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1

Computing / Re: The Keeb Thread

« Last post by Spectere on Today at 11:37:07 AM »

I could see a 60% keyboard easy to replace switches in being a good testbench for switches. I wouldn't want to daily drive anything smaller than a TKL but as a testbench type of thing...im interested in searching for one.

If you have a programmable keyboard (running QMK or VIA firmware) compact is kinda hard to top. I'm currently using a 75% layout with some custom tweaks and it's been absolutely wonderful. TKL feels like a waste of space for me at this time, both in terms of gaming and productivity.

Mind you, this is coming from someone who couldn't even imagine stepping down to TKL keyboard a couple years ago.

I think it would be fun to have a platform to try switches, even something really small like buying in batches of 10. In all honesty it's more of a "toy", I don't need another expensive "hobby" right now tbh...

The problem is that when you start getting to more of the "exotic" sizes you tend to lose the advantage of mass manufacturing. The GMMK Compact is one of the few I can think of that are pushed toward a mass market, but not being able to fully reprogram a compact keyboard is kind of a tough sell IMO. If you would primarily be using it as a switch tester it would work out well, though.

Cool for the people who are into it, but some people just want a nice "premium" keyboard without any of the bullshit. Which there seems to be plenty of options now a days, so, something for everyone. My analogue is knives, so when someone asks me about wanting a pocket knife, I need to ask a few questions. Not everybody needs or WANTS a $200+ pocket knife, and I think that's the same thing for anything really.

That's one of the things I really appreciate about r/HeadphoneAdvice. Give them your budget, your current equipment, and what you listen to and they'll try to match you with something that'll make it pop. Audio is just as subjective as keyboards are, there are a lot more options available in that realm, yet some Redditors managed to make a dedicated recommendations sub work.

I wound up leaving that subreddit with a nice set of headphones and knowledge. r/MechanicalKeyboards has such a high signal to noise ratio by comparison that I didn't know where to even start, so I wound up going with GMMK. It was better than I had, but I wouldn't call it a good choice for someone who sits at a computer for 8+ hours per day. If there weren't so many crossed wires and rampant elitism I would have been able to get to my current place sooner, for less money, and with more decisiveness.

I mostly blame youtube, because that's where I look for things, and people who make their living off one SPECIFIC thing, gotta go hard on that one thing, and I think it unintentionally breeds elitism. This is for a lot of things, not just keyboards, but specifically what I encountered on the youtube/reddit in my search for a keyboard. Again this is in my other interests, like beer, knives, warhammer, bikes, everything. Just makes it a little harder as a consumer.

Never underestimate the power of the Internet echo chamber, as well as what people will gleefully form cliques around. I swear, half of the reason they don't even know why they're doing it.

I mean, I've literally been called stupid to my face for using an iPhone by people who could barely navigate their way around a Windows PC. People are fuckin' weird.

Curious, do you just go ham and make 100 keyboards to try new switches? Or do you buy small batches of 10 and plug em in somewhere before you take a bigger plunge? I really don't know how people can know so much about switches without having a proper typing experience with them. Like with liquor, you can try 2oz at a bar or something, switches...iunno.

I'm not that into it, haha. One thing to keep in mind is that everything kinda works together to make the complete product. If I were to test switches in a keyboard with an aluminum shell and a carbon fiber plate, it wouldn't feel or sound the same as it does in my main keyboard with its acrylic shell and brass plate. If I wanted to have a dedicated test keyboard, I'd basically just have to buy another crystal IDOBAO ID80…for $260. :s

If I do decide to try out switches, I go all the way. I yank all the switches out of my board and plop new ones in. If I still like them after a couple weeks, I keep them. If not, I swap them all back. The latter has only happened once so far (Drop Holy Pandas. They felt good but were so unreliable that I got tired of messing with them).

You could get away with just replacing the alphanumerics and modifiers, but in my case that's almost the whole keyboard.

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Computing / Re: The Keeb Thread

« Last post by vladgd on May 26, 2022, 11:37:08 PM »

I love trying out new switches, but I hate swapping them, haha. Definitely invest in a good switch puller if you're going to do that. The weird, stiff metal ring ones are kinda awkward (and if you slip, the hooks at the end are very good at slicing through skin. Don't ask how I know).

I could see a 60% keyboard easy to replace switches in being a good testbench for switches. I wouldn't want to daily drive anything smaller than a TKL but as a testbench type of thing...im interested in searching for one.

