In my never ending quest for the right keyboard I just got a Realforce 88U with 45 gram Topre switches. It looks old fashioned and doesn't have any backlighting, which is why I went for the lighter version. It doesn't even have a caps lock light. It looks very old fashioned compared to some of the keyboards I have such as the Microsoft Surface keyboard. But I like that old skool look. It's also the most expensive keyboard I have every bought. It only arrived this morning so it's early days and it feels odd using a TKL when I'm used to a full sized keyboard (but realistically I rarely need the extra keys and the full size in UK ISO layout has been out of stock for some time). There is an (expensive) separate matching USB keypad available if I ever need it.
Apart from the feel of the keys and the light colour, one of the things I really love about keyboards like this is the separate groups of function keys and navigation key clusters (arrows, home, end, etc). As a programmer I hated having to look down at the chiclet keyboard to find a specific function key in the IDE (e.g. hit F10 instead of F11 or F9 by mistake), or look down to find the home, end, page up/down, etc. This is much better with really good key feel and easy to find the function keys and navigation keys.
But so far I can see what the fuss is about with Topre. It's lovely to type on. It is obviously a little noisier than the MS Surface chiclet keyboard but a lot quieter than my Razer mechanical with blue switches. Hopefully I can now consign both to the spares drawer and use this as my one keyboard for productivity and gaming. Happy so far. No regrets at this point.
