I have been through the whole mechanical keyboard phase and concluded that there are two keyboards I will never give up. Matias quiet click (mini) and my old trusty dome with slider of some brand I dont know (although googling around I suspect it is BTC).
The matias has the nice tactility of a snappy rubber dome with the benefit of not having to bottom out. I DO bottom out, but I am such a light typer that I sometimes miss keystrokes on other keyboards.
The BTC (??) is sort of a poor man's topre. I like it a lot more than my friends realforce which hardly seems to have any tactility.
Silent switches saw quite an uptake since past two years or so. Never had matias quiet click myself but based on YouTube vids I'd say you can go a whole lot quieter without losing tactility these days. I run an office setup with U4S these days, these are good to go out of the box if you don't like to mod them. They are so silