[bayindirh]

We have a bunch of old Sun Microsystems mechanical keyboards at the office, and they're not loud. I use a Cherry MX Brown equipped keyboard and it's not loud either.

Does everyone use "Blue" switches over there?

BTW, I don't believe mechanical keyboards are a fad. They're much better than the better rubber dome keyboards. Especially as they age.

[FPGAhacker]

Out of curiosity, have you done typing tests? I did once with some keyboards I was comparing. For me there was a difference. At least in the moment. It's possible I was just better on one because it was similar to what I had already been using.

[bayindirh]

I've used a lot of keyboards in my life. The latest rubber domes I've used are either Microsoft and Logitech. Currently I'm using two keyboards daily, a Microsoft Sculpt (rubber dome) and a Logitech G710+ (Cherry MX Brown).

Logitech is much more consistent, softer, strains my hands less, allows for faster typing.

Rubber dome keyboards become heavier as they age, because their key stems wear down. They become extra heavy when you don't use them for some time, because grease tends to harden as they age. This is not the case with the mechanical switches. They just behave the same, all the time.

On the worst case, a rubber dome keyboard needs so much force and has so much friction that it sprains your hand/fingers (Dell's low end bundled keyboards are an health hazard).

[bluGill]

Yes, not for speed by for quantity. My model m makes we want to type more.

You might not think that is a good thing. ..

[GekkePrutser]

Did Sun ever make mechanicals? I mainly recall the type 5 but it was rubber dome. The ones that came after were like cheap $10 pc keyboards.

[donatj]

The majority were rubber dome, and all the Sun keyboards I own are, but they made some mechanical type 5’s. They pop up on eBay once in a while. I am not sure the deal with their existence.

https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=78888.0

[someuname]

>Cherry MX Brown

Significantly louder than a standard Dell membrane keyboard, or Logitech MX Keys, or Apple.

[bayindirh]

I personally use MX Browns at home, but they're not significantly louder than a full size, well used membrane keyboard. Membrane keyboards tend to get noisier as they age and their stems wear down and their lubricants degrade.

On the other hand, there are far more silent mechanical switches available. There are "Silent Brown" switches, "Red" switches without any tactile feedback, or "Silent Red" switches, with even less noise.

If I decide to change my office keyboard one day, I'd buy Red or Silent Brown switches, not because standard Browns are actually annoyingly noisy, but we as people are under stress in the office and get irritated sometimes, and I want to be polite.

As I said before, mechanical keyboards are not about the noise they make primarily, they're much more comfortable to use and they last a long time. Oh, I like the sound of my Browns, but it's just a secondary effect.