Keyboard Love Story VII - Dell AT101W

[codehead]

It was close to mid-summer (which here in Finland equals to like two weeks after the summer has actually started) 2012 and I had just received my first ALPS board. After a while of digging information about which ALPS board to get, I concluded that Dell AT101W was the perfect entry-level ALPS board: low prices, well built, good availability and Mr. Interface said that there’s basically nothing to dislike about the board.

I ended up buying it from a fellow pre-hacked-GeekHack-member Hashbaz. I was in talks with Javifast who was also selling it, but as it turned out, shipping the beast from Spain to Finland was actually more expensive than shipping it from US. EU... Free trade and all that crap, right? USPS delivered it surprisingly fast; Hashbaz sent it on a Thursday and I received it the next Tuesday. As a very nice surprise, Hashbaz had thrown in a white-on-red GEEKHACK double shot Cherry keycap!

Typing on Dell AT101W and its black ALPS was not as effortless and light as it is on a Cherry MX brown or blue board. Typing felt lighter yet not as pleasing as on Buckling Springs. Despite my efforts, I wasn’t able to type on black ALPS without almost constantly bottoming down the keys. It kept bothering me. I thought the problem was, that the sliders on this particular specimen were stiff. Also, according to OCN Mechanical Keyboard Guide and many other sources, ALPS sliders tend to get stiffer over time. In my case, it meant that the amount of force it took to reach the tactile bump point was so high that it was pretty much game over already once the point had been reached. Hit the bottom.

I must admit it. I was disappointed. I didn’t expect it to be that bad after all those nice things I’d read about the Dell.

But this is not actually the whole story! You see, I wasn’t yet giving up with the Dell...

[Burz]

The Japanese supposedly swear by the practice of using lube on their Alps boards, as if it were the only way to use them. I think they may be right because my AT101 changes from day to day and I think it may be due to changing humidity. So maybe I'll try lube soon.

As it stands now, my Dell feels like 2 steps up, at least, from the rubber domes I had before. It was in great shape when I got it, used but virtually mint condition; no shiny spots and no dirt.

Hey, if you give up on the black Alps switches, you could try replacing them with Matias clicky or quiet.

I also went with the Dell for 'entry level', but if I could do it again I'd probably pay a little more for an SGI or just save the money to use toward a really nice compact board.