Gadgetory

quick response times tactile feedback that delightful clickety-clack sound that's like a Vegas craps table that keeps your roommate awake at night mechanical keyboards are awesome for all of that not to mention their durability and premium feel but what if instead of relying solely on a mechanical actuator you can harness the power of light to when you type and I'm not talking about the ever-present RGB backlighting either we are starting to see optical keyboard switches hit the market which are actually sort of a fusion of existing mechanical keyboard technology and infrared light that determines when you push down on a key and unlike the huge variety of purely mechanical switches there are only two main types of optical switches out there right now since the technology is rather new the first type is called a light strikes which also called an lk switch these work with a more or less traditional mechanical shaft that blocks a freaking infrared laser beam when it's idle but when you press down the beam is allowed to hit a sensor on the other side of the switch which registers a key press now although this is a pretty simple principle of operation it actually allows for a faster response times when gaming because LK switches register keystrokes after traveling just one and a half millimeters downward about 25% less than most current mechanical keyboards the manufacturer also claims that actual response times could be as low as a fifth of one millisecond which is useful if you need to aim and fire quickly before getting headshotted not that too many people have fire bound to their keyboard don't worry about those little details the other kind of switch goes by the super-intense name of flare tech and works quite differently instead of using a beam of infrared light the PCB has an upward facing I or sensor that can tell when the switch itself is being pushed down now although this is a little more complicated and expensive to engineer than the L K switch the IR sensor can actually tell how far the switch is being pressed down allowing keyboard manufacturers to use them as so-called analog switches in fact a Dutch keyboard manufacturer called routing currently has a keyboard with flare tech switches on Kickstarter featuring this analog control that they're advertising as fine control over things like player movement or steering and throttle in driving games imagine being able to push down just a little bit on a key to make your car go more slowly around corners instead of like spamming the key and hoping that somewhere between here and here is like like here-ish cool right routing is also pushing customizability as a feature of this keyboard as the analog functionality can be programmed in a number of ways to make these key switches much more versatile than traditional ones and I mean beyond just gaming they also have the distinct advantage of being replaceable since neither type has to be soldered on to the PCB so the light sensor used by an L case which is housed in the switch itself while the IR sensor of a flare tech switch doesn't need a physical connection to the switch making combining like a keyboard baseplate with any other type of mechanical actuator that you want sound pretty versatile in the future and all of us without giving yourself a crash course in soldering of course since the technology is so new there isn't much to choose from yet although there are a small handful of L case which is currently available on Amazon but given their potential to help gamers get quicker response times and more granular control it wouldn't be surprising to me to see bigger name peripheral brands try to incorporate optical switches into their keyboards in the near future and bring in the sweet sweet paper that comes with cutting edge technology speaking of being on the cutting edge with a lynda.com membership you can stay on the cutting edge whether you're looking to take your career to the next level or you just want to get 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