deskthority

Hi all -- I was thinking about the MacBook Pro's sucky keyboard and how a grain of sand can kneecap the whole board. The MBP's keycaps have very little border space around, but there's just enough for a grain of sand or whatever to get in there, and if it does, they apparently can't handle it for so...

New airguns usually use nitro pistons instead of springs. They are a lot more consistent, smoother (if they are well lubed) and more durable, considering that those pistons have less vibrations and a more straight upstoke they should be even more lineal than normal springs. You could combine them w...

New airguns usually use nitro pistons instead of springs. They are a lot more consistent, smoother (if they are well lubed) and more durable, considering that those pistons have less vibrations and a more straight upstoke they should be even more lineal than normal springs. You could combine them w...

Do Apple's problematic super-thin keyboards have springs? (https://www.extremetech.com/computing/272661-apple-keyboards-vulnerable-to-single-grain-of-sand-analysis) I think I mistakenly assumed all keys had springs, but Apple's don't look like they have room for springs. I'm still intrigued by a pas...

Hi all -- Thanks for all the info. On the magnetic idea, I just discovered something called a Hall Effect keyboard that has been around a while: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keyboard_technology#Hall-effect_keyboard Hall effect is only a sensing technology however. It does not produce any resistanc...

Blaise170 wrote: ↑

What is this? How does it work?

Hi all -- Thanks for all the info. On the magnetic idea, I just discovered something called a Hall Effect keyboard that has been around a while: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keyboard_ ... t_keyboard

A couple people on reddit have done some experimenting with magnets. I'm not able to fetch the link right now but I'll come back later and post it. You can also find it pretty easily by searching /r/mechanicalkeyboards https://www.reddit.com/r/MechanicalKeyboards/comments/84yxkj/modification_repell...

Hello everyone, To your knowledge, has anyone developed or offered a different kind of key cushioning mechanism? It seems like metal springs have been the only mechanism. What about an air spring system or gel? I saw an old patent for a torsion bar instead of a spring -- that's the only alternative ...

I remember a person on the forum using a version of Apple's charging cable to create a hot-pluggable number pad add-on to his 75% keyboard. It magnetically latches and shouldn't emit any radiation. Maybe the IEEE 1394 (FireWire) four pin port could be useful for a custom keyboard port? There are ne...

I've always found polling strange for a keyboard protocol. Have you seen the changes in USB 3.0? I think it offers an event-driven or interrupt model. Locked-down USB via software is possible in theory, but I think we have plenty of experience at this point that software solutions that are possible ...

Hello everyone: Do you know of any alternative keyboard connector interfaces besides USB and PS/2? Have you heard of any efforts to create one? I'm most interested in contemporary or new efforts, not things that historically preceded PS/2 like the AT interface. What about alternative protocols? I've...

Hi all. New member here. Optical keyboards should be fairly easy, and cheap with commodity LEDs and plastic fiber light pipes. There were lots of interesting patents filed back in the 1970s and 80s laying out different implementations. These are all expired and public domain at this point (there are...