Biostar Shows-off Socketed Switch Mechanical Keyboard at Computex

Biostar had many things on display at their Computex booth including video cards, motherboards, mini-PCs and of course, hot booth babes. One of the most interesting products on display however was their new mechanical keyboard which features a unique socketed switch design. Unlike typical mechanical keyboards with switches that are PCB soldered, the Biostar gaming keyboard can be pulled out of the PCB with a simple tool while in operation like you would a key-cap.

The base of these switches are transparent for LED backlighting and do not use Cherry MX compatible keycap mounting. The Biostar Gaming mechanical keyboard instead uses a rectangular mount; when we asked why, the Biostar product manager (working through a translator) said that in China, gamers smoke a lot of cigarettes and the rectangular mount makes it “easier to clean the ashes” that get into the socket mount. It certainly was an answer I was not expecting. Biostar also had their first gaming mouse on display which uses an Intellimouse Explorer 3.0 style body and an ADNS-3090 optical sensor which looks like a solid mouse to pair with this gaming keyboard.