I am doing most of my typing nowadays on a Tofu65 keyboard. The keyboard is a so-called custom keyboard. The basic package includes components that you have to assemble together to build your keyboard. Some custom keyboard packages come with most of the components required to build a basic working keyboard and as such the user needs to do very little extra purchase. But Tofu65, like most packages, comes with only the case, a case foam, the pcb and the plate.
For a keyboard, you will of course require keyboard switches and keycaps, and these you have to purchase separately when you are building your Tofu65 keyboard. For extra “mods”, short for modifications, you might also want to purchase some kind of “plate foam” - a dampening material that sits between the plate and the pcb. Poron foams or PE foams or a combination of both are a common choice for this purpose. And you have to purchase or prepare these separately. By prepare I mean, get poron foam and make cutouts youself. There are plenty of other mods - the tape mod for example consists of simply put painter’s tape on the back of the pcb. The Tofu65 case has a seamless design - there is only one metallic block that forms the case of the keyboard and has a tray-mount style.
For my Tofu65 build, I opted for a brass plate with poron plate foam. I am also using PE switch pads which are similar to PE foam layers but come in the form of stickers for each individual switch. I am using Durock POM Linear switches with Akko Black on White keycaps. Overall I am quite happy with the sound and the feel of the typing. It’s not extremely loud, but still has a good clack to the keypresses. I lubricated the switches with Krytox 205G0 industrial lube and after some usage, the switches feel absolutely buttery smooth.
The tofu-65. A seamless tray-mount design. A perfect rectangle. This is geometry at its perverse basic. Those sharp corners leave no doubt this is a keyboard machined for only the most deviant of creatures.
What can this primeval aluminum block really achieve? Nothing by itself. For it has to be wielded. This symbiotic device constantly implores its user to channel his persona into unapologetic keypresses, ushering creativity. Productivity.
Lesser men are driven to insanity, whilst the strong survive and thrive within the virulent bond that has formed between the instrument and the wielder.