Comment by dsissitka
5 years ago
> A major source of latency is key travel time. It’s not a coincidence that the quickest keyboard measured also has the shortest key travel distance by a large margin. ... Note that, unlike the other measurement I was able to find online, this measurement was from the start of the keypress instead of the switch activation.
That's disappointing. He isn't measuring latency nearly as much as he's measuring point of actuation.
Well, thats a reasonable point of reference: for a user, his starting point is clicking the button, the rest is not under his control
I don't think it is.
With a clicky switch I expect it to actuate when I hear it. With a tactile switch I expect it to actuate when I feel it. With a linear switch it depends on the switch. You can get linear switches that actuate as soon as you'd like.
The more I think about this the more useless it seems. Several of the keyboards he tested come with your choice of switch, different switches with different actuation points, and so you can't just say Keyboard X has a latency of Y without mentioning what switch you were using if you're going to measure from the beginning of the keypress.
Personally I don't think start clicking as click action is done. If I want to minimumize the gap, I'll use speed switches or thin keyboards.