k70 rgb New to Mechanical Keyboards [Switches]

The RGB Keyboards actually only come with 2 types of Switches: Red and Brown

Both have a 4mm travel until bottoming out und 2mm until activation. The Difference is the Tactile Feel.

Reds are linear Switches. You need 45g to press it all the way down (4mm). At 2mm it activates, but you don't feel it.

Brown Switches are Tactile Switches. You can feel a slight Bump, right before it activates (At about 1.5mm?)

On the Left you see the Activation Graph for Reds and on the right for Browns

http://techreport.com/r.x/corsair-k60-k90/mx-diagram.png

The best switch for you is the switch you prefere typing/gaming on. There is no best switch for everyone. Do you have anything nearby where you can try some Switches? I personally use Browns and like them. A friend of mine uses Reds and loves them but I cannot type for **** on them. It's all about preference

I'll sum up the entire internet debate over "gaming vs typing switches" in this post.

NO SWITCH IS BETTER FOR GAMING/TYPING. Period.

What I mean by this is no switch will increase your gaming or typing performance. Those "gaming switches" are all marketing hype. What is the most important in your decision process over which switch is the best for you is COMFORT.

Now, there are differences between switches for sure (there are more than 6 types of switches). First of all, you have different brand of switches (Cherry MX, Matias, Topre, etc.). Then you have different type of switches (linear, tactile, clicky, etc.).

I could go on with pages of information on all these types of switches but since you seem to have made your choice for the K70 RGB, you are down to two different type of switches: Cherry MX reds and Cherry MX browns. If you want more information on all other type of switches, google them up or head to specialized keyboard forums like geekhack.org where you will find ALL the information you need on the subject. This link will also help you a lot in demystifying all those switches:

https://mechanicalkeyboards.com/faqs.php?faq=mechanical_switch_difference

Cherry is a brand of switch designed by ZF Electronics (German based company). Basically, all their switches have a 4mm travel distance (meaning when you press a key, it will travel 4 mm until it bottoms out or in other word, hit the board). What is a particularity of those switches is that they actuate (register as a keystroke) with 2mm travel distance meaning you don't have to bottom out to register a keystroke (like you would need to do on your typical rubberdome keyboard).

Now, MX reds characteristics are that the switch is completely linear meaning the required downstroke force you will need to apply on the key increases on a linear pattern. Here's the force diagram required for the MX red switch:

http://www.wasdkeyboards.com/media/guide/graph-mx-red.jpg.

As you can see, the force increases following a linear pattern and the required force to actuate the key (reach that 2mm travel distance) is 45gcN and you will need 60cN to bottom out (reach the end of the 4mm travel distance).

MX browns are tactile meaning there will be a tactile bump while you downstroke. Take a look at the force diagram of the brown switch:

http://www.wasdkeyboards.com/media/guide/graph-mx-brown.jpg

Basically, MX red and brown switches require the same amount of force to bottom out (60cN) but you can clearly see on the brown diagram that the required amount of force increases to a pressure point before the actuation point of 2mm resulting in a "bump" giving you what we call a tactile feedback that the key is about to actuate.

Those are the objective facts on these two different type of swtiches. Now comes the whole subjective perspective of which switch is better than the other.

The marketing hype and non sense thrown all over the internet states red are better for gaming because you can double tap more quickly (since you don't have that bump in your way when you downstroke) while brown switches are better for typing because the bump let's you know you have actuated a key when your press it.

The thing is that bump in the brown switch pattern is really only noticeable when you slowly press the key. At full speed (typing as fast as you can) you will barely if not even don't notice that bump anymore. Same goes the other way around: you can double tap as fast on brown switches than you can on red switches following the same reasoning.

I personally favor largely red over brown. Not because my performance is better with red switches but simply because I don't like the tactile feedback provided by browns. The feedback is not prominent enough for me to be useful. If I wanted tactile feedback, I'd go with something like MX Clear (65cN tactile feedback). Then again, I really prefer a linear feel to my keys than a tactile one again, not based on performance but on comfort.

The other non sense that people will give you is that you can avoid bottoming out on browns because of the bump (because once you hit the bump, you will release the key and not hit the board all the way down). That's funny because I still have to get actual evidence of this (not a single brown switch owner I know of has agreed to post a video showing them type at full speed and not bottom out on their keyboard). Since brown switches have been tagged as a good balance between typing and gaming (low actuation force/tactile feedback) and are supposedly better for typing than reds, I have yet to understand why all professional stenographer use linear switches over tactile switches to work (for sure I know why: they do because linear switches are less fatiguing and because the tactile feedback making you supposedly better at typing is wrong).

Long post for sure, but you got most the information you need.

The best and only way to choose your switch is to try them out for yourself. There are switch tester also that you can order for like 10-20 US dollars (it's a little board with different type of switch that you can try).

Thank's for the feedback and really in depth Information, upon doing some further research I've found that the Blue and Red Switches are my style but decided to get the Red Switch now :)

Thanks again for the support.

Just to add my 2 cents. If you are a bit of a sloppy typer, or tend to not type accurately at times. You might see yourself doing typos and accidentally triggering some keys with red switches.

Being a linear switch, there is barely any resistance and no 'bump'. So it's really easy for a slip to trigger an actuation.

Blues were discontinued, there wasn't enough demand and blue switches tend to fail more often then the others.

If you want blue switches you'll most likely have to get them used and please note that the warranty will not transfer of you buy a used keyboard.

I doubt we'll see the blue switches back anytime soon for now.

Maybe once the situation calms down, they're having trouble keeping up the production with just red/brown because of all the demand there is, but for now I highly doubt the blue switches will be back. That's just my opinion thought.

Just to add my 2 cents. If you are a bit of a sloppy typer, or tend to not type accurately at times. You might see yourself doing typos and accidentally triggering some keys with red switches.

 

Being a linear switch, there is barely any resistance and no 'bump'. So it's really easy for a slip to trigger an actuation.

This is very true. I can touch type and I found that using the red switches has improved my typing by about 10 words per minute. You do have to be fairly accurate though with your fingers.

When I first started using the red switches in game however I found that when I was resting my fingers on certain keys (I play MOBA games like League of Legends) I found that I would sometimes push the key by mistake and activate skills when I didn't mean to. I got used to it after a couple of hours though.

I have never used brown switches before but I think it is all personal preferences. You will find that some people swear by the brown and others will swear by the red.

Personally I like the fact that I just have to push slightly down for a key to activate and my previous keyboards did not have a tactile bump either.

One day I would like to try a brown switch however to see what they feel like.