Tai Hao Softkey f-21s

[zrrion]

Picked this up recently in a lot of other keyboards hoping this would be a Tai Hao clicker keyboard, one of the switches was broken and I could see part of the mechanism so I didn't actually look into it before I got it or I would have known it wasn't going to be a clicker keyboard since it's obviously labeled "softkey." The wiki page for Tai Hao is the only place on the wiki with info on this board and what is there is an unsourced reference to the line's existence with no explicit reference to what they have going on so it wouldn't have done much good to look it up I suppose.


visually though that's tai hao semi mechanical

The wiki page for "Tai Hao APC semi-mechanical" lists 3 types of this switch, all of which are clicky and none of which are related to the softkey or clicker branding directly, but looking through the sources there we get this thread: viewtopic.php?f=2&t=749 which shows an identical board but branded with "Clicker." interestingly it looks to have a copper coloured tactile leaf and a mantis foot style click leaf, however my board does not have the click leaf only the tactile leaf.




compared to white alps


and here you can see the shape of the leaf, it's not especially tactile

From all this I've come to the conclusion that "softkey" may refer to a tactile variant of the tai hao semi mechanical while clicker boards are the clicky version. The caps are doubleshot, but several of the keys are pad print. the windows key for sure is pad print but is still doubleshot while the left, down, and right arrow keys as well as both shifts are double shot with a colour that doesn't match the legends so who knows what's going on there.

The keyfeel on this board is also not tactile, even though it is clearly supposed to be tactile, the weighting of the spring simply overpowers the tactility and makes it very difficult to notice it. it does sound nice enough though. swapping the tactile leaf (or if you're feeling frisky you can also swap in the slider, IDK if that actually does anything desirable but you can do it if you want) into white alps which makes for a very nice lightly tactile switch. The wide click leaves in clicker are also compatible with alps housings and that's what I was hoping to get here, but my search goes on I guess. I'm certainly not disappointed though, the tactility once swapped into alps switches is very nice and doesn't have an analogue in the alps catalogue so I'll for sure be making a board with these tactile leaves in it eventually.

EDIT: I've been informed by a trusted source that both clicker and softkey branded boards can be rubber domes but they didn't have any photo evidence to back this up so I can't confirm it. Still, there's a possibility that my hypothesis of clicker being clicky and softkey being tactile is incorrect. More of these boards need to come out of the woodwork before we can know for sure.

[zrrion]

okay, so I did some frankenswitch experiments recently with these tactile leaves and the results are interesting. They have a similar feeling (probably) to SKCM browns but as the browns I have have been spring swapped that effects my ability to compare accurately. I think if you like how browns feel but think they are too heavy this would be a good alternative.

Entonces, here's a comparison sound test between 2 videowriter boards, one with spring swaped browns and one with salmons that have springs from white-black KPT and these softkey leaves: https://v3.fastupload.co/file/10156
I did not have the feet flipped out for these tests but I probably should have, I feel high tactility/weighting is more comfortable at a steeper angle and it was weird to type on them in the test like that. if there's interest I can do another comparison with the feet flipped out to see what that does.

It's a nice combo that's pretty similar in weighting to the swapped browns with maybe a quieter sound? hard to tell exactly there. tactility is also similar with the drop at the end of the bump for the browns being more noticeable when testing single switches but at speed doesn't matter all that much. I think this frankenswitch has potential and would be very interesting to pair these tactile leaves with something like matias quiet linear springs to see what such a light spring does to the tactility. The KPT springs are about 1 mm longer than ALPS springs and I'm sure that does something to the feel, but I haven't tried enough spring combos with these leaves to really say much there.

[Muirium]

I could be so into damped, light fake-brown. Don’t make me!

Seriously, though, sounds like you’re onto something. Tell us how that board goes. I’d throw some damped sliders into the layout to see.

[zrrion]

I did try it with dampened cream housings/sliders and it was okay. I don't like dampened alps as much as standard alps though but for someone who wants a quiet board it would be a very nice thing. the springs of the dampened creams are also lighter than the KPT springs I used but only slightly so the difference in feel isn't huge. If you don't have KPT parts just laying around like I do then it wouldn't be a bad way to go. I honestly just tried the KPT springs since they were the first thing I found in my parts storage that was lighter than salmons.

There's a meetup sometime next year in philly and someone should be bringing an unmodified videowriter board so I should be able to get a good comparison then at the latest.

Like brown alps I don't think you have to worry about upstroke click with these, but I paper modded them anyway, as well as bent out the tabs a little just in case. I haven't tried removing the tabs to see if they can be click modded yet since I only have one boards worth, if I get some more of these (or I build something that isn't just a test build with them and no longer need parts) I will give it a try.

[Palatino]

Thanks for all this - I have the same Tai-Hao clicker board which I might try some of this with. To be frank, though, it’ll be hard to beat stock dampened Alps for me: I’ve discovered them quite late, having avoided AEKs for a long time, but my god they’re nice! Feel and sound together. Worth the ADB converter price certainly. Now waiting on a Bluetooth adapter so I can do iPad + AEK on the go

[Muirium]

Bridging your Apples? Maybe something like this…

viewtopic.php?f=45&t=20848

The adapter chain may prove a bit unwieldy for mobile use, mind!

[Palatino]

That’s the one I’m getting - looks nifty. Good return policy too if it doesn’t fit the bill. Then it, the Drakware adapter and a power bank can go snugly together into a little box with slots and into an earmarked compartment in my pannier, or baekcycle bag as I’ll have to rename it.