I don’t see BOX Navies, Zealios, Halos/Hakos, etc. being available as options in popular keyboard manufacturers such as Filco, Ducky, Corsair, Razer, CoolerMaster, etc. I know because these are enthusiast switches and not to mention BOX Navies and Royals are designed with Novelkeys and Halos/Hakos with Input Club. But in the mainstream market today, it’s always the usual and common red, brown, blue, and black MX switches being the only options.
Do you think it will change in the future and more options will be available to the masses or is this just the way it is because of the difference of an enthusiast and non-enthusiast? Are Matias keyboards gathering popularity since they are close to Alps switches?
I doubt it will change because it doesn’t need to change for the targeted consumer at least for the gamer specific brands. They have used the same switches for years and years and people still upgrade the boards to the newest model just because of perceived “new features”. It doesn’t seem like the switch choice really matters to the gamer market, not to mention that for most people just having a keyboard that’s mechanical seems sufficient enough that they don’t care about getting another. (That seems to be the major mentality at least to me)
That’s too bad because key switches have the most impact on how a keyboard would feel being typed on. Would have been interesting if the new models the mainstream keyboard manufacturers release would introduce new switches, not providing the red, blue, black, and brown MX switches at the beginning. More people would then discover the mech board community’s beloved switches and these would have been a better “new feature” than adding more lights and extra keys here and there. But I’m bad at business, this might be a nightmare for the keyboard companies as it would be too risky.
GMMK I think has become popular with gamers and there is this Ace Pad Tech Hall Effect keyboard aimed at gamers released by a Chinese company and was positively reviewed by Chyrosran22. Hopefully, diversification of switches would happen. I’m tired of seeing the same old red, brown, blue, and black switches More colors would be nice as it’s a colorful world out there.
Yeah it would be cool to see, but it seems like manus atm care more about making proprietary switches and hardware (like Razer with the new all stabilized switches) than expand their switch choices. It may seem counter-intuitive to us being enthusiasts that they wouldn’t want to use the latest and greatest, but they have much more marketing power if they do something new themselves.
But at the end of the day, does it really help the keyboard community to have those manufacturers use more enthusiast grade options? I think it’s a good thing there’s a separation, it keeps our market from being dragged down by too much corporate nonsense. And like I said, the gamer market is aimed at “gamers” and most people who would subscribe to that sort of broad term and subject themselves to those items targeted at their demographic. They are likely happy with just knowing their keyboard is mechanical.
Until appreciation for various switches become mainstream, I don’t think we’d see this. Sadly, as many of us we think we are in the community, we’re still just small in size compared to the scale of distribution of the mainstream brands. It won’t be worth the investment for them.
We can keep working on teaching everyone we can, though. So demand becomes significant that they have no choice but to support such options.
Well, you’ve got a Chinese company like Motospeed offering Box Whites in their boards, so really I don’t think it’s that farfetched to this that some of the more “enthusiast-grade” switches could make it to prebuilts. Granted a small Chinese company is way different from someone like Corsair or Razer, but I think it still shows that it could be possible.
WASD code keyboard has zealios with a prebuilt option. Im not sure where he is getting that they would melt. Pretty sure zealio/aliaz housings use some sort of nylon mixture, but that is just an educated guess
Is the GMMK board line considered mainstream at this point? IIRC all their boards are hot-swappable.
I know it’s not Logitech, Razer, etc. but it is somewhat known to the greater keyboard community.
I don’t think you’ll see the big ones selling hotswappable boards soon. Maybe Razer in the future, but their custom made switches are their big deal right now. They have no reason to take away from that.
Ah. The Tada and vortex core are the only two prebuilts I’ve bought and when I got the Tada it showed over 100 in stock. An incorrect assumption on my part!
Yeah all the GMMK line are hot-swappable and they def aren’t as big as the major brands but they at least seem to be trying i suppose.
Even if the big gamer rgb companies did all hotswap boards, I don’t think their quality would improve. The boards would still use low profile cases and thin metals and just continue to value some weird edgy look over genuine feel. So even if they used good switches, the boards would still be pretty bad feel-wise.
It’s possible, but if it gets more people thinking about customizing and getting into the hobby, then it’s good in my book. It also allows trying new switches in a less than full board worth of switches, so for gamers, you can buy 4-6 switches and try that.
More colors would be nice as it’s a colorful world out there.