I think it would be fun to have a platform to try switches, even something really small like buying in batches of 10. In all honesty it's more of a "toy", I don't need another expensive "hobby" right now tbh...

Cool for the people who are into it, but some people just want a nice "premium" keyboard without any of the bullshit. Which there seems to be plenty of options now a days, so, something for everyone. My analogue is knives, so when someone asks me about wanting a pocket knife, I need to ask a few questions. Not everybody needs or WANTS a $200+ pocket knife, and I think that's the same thing for anything really. I mostly blame youtube, because that's where I look for things, and people who make their living off one SPECIFIC thing, gotta go hard on that one thing, and I think it unintentionally breeds elitism. This is for a lot of things, not just keyboards, but specifically what I encountered on the youtube/reddit in my search for a keyboard. Again this is in my other interests, like beer, knives, warhammer, bikes, everything. Just makes it a little harder as a consumer.

/softrant?

Curious, do you just go ham and make 100 keyboards to try new switches? Or do you buy small batches of 10 and plug em in somewhere before you take a bigger plunge? I really don't know how people can know so much about switches without having a proper typing experience with them. Like with liquor, you can try 2oz at a bar or something, switches...iunno.

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Computing / Re: The Keeb Thread

« Last post by Spectere on May 21, 2022, 01:32:41 AM »

So the main 3 types of switches are clicky, tactile, and linear. From what I see online nobody likes clicky switches, so it's whether you want tactile or linear switches.

I love clicky switches. The only reason I stopped using them is because I started doing the YouTube gaming thing.

Before I started doing that I used Kailh Box Navy switches. Very heavy switches, but they felt great to type on.

And this gets to why I am kind of happy I didn't dump $400 on a new keyboard, pretty much all of this stuff (as what seems to me) is totally subjective.

It doesn't really start getting expensive until you start messing around with different case materials, plates, etc. I basically fell in love with a combination of gasket mount keebs with a brass plate, but that's far from being the cheapest way to go.

Now maybe in the future I'll see how easy or not so easy yanking out switches is on this sucker so I can play with other switches.

I love trying out new switches, but I hate swapping them, haha. Definitely invest in a good switch puller if you're going to do that. The weird, stiff metal ring ones are kinda awkward (and if you slip, the hooks at the end are very good at slicing through skin. Don't ask how I know).

Currently eyeing gateron milky yellow, and ink black...but I'm kinda content enough with these normal cherry mx browns where I think I'll be content for a little while.

The Cherry MX Brown is a good baseline switch. A lot of enthusiasts seem to like to shit on them, but I think they're fine.

If you like them, you'll probably love Kailh Polias. To me they feel like smoother, slightly heavier, yet crisper Browns.

Feels pretty damn good to me, and could be placebo effect, but I swear my typing is 20% faster on this thing too.

Eh, probably. One of the reasons tactile keyboards are beloved by typists is that you can feel roughly where the actuation happens. With practice you'll be able to consistently actuate the switch without bottoming out (or at least without bottoming out hard). That can make quite a difference in the long run.

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Gaming / Re: FFVII Remake

« Last post by Spectere on May 21, 2022, 01:14:26 AM »

I mean right now my ps5 loads games faster than my pc does on my samsung m.2 ssd...like from the ps5 dashboard I can be LOADED IN GAME in death stranding OR ff7r by the time you can count to 10. So booting up the game, skipping to the title screen, selecting your file to load, loading the game and being loaded ready to play, 10 seconds. It's a novelty I am still impressed with and I applaud. Load times last generation seemed to be the worst they've been yet, and seeing it do a 180 is very satisfying.

The way they do it is a bit cheaty, but it's a fantastic approach for games systems. When you switch games on both the Xbox Series and PS5, the OS creates a save state and just loads that. The only time it actually loads the full game is when the game updates, the game crashes, or if you haven't played it in so long that it just wipes it from the cache.

It's pretty trivial to do that on a platform that uses game VMs and a fixed architecture. Features like that are unlikely to come to a PC because devs can't rely on the environment being the same twice in a row.

I really hope not. Any reason for windows OS to have a gaming focused competitor is a good thing. I await the day valve has a proper OS that you can game on without using windows. 

