Tealios

[ArtoriasEdgeworth]

Does anyone think that the Zealios page should be updated to also contain data about the new Tealio switches?

[Menuhin]

They use a very different marketing strategy this time.
Description is only "67g (bottom out force), Transparent housing, Tiffany Blue Stem, PCB Mount", but they emphasize on:





I hope I can also propose to a "material girl" with their Tiffany switches.

[Daniel Beardsmore]

I hope I can also propose to a "material girl" with their Tiffany switches.

That's wrong on more than one level.

Does anyone think that the Zealios page should be updated to also contain data about the new Tealio switches?

You mean, should Tealios share the Zealios page, or get a separate page? I guess they're a replacement for the clear Zealios, which sadly I don't possess (which is why I wasn't able to photograph them). This is a common problem, when an organisation produces multiple products that are clearly part of a series but no series name is assigned. For example, "high profile reed" isn't an official name as such, but I've used that description to cover Clare/Pendar SF, SG, SI, SH and SK series as they're all related.

Giving Tealios a separate page seems a bit pointless — I guess for now they can go on the Zealio page and someone needs to threaten ZealPC to assign a series name for the purposes of documentation.

(Besides, Tiffany Blue is a trademarked colour in the US …)

[Findecanor]

I would classify Tealios as being in the Zealio switch family, with just a catchy name for marketing.

Variations of a switch family usually get a redirect page to the family's page so that each individual type can be properly put into categories. Redirects from "Clear Zealio" and "Purple Zealio" were created when "Zealio" was created, and I think that indeed there should also be a redirect from "Tealio".
A switch variation gets its own page only if it is significant enough. Most Cherry MX switches have their own, but that's because it is so very popular and some of them have text about mods or how they were created.

[Menuhin]

I would classify Tealios as being in the Zealio switch family, with just a catchy name for marketing.

Variations of a switch family usually get a redirect page to the family's page so that each individual type can be properly put into categories. Redirects from "Clear Zealio" and "Purple Zealio" were created when "Zealio" was created, and I think that indeed there should also be a redirect from "Tealio".
A switch variation gets its own page only if it is significant enough. Most Cherry MX switches have their own, but that's because it is so very popular and some of them have text about mods or how they were created.

I would say almost every modern switches of the recent 20 years belongs to the "Cherry switches" design. They (mostly from China) are either copycats of Cherry's design or they have done some minor booger size modifications / improvements. Cherry has been a lazy company. However, until its design expired and then the Chinese are copying, and eventually a portion of the market share got eaten by the Cherry copycats -- people started to prefer Gateron instead of the stock Cherry switches, its started to realize the danger. Zealios is a parasitic copycat -- not that in a bad way, but it is basically a modified Cherry design, implemented by Gateron. So Zealios stands on the shoulder of Gateron, and Gateron stands on the shoulder of Cherry. (Given that I still fall for Zealios' products - I have 1-2 builds with them).
Another copycat case is the Topre-clone by PLUM keyboard - they are of very similar design.

Can I say Matias (e.g. Matias Quiet Click,etc) a copycat? I think he simply purchased the rights to manufacture switches with Alps design, and all together ditched the best of Alps switches (in terms of key feel) and let the designs that are easier to manufacture and simpler to maintain survive.

There are not too many new switch designs out there in recent history (through my limited reading of the posts and Wiki here and also in other places). The Hall-effect switch keyboard is not new, but is a re-introduction of an old technology, implemented in a non-modular way by the Chinese in collaboration with XMIT.

Kaihl is kind of an oddball, it introduced the low profile switches and the box switches with closed internals. I would say it really has some innovative spirit.

However, the real innovation is the light-sensing switch (similar to magnetic mechanism that there will be no wearable contacting parts) introduced about 2 years ago, with press releases and so on, but I have yet to see a full keyboard built with such mechanism.

[Daniel Beardsmore]

Optoelectronic switches are nothing new. [wiki]Tokai SPT-0101[/wiki] has been around since 2000, maybe older (I'm only going by what limited information is on the Wayback Machine, and Tokai just went out of business this year, taking the knowledge with them).

[wiki]Burroughs Opto-Electric[/wiki] is much older.

[purdobol]

I would say almost every modern switches of the recent 20 years belongs to the "Cherry switches" design. They (mostly from China) are either copycats of Cherry's design or they have done some minor booger size modifications / improvements.

Well lets be honest here. Mechanical keyboards resurgence happened solely due to gamers. And their needs is what drives the market today. That ain't going to change anytime soon. And cherry is the company that meet the demand in time of need. It's not going to be easy to dethrone the king. Brand name and all that. R&D cost a lot of money and is risky. Better to copy what works and add marketing blur to the mix.

Keyboard enthusiast community like this forum is still to niche for any new clever designs at a reasonable price geared towards mass market...

[Menuhin]

Optoelectronic switches are nothing new. [wiki]Tokai SPT-0101[/wiki] has been around since 2000, maybe older (I'm only going by what limited information is on the Wayback Machine, and Tokai just went out of business this year, taking the knowledge with them).

[wiki]Burroughs Opto-Electric[/wiki] is much older.

My reading of the more modern history of keyboard is incomplete.
But only 1 modern of keyboard was ever produced - it must be a rare find for either the keyboard or any related post about it.

As I can see, key switch technology is improving in general.
I just hope some company can produce those thick and shiny MicroSwitch-style doubleshot key caps in the future, to pair with these modern switches.

[webwit]

Datahand optical magnetic switch. It's almost punk tech, it's a very simple concept, like you could make something like that in DIY projects.

[Menuhin]

I would say almost every modern switches of the recent 20 years belongs to the "Cherry switches" design. They (mostly from China) are either copycats of Cherry's design or they have done some minor booger size modifications / improvements.

Well lets be honest here. Mechanical keyboards resurgence happened solely due to gamers. And their needs is what drives the market today. That ain't going to change anytime soon. And cherry is the company that meet the demand in time of need. It's not going to be easy to dethrone the king. Brand name and all that. R&D cost a lot of money and is risky. Better to copy what works and add marketing blur to the mix.

Keyboard enthusiast community like this forum is still to niche for any new clever designs at a reasonable price geared towards mass market...

Too much of a niche...
People have hobbies like jogging, climbing, hiking, dogs, car racing, and even smoking cigars, but whenever I told people that my hobby is also computer keyboards, they all looked so astonished that they do not believe something like that exists. "What do you do? What do you do when you meet other people with the same hobby?..."

[Findecanor]

We are getting away a little from the topic here... but:

However, the real innovation is the light-sensing switch (similar to magnetic mechanism that there will be no wearable contacting parts) introduced about 2 years ago, with press releases and so on, but I have yet to see a full keyboard built with such mechanism.

Do you mean like laser keyboards or optomechanical?

As to optomechanical, I know of three switch types that came out not too long ago:

• Bloody LK "Light Strike": Some keyboards from A4Tech/Bloody should have been out in USA and Asia a while, but I don't know how long.
• Gateron KS-15: Tesoro Excalibur Spectrum SE has been out since early this year.
• Adomax's Flaretech. They may have been renamed "Flaretech Prism". A low-profile Flaretech switch has also been displayed at some trade show.
  • Wooting One was on kickstarter and introduced as TKL this year, with the main selling point that it has "analogue" sensing. Available from Wooting's web site.
  • Zowie Celeritas II is full-size, is widely available in retail stores (at least where I live) and came out under the radar because it is not much different at a cursory glance from many other gaming keyboards: it has "only" red backlighting, for instance.
  • Gigabyte's Aorus K9 Optical is about to come out, with a water-proofed PCB.