Mechanical keyboard round 3
Yes, for the third time.
Back in December I bought a mechanical keyboard. This worked out for the most part, but there were two things that bothered me. First, the lack of a number pad just annoyed me. It's not that I use it that often, it's that it feels weird not having it there. I sometimes rest my right hand fingers on those keys when using PageUp, PageDown, Home or End (which I do use regularly). Second, the keyboard started to repeat O for some reason. Not all of the time, just some of the time. Bad switch? Not sure. But even without that sometimes-wonky O, I knew I had to get something with a number pad...
...which I did. I bought another cheap mechanical keyboard, this time with the number pad. But then I ran into yet another problem. Keyboard ghosting. What this means is that in the way the keyboard is wired under the keys, certain key combinations aren't recognized. For example, a key combo I sometimes use is CTRL+SHIFT+M (this makes Firefox go into "Responsive Design Mode" to emulate a mobile browser). As in left side CTRL, left side SHIFT and M. On this keyboard, that combo didn't work and will never work because of the way it's wired. If I used the right side CTRL and SHIFT with M, sure, no problem. But left side? Nope. For that particular 3-key combo along with a few others, they were never going to work because of the ghosting issues.
Yeah, this was getting annoying fast.
Finally, I found a cheap mechanical keyboard where everything works with no wonky repeating keys and no ghosting issues, a Philips G400 seen in the video I made above.
Yes, the keyboard has dopey lighting effects which I don't use. But fortunately the standard (and only) backlight color is white, and each key is separately lit so every key can be seen easily.
I like it so much that I've already ordered a second one as a backup. Fortunately, this keyboard is cheap. As in under $20 cheap.
Why didn't I just go back to a plain computer keyboard?
Most people in all honesty would be perfectly happy with a $5 Dell PC keyboard from Goodwill. Sometimes you can even get one there for $3 or even just a dollar if you look around enough. If you're seriously cheap when it comes to PC keyboards, go to Goodwill and get one made by Dell. Most are in really good shape.
If you're not that dirt cheap, the next best thing is a Logitech K120 or HP Business Slim.
I write a lot, and when I got my fingers on a mechanical keyboard, that's when I knew it was the keyboard for me. The tactile feel, the sound and the typing action is second to none where PC keyboards are concerned.
The problem for me was finding the right keyboard that had the right layout and didn't have any issues. I finally found it with the Philips.
