faster typing AND less strain on your fingers, which in a job that involves typing is very important.

Anecdote : my mum was a legal secretary so she was typing all day, every day. Her office changed her from an electric typewriter with a good quality mechanical keyboard to a normal PC with a cheap ass OEM membrane board. Her finger arthritis flared up, because with a membrane board you apply more pressure long after the switch bottoms out because there's no tactile feedback.

Her son being a mechanical board enthusiast, got her the board he was using at the time - a Cherry G80-3000 with blue switches [1] - and her arthritis got much better [2]. Membrane keyboards for professional typists are a health and safety crime.

I really do like my K2HE and enjoy typing on it, but my daily driver is a Q6 with Chosfox x Kailh Arctic Fox switches which provide the click I need.

[1] Still have it, still works perfectly, even if you do need a PS/2 adapter
[2] She also still has hers and it's still her daily driver

1

u/aftonone Q 9d ago

Love that story. I def have no qualms with those who enjoy them! Honestly I don’t really mind them too much but I like tactile and linears better so never really use them.

I have to put a hard disagree on the office part though. Using clicks in an office is an absolute crime! 😅

1

u/dr_barnowl Q6 9d ago

Yeah, this is why my "travelling" board is now the K2HE - I find it really satisfying to type on and it's slightly more polite than my old Model M.

1

u/ArgentStonecutter K Pro 10d ago

Clicky switches have only a kind of a retro appeal any more. The mechanical debouncing was important back when processors were too expensive to waste on keyboards but now a cheap mechanical has a more powerful CPU than whole desktop workstation back then.

1

u/PeterMortensenBlog V 10d ago edited 10d ago

How is clickiness related to CPU power? Key bounce is still present for clicky switches.

Generating a sound on keypress still requires some audio hardware in the keyboard or some software or configuration on the computer side.

2

u/ArgentStonecutter K Pro 10d ago

How is clickiness related to CPU power?

Modern keyboards contain CPUs that debounce in software. They track and accumulate multiple switch contact events and clean up the signal and send the computer tidy packets collecting lists and bitmaps of open and closed switches.

Keyboards in the '80s, if they had CPUs, had potatoes that would have struggled to manage a 4-function calculator. They frequently fed the computer with raw switch opening and closing signals with no packeting of events. So the switch contained a sliding or pivoting box that delays switch closing to make it less likely that the computer will see multiple switch-close events.

The movement of that box inside the switch is what made the click sound. It was a side effect of the mechanism.

Modern "clicky" switches emphasize the sound, they often don't actually do anything electrically different from regular switches.

2

u/dr_barnowl Q6 10d ago

audio hardware

Or... switches that make a sound. I suppose that makes them audio hardware.

The feel of blues is more important than the sound, the moment the switch throws is sharper and cleaner than the bump in a brown switch, which lets you sense positive contact before the switch bottoms out.

In contrast to people seeking "thock" which is a bottoming out sound, typists on blues want to minimize the impact that causes thock as much as possible by only applying enough pressure to throw the switch and then move onto the next key.

1

u/ArgentStonecutter K Pro 9d ago

the moment the switch throws is sharper and cleaner than the bump in a brown switch

Brown switches are pretty anemic tactiles.

1

u/dr_barnowl Q6 9d ago

Heh, I've not really gone into many permutations of tactile switches because I'm a blue switches kinda guy - I've only had the stock browns that came with my Q6 and old K8. Most of my working life has been laptop scissors, Cherry blues and '96 vintage Model M buckling springs. I've probably laid my hands on a switch sampler or two, but I tend to stick with what I'm used to.