I've built over 100 keyboards and you know what I always thought was
necessary in every build foam but it turns out you don't need foam in your
keyboard kind of I'll I'll explain in a second Patty hey I'm hip yo Tech and
this video is a bit of a story we're gonna be learning a little bit now I know what
you're thinking hippo you're betraying us you're you're leaving foam foam gang no
sounds together I'm gonna be building an incredibly clacky keyboard yeah no thought
but there's a Twist I'm building it without foam this is the enter 67. it's a keyboard
from drop.com and guess what it's only 150 but we'll talk about that more later after
I lint roll my cat Nola she needs it now I will be doing my standard hippo Antics and
uh doing weird mods But ultimately what I'm gonna try to do is maybe realize foam isn't
always the way and also I'm using tactile switches in this build is this like a new
hipio age of Revival speaking of Revival revive the Subscribe button like I'm Reviving Nola here
with this massage gun if you hit subscribe I'll give you an extra howdy hey I'll wait
howdy hey now oh what's this box on the floor looks like I might have dropped it this part of
the Story begins with the keyboard a keyboard that was sent to me by drop and I'm very very
curious about this is the kaziwa quezawa enter 67. now don't get this confused with the drop
enter it's actually totally different but we'll get into that later it's just a board being sold
on drop that isn't actually made by drop as far as I'm aware I could be wrong now this video is not
sponsored but drop has been a sponsor in the past so keep that in mind now you're probably thinking
hippo this is just another metal rectangle what's going on what's special about this one well a few
things number one the price number two oh my God what was that number two the quality and
number three the sound I'll get into all the foamy stuff later don't worry we're still doing that but
let's start with the board so unfortunately this keyboard is a group buy which makes me go you
suck but it starts at 149 US Dollars and if you're checking your little fact sheet there that means
it's pretty talky affordable for a custom keyboard for a custom keyboard now even though it's a group
buy I'm actually interested in talking about this because it fulfills in July meaning yeah if you
buy this keyboard you'll have to wait through all of May and all of June but actually two
months isn't that bad for a group buy that's actually really good these shorter group buys
are really finally starting to make me excited for groupies again now this board is aluminum or
aluminum for you British viewers and I've got the pink version here in front of me but it comes in
a lot of different colors and the build quality is shockingly good for how affordable it is like
this board is cheaper than the kikron Q2 keep that in mind and oh my look at that back weight
that is a premium style backweight that I would typically see on like a 300 plus keyboard it's
stainless steel and boy it's pretty now just like my therapist always says it's time to open up
uh the keyboard the keyboard now earlier I said that keyboards don't need foam but
you're probably wondering why does this keyboard come with foam then why does it come with foam
well keyboard sound is entirely subjective now I prefer a deep thalkier sound but some people
might prefer a clackier sound some people might prefer whatever monstrosity this is anyways so
they include foam so that you can customize the sound to your preference it also adjusts the feel
as well now despite what some people might tell you there isn't really one true best way to mod
your keyboard for example PE foam can be really good if you like a certain sound profile but it
can also be a little bit boring if you like a different sound profile but this keyboard
gives you a lot of different options now for some boards I really really prefer the foamed
sound like the Zoom 75 I feel like sounds super marbly and deep when I put all of the foam in
it and it included a lot of foam like listen to this I think this sounds absolutely incredible
but that's subjective but if you think that sounds bad you do need to get your ears checked actually
that's actually a real fact if you think that sounds bad please get yours checked but often
if you leave foam out in some cheaper keyboards the keyboard will end up sounding incredibly
pingy I'm looking at you kikron but if a board is made out of more premium materials then the
design is good then you can actually end up with a very clacky sounding keyboard and a very flexible
gasket performance if you leave out the foam but I'm honestly wondering if that's going to
be the case here I mean the board is a hundred and fifty dollars it can't actually sound good
without foam right right well one good sign is that it uses gasket socks which are my favorite
style of gasket but to put this board to the test I'll be building it with foam and without foam
yes we will be building it both ways honestly if you're following along at home with any keyboard
that you've purchased I do recommend that you try it both ways that way you can see what you
actually like you never know you might think that you really like a non-foamed sound did
you add foam and you actually really like the foam sound or vice versa especially if you're
building a keyboard with a lot of dead space like this one sometimes the foam is just necessary
now before we get too crazy let's start the actual build for stabilizers I just used some
of the Wu Chase stabilizers that I really like and Nola helped me out a whole lot it's become
her regular routine to just sit and watch me Loop stabilizers as she really likes to push
the stabilizers around the desk and she really feels like she's so useful because she is she's
cute please go leave a comment and say thank you Nola for helping out hipio you are the best
and the Subscribe that was two different requests there I don't think I mentioned this yet but the
board is hot swap meaning that you can swap the switches out without soldering and it also has RGB
LEDs on the bottom do you see those guys do you see them RGB sorry I'm a gamer at heart now the
one asterisk to this build is I will be using this in between plate and PCB foam for the whole entire
build now I know what you're thinking you're gonna write you're gonna say hippo that's foam how dare
you how could you I hate you well this keyboard doesn't have standoffs for in between the plate
and PCB I don't know if that's just because it's a prototype or whatever and assembling a keyboard
without those standoffs is literally the biggest headache in the whole entire world so I'm gonna
be leaving that foaming it's not doing too much I promise it's doing a little bit but not too much
now this keyboard comes with two pieces of foam for the case so I put both of those in I plug the
keyboard in I put my head in front of the camera and I think that's basically the assembly I would
rate this board as incredibly beginner friendly as there was nothing too hard about building it
and with a simple guide it would actually be incredibly straightforward and I forgot to
charge my wow stick now you're probably thinking hippium you're building a clacky keyboard so how
are you gonna actually make it clacky well I've got the tricks right up my sleeve I'm really up
my sleeves right now but you can't see that I'm going to be trying a bunch of different switches
now I have literally six of these containers full of switches in my closet and also a whole
entire Ikea Cube full of switches so I've got a lot but I wanted to find a nice clacky tactile
switch that sounded good from the factory so I decided to go with these ruche WS blacks
which are a nice tactile switch I'll have them and everything else linked down below for you
now in my opinion tactile switches tend to just sound a lot clackier I'm not sure of the science
here so don't quote me on this it's just every time I build a keyboard using tactile switches
it sounds a little bit clackier versus thalkier that means higher pitched versus deeper pitch so
keep that in mind when you're curating your sound profile for your board the keyboard is the sum of
all of its parts now I think a board like this with a stainless steel weight just sounds better
if you play into the clackier side of it like if you try and force it to sound deep it's just not
gonna sound as good as a keyboard that's meant to sound really deep now for the keycaps I have some
very very interesting budget keycaps and I know this looks super janky but hear me out this is
a 27 set of keycaps that I got from Amazon now I could have used some expensive hundred dollar set
of keycaps but I felt like that really wouldn't have fit the vibe of building a more budget
keyboard like this and these are double shot ABS keycaps so they're no joke they're actually pretty
decent now they've got a few quirks like the space bar but we'll check that out later but overall the
value you're getting here is pretty incredible so if you're budget gang then I guess check these
out down below I'd say the biggest caveat is that the profile of these is really weird they're MSA
profile so they're like flatter but also taller now this is something that you could get used
to with maybe like a week or two of typing on the board but if you're used to a more gamery
style keycap then that's gonna suck now with the foam in this board has a tiny bit of flex to it
but when you're typing you really don't feel any of it but what you do feel is the Epic power of
the RGB gamer time which I'm feeling it right now I'm feeling it so good right now gamer 10.
[Applause]
now that was the board with foam so it sounds decent right like it sounds okay but it's not
knocking my socks off and it doesn't really sound that incredible but what if I told you
it sounds better without foam okay except the spacebar I modded the spacebar with killmat
great idea by the way so next what I'm gonna do is take this whole bad boy apart strip out
the foam and see if we can't get a better gasket performance and also a better sound and feel also
see I'm charging my wow stick this is character development I am developing so well thankfully
the disassembly of this board is really really easy so I don't need to show you that again then
I just remove the foam put it back together and bada bing bada boom it's like a whole different
keyboard now you're probably thinking hippo but the keyboard doesn't look any different but look
at this gasket performance after swapping it out now I'm gonna be honest here it was definitely too
much gasket performance like I'm pushing down here dramatically to show you but even light typing you
can literally feel the vibrations in your opposite hand while typing on this board but let me give
you a before and after so you can hear what it sounds like with and without foam so here's before
[Applause]
now normally with foam a keyboard sounds a lot Fuller and deeper but in this case the
keyboard sounds a lot Fuller and lighter this isn't the most revolutionary thing ever but
I am incredibly shocked that a budget keyboard like this can sound good without mods like the
less mods made it sound better that's kind of crazy I'd love to know what you guys think down
below so go ahead and leave a comment leave that engagement for me and let me know what kinds of
boards and mods you'd like to see in the future I'll leave you with a slightly longer sound test