Valve already tried doing it and it didn't go particularly well. Contrary to popular belief, the issues with Linux gaming historically go far beyond devs simply not porting their games. The architecture is a complete mess, to the point where video card drivers have to bypass half of Xorg in order to offer acceptable performance. There's a replacement for Xorg called Wayland, but in my experience it still simply work well enough to be a definitive replacement.

In more recent times, the Steam Deck is another attempt by Valve to push Linux adoption. Everyone I know who bought a Steam Deck eventually loaded Windows on it, though.

Oh, then there's the fact that Steam still requires a messy multilib installation to run on Linux since they refuse to release a native 64-bit version of it, forcing you to maintain a ton of 32-bit libraries on your system even if you're only planning to run 64-bit games. Similarly, the Mac build of Steam is not a universal app, so you need to use Rosetta 2 to run it on ARM Macs. If they truly give a damn about non-Windows platforms, they have a weird way of showing it.

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Gaming / Re: wut specturr'z playing

« Last post by Spectere on May 21, 2022, 12:49:21 AM »

I just finished up MAP27, including the, erm, secret part. Speaking of that secret part: I managed to beat it first try. I ate two rockets pretty much right at the start because I'm a dumbass, but I was able to snag a megasphere and stay in the fight as the arena continued to open up. Holy hell, is that part fun. I wish I were recording that.

I've been live streaming Valiant, so I now have a recording of me doing a deathless clear of the Final Countdown secret: https://youtu.be/RJHKjcdf73g?t=15460

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Song of the Day / [chillwave?]Toro y Moi- Goes By So Fast

« Last post by vladgd on May 20, 2022, 11:49:52 PM »

So like I'm drinking again, and iunno when I drink I partake in music more than I do when I don't. But like this track...ohh boy ohh boy.

It's like modern, but like 60's? But like not vaporwave, but kinda? BUT ALL FUKIN GOOD jeeeeeezzzzzzzzz

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Gaming / Re: FFVII Remake

« Last post by vladgd on May 20, 2022, 09:18:48 PM »

The PS5/XBS, on the other hand, are actually fantastic PC alternatives. Zen 2 paired with a solid GPU, NVMe SSDs, tons of RAM and cores…it's basically the perfect blend of components for a living room box.

I mean right now my ps5 loads games faster than my pc does on my samsung m.2 ssd...like from the ps5 dashboard I can be LOADED IN GAME in death stranding OR ff7r by the time you can count to 10. So booting up the game, skipping to the title screen, selecting your file to load, loading the game and being loaded ready to play, 10 seconds. It's a novelty I am still impressed with and I applaud. Load times last generation seemed to be the worst they've been yet, and seeing it do a 180 is very satisfying.

Honestly, if Microsoft ever partnered up with Valve to bring Steam to the Xbox Series X I'd spend a lot more time in the living room. That thing would make a solid Steam Machine.

I really hope not. Any reason for windows OS to have a gaming focused competitor is a good thing. I await the day valve has a proper OS that you can game on without using windows. 

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Computing / Re: The Keeb Thread

« Last post by vladgd on May 20, 2022, 09:10:52 PM »

So like, I decided while I went crazy on the steering wheel...the further I go down keyboards the more I don't really want to "build" one.

Wanted to try new switches, in a hotswapable keyboard, in something that isn't going to give me double inputs like my corsair keyboard.

Ducky One 3 tkl with cherry mx brown switches

I've used this thing less than 20 minutes as of this post so this is just initial impressions.

So the main 3 types of switches are clicky, tactile, and linear. From what I see online nobody likes clicky switches, so it's whether you want tactile or linear switches. My last keyboard had cherry reds, so I've heard good things about browns and not so much about clears so that was my decision made for me.

Pressing a single key it's very hard to feel the tactile "bump", but typing on it feels quite different than with the linear keys. And this gets to why I am kind of happy I didn't dump $400 on a new keyboard, pretty much all of this stuff (as what seems to me) is totally subjective. I like keyboards and I think the different switches are cool, but I'm not "into it" into it, yknow? I just want a premium feeling thing that feels and looks nice, and from what I can see with this board, it's the single nicest feeling keyboard I have personally experienced. I can't say browns > reds, they both feel nice to me to be totally honest. However this thing looks/feels/sounds good to me, and my first impressions is pretty positive.

It looks a lot nicer in person than it does in the pictures/videos I've seen, and feels a lot more hefty/solid than my last board.

Kinda reminds me of a knife I bought.



Benchmade Bugout in carbon fiber and s90v steel. Looks pretty nice in the pictures, then you get it...and the real carbon fiber pattern has this cool 3d effect that doesn't show unless you're handling it in person. And it's sharp as heck, and STAYS sharp as heck. You can read about s90v having insane edge retention, it's one thing to read that. However seeing your knife feeling as sharp as the day you got it with months of casual use, that's another thing entirely. Mine is still one of the sharpest knives I own, and I have a lot of newer stuff with less use. Now sharpening s90v is neigh impossible for an amateur so there's that...but this is a keyboard topic so back to that...

Seeing and using this keyboard feels like that, it looks nice, but it's a lot nicer than the videos/pictures portray.

AT LEAST FOR SOME SIMPLETON WHO'S ONLY USED 2 MECH KEYBOARDS, take my opinions with that giant grain of salt.

Now maybe in the future I'll see how easy or not so easy yanking out switches is on this sucker so I can play with other switches. Currently eyeing gateron milky yellow, and ink black...but I'm kinda content enough with these normal cherry mx browns where I think I'll be content for a little while. Feels pretty damn good to me, and could be placebo effect, but I swear my typing is 20% faster on this thing too.

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Gaming / Re: FFVII Remake

« Last post by Spectere on May 17, 2022, 11:22:57 AM »

I recall replaying the ps4 port of the original ff7 and not even doing wutai until late game, didn't even know it was optional for the most part.

I only knew about it because I was a child of the Internet and had access to GameFAQs (and because my friend, who played the phuck out of the PSX version, told me about Yuffie and Wutai).

I mean you can, but who's to say when the next part releases, on the ps7?

Hah. Touché, friend.

I think giving the original a playthrough up to the end of whichever part is a fun idea so you can see all the little things you thought they just made up, but ended up being in the original. Like Johnny, I didn't even remember he was in the original.

I actually wound up doing that in the time leading up to FF7R:1's release, so I was able to pick out a loooooot of changes and such.

Johnny is a bit of an odd one, since he's ever-present but not quite as noticeable as he is in the Remake. If we're being honest, I think I prefer him being an ever-present background character.

Honestly, aside from transferring your saves and whatnot over...I don't think so? I've been able to throw in various ps4 discs like mgsv ground zeros, the wipeout collection, ff7r (obviously), no issues. Going digital however...same thing, stuff on your psn seems to work fine. Like the ps4 ff7 original port, burnout paradise, ff8 remaster, downloads/works fine.

I'm not a fan of throwing out old consoles, but in my case it seems to do all what the ps4 can, only better.

Cool, thanks.

I don't think I'd really feel bad about selling off the PS4 (or maybe I'll just exchange it for my old PS3, which my dad is currently using). The PS4/XB1 was kind of a lame duck generation in a lot of ways. The CPUs were ungodly weak even for the time (seriously, AMD's cores from that era are Pentium 4 levels of bad), so they were capable of shiny graphics with minimal substance, and they were using HDDs when SSDs were getting popular. It was an upgrade from the previous generation, but considering the previous generation was from 2005/2006 that's a pretty low bar to clear.

The PS5/XBS, on the other hand, are actually fantastic PC alternatives. Zen 2 paired with a solid GPU, NVMe SSDs, tons of RAM and cores…it's basically the perfect blend of components for a living room box.

Honestly, if Microsoft ever partnered up with Valve to bring Steam to the Xbox Series X I'd spend a lot more time in the living room. That thing would make a solid Steam Machine.

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Random Chat / Re: Weight Loss

« Last post by vladgd on May 12, 2022, 01:32:39 PM »

...will try to keep this up.

So like all the other times, I didn't. In fact with my hiatus from work and taking it easy in general this year...I have reached my heaviest weight ever, 225lbs.

Always told myself if I started to get fat, I was going to do something about it, so I guess this is an attempt at that. Normally when I go without food for a while my torso gets somewhat thin, but this time it's like I feel bloaty all the time, even with a nearly day long fast. Think my body is telling me that I am no longer young enough to get away with eating trash all day, low activity level, and beers beers beers.

...and with my last relationship recently ended(mutual, we're still on good terms, yay for being adults I guess), I need a positive goal to work on right now. Pretty much what sparked my weight loss journey the last time, so may as well make the best out of an unfortunate situation.

GOAL WEIGHT 185lbs. Updating when I can motivate myself to make any progress.