Ah ha ha, here we go again, time to build my friend another keyboard but this time,
we got a budget of $150 and so this gives you a descent idea on what you can expect
for a build around this price area and ill show you more options for this price area.
Also i can show you how to make this build even cheaper.
Let's start with my friend wanted.
so my guy wanted a 65% board that was white or clear with tactile switches.
He left the keycaps up to me but gave me a budget of $150 and underglow and front lighting
is appreciated but not necessary.
And disclaimer, this build was the best I could think of with my knowledge, financially
and just whats available rn.
So we got the TM680 (cause it was a unique board) white edition that comes with a 2 in
1 switch and keycap puller and a gray/silver braided usb-c cable, a pack of 70 salmon switches
from kinect labs, these pink and blue hiragana keycaps off of amazon that include the 1.75U
right shift button (very important), and these are optional but i bought some durock plate
mounted stabs from divinkey to make it sound better 3x 2U stabs and 1x 6.25U.
So in total including the durock plate mounted stabs, it cost about $159 ish including taxes
and shipping (well tax and shipping to me at least haha) but all of it should fit in
your $150 exact budget but im sure you can spare the extra 9 bucks to make it sound better.
but you can make your keyboard a lil cheaper as i found out later but just keep watching
to find out.
Oh also, you do have to buy lube, tools, and foam if you are starting out and that will
cost you an extra like $10-25ish dollars depending on what extra modifications you want to do
so keep that in mind.
So I usually like to begin with modifying the stabs.
So the TM680 does come with some generic plate mounted stabs that were lightly lubed (kinda
messy tho) and they also kinda suck so I wanted to upgrade them.
We're using these durock plate mounted stabs and I usually like to take the stems and holee
mod them but this time i find that holee modding them makes them feel too mushy (PAUSE scratch
that, i only holee modded the spacebar because there was too much rattle, somehow got it
to work) and it actually just made them stuck idk why, here's a quick comparison, Keep in
mind these are all lubed with krytox 205G0 except for the generic stabs.
Next i clip the stems if needed and in this case you do so clip them to make the bottom
flat.
Then just lube the housings and the stems with Krytox 205G0.
Put them together and move onto the wires and lube them krytox as well.
Then click them together and now you're done.
ez Lets move on to the switches.
These are salmon switches and I usually like to lube my tactile switches with Tribox 3203
on both the bottom housings and the stems and I like to bag lube the springs with Krytox
GPL 105 Oil cause im lazy and i cant be bothered to lube the springs one by one.
And thats pretty much it.
Now Before we assemble the keyboard, lets take a look at board.
The tm680 is a nice 65% hotswap board that comes with a rotary knob with most of the
board made from a plastic material.
It comes in Rose Pink, White, Black, and two new colors of Milky White/clearish and a translucent
tiffany color.
The board is actually quite light and comes with some side glow and a lil bit of underglow
out of the little holes on the back of the board.
We also have per key lighting but sadly it has northfacing leds which will interfer with
cherry profile keycaps.
The board comes with the plate and top frame connected (im not too sure how to seperate
them without breaking it) and it has foam in between the pcb and plate.
Overall, its actually a descent board for its price, definitely better than a gk61 or
similar board.
and I think theres more value in the board then those generic board imo.
So I bought the board from Aliexpress which was a dropship, same thing on Etsy but the
one from Aliexpress is cheaper.
The original listing was on taobao by HolyTom for about $40 but its quite difficult to use
and navigate on taobao if you dont read mandarin or if you dont have AliPay.
There is an alternative way of buying it through SuperBuy which is basically a third party
company that helps people outside of China purchase things from Taobao but that is also
confusing but ill leave a video down below if you want to check it out.
My recommendation is to just purchase it straight from Aliexpress no hassle, make life easy.
But im pretty sure you can save a bit more through SuperBuy or TaoBao if you can figure
out that mess.
Before we start assembling, i just want to say that before i did anything, i tested the
pcb with a pair of tweezers and noticed that the down arrow and right arrow were not working.
I got worried and opened the board to notice that a little tiny circuit thing was broken
I was scared.
I dont know what i did but i just placed the circuit back and smeared all over the circuit
with the solder and somehow it worked (kinda just messed around and it worked, the down
arrow and right arrow worked) honestly dont know how; im not a electrical genius but i
guess whatever i did worked.
Then I also put some extra solder on the hotswap sockets for safety measures
So i noticed that the bottom was pretty hollow so i decided to fill the bottom with some
foam to dampen some of the sound.
Im gonna be using some of this sparkly spongey foam that was left over from my packagaes.
Idk probably cost like $2 but its free for me so... moving on.
just align it with the botttom of the board, and trim the necessary amount to fit in the
board.
I noticed that the foam was also too thick so i tried to chop it in half like a sushi
chef but but it didnt work out to well.
the foam looks so scuff but thats how we do it on the PaperAcrobat channel.
I mean you're gonna see it anywyas and this side is pretty, relatively clean.
Then i just push down to cut the holes for the standoffs and trimed the foam to allow
for the underglow and Sideglow from the PCB.
The foam made the board definitely heavier and just feel ssolid dude, big improvement.
I assembled the board by placing in the stabs then the switches and the finally, placing
all the keycaps.
I thought about bandaid modding the stabs but actually the Durock stabs are a super
tight fit on the plate and i think that I put some bandaid there that the stabs wont
even go in.
If you go with the generic stabs, highly recommend bandaid modding it as its pretty wobbley.
Lastly, the spacebar sounded really hollow and so I took some of the foam I used for
the case and trimmed it to fit inside the spacebar.
And here's a quick sound test.
Overall, I think the board came out great and sounds pretty good.
I will say that the Durock Stabs are a super tight fit with this board and it was a struggle
to get it out.
For the price for about $150 I think this board was pretty good, you definitely need
to do some modifications since the stock board sounds pretty horrendous, but overall I think
this board sounds pretty nice.
Along with that, I really like the subtle underglow and sideglow which comes with a
manuel on how to use the change RGB, thank you so much cause i have had too many boards
that dont tell you how to use it.
I will say that the case material does feel like a GK61 and basically any similar boards
but again I feel as tho the features the tm680 offers is a lot better.
Its only an extra $8 upgrade to go from a gk61 to tm680 if you buy from aliexpress and
that includes shipping.
I also like that its a 65% since i think that the best starting point for your custom keyboard
as it offers more realstate for your work space while also maintaining some extra media
and function keys.
Moving down from a full size keyboard, i think this keyboard size would be the best imo as
i think the 75% is still a little too big but that's just me, i play video games at
a super low dpi and i like to swing my arms all over but thats just me.
Overall, i like the aesthic of the keyboard, i think the all white board with a touch of
blue and a hint of pink looks really clean.
The one thing i will complain about is that quality control as this copy came with a loose
circuit that i had to fix myself.
Other than that this board is relatively user friendly and ez to use.
In this price range, if you're willing to spend more, the Nk65 EE or the KBD67 Lite
are solid choices to upgrade your barebones kit.
As for the D60 Lite that is coming out, i dont know too much about it so i cant say.
If you want something a bit cheaper but also fits this caterory of descent budget boards,
there's this board called the Nimbleback which i really like and its $10 cheaper than this
tm680.
its off of amazon and its not a barebones kit as it comes with everything including
the switches and keycaps but theres a lot of features and little things that i really
like which is why i recommend it, hint hint, that video will drop soon.
And yeah thats it, thank you so much for watching.
Please drop a sub or like if you enjoyed it.
I appreciate the support and leave your comments down below what you want to see next and again,
ill consider it, thanks guys.