from Hacker News

A lightswitch so good they made it illegal

by caxco93 on 11/23/22, 2:34 AM with 3 comments

  • by rektide on 11/23/22, 3:25 AM

    Mercury switch, which is dead silent.

    Very fragging annoying we have seemingly made no effort since. There's a lot of obnoxious buttons that dont make sounds, but I'd really really like actual switches that dont make super loud clacking whacks.

    I replaced a bunch of switches with dimmers, and that's ok, but it seems absurd to me how obviously underserved, how unchanging the popular tactile system is. Iterate please, dont disrupt! Buttons are easy to make, but such a tactile downgrade.

    Ditto for door-knobs. Maybe I'm missing something but the bolt-action klack is so loud. Cant we, like, damp that? There just doesnt seem to be a market for non-shitty house-gear.

  • by rsclient on 11/23/22, 4:00 AM

    A little bit click bait. It's not illegal because it's "too good". It's illegal because it's full of poison (mercury).

    And weirdly, I can't seem to find any actual laws naming them. There are laws about mercury waste such that I bet it's not practical to make and sell them, but I don't see any actual bans (except maybe in europe where they have the rohs standards)

  • by bradknowles on 11/23/22, 7:29 AM

    The sound is part of the intentional feedback. You need that in addition to the tactile feedback.

    Otherwise, how would you know if it has done its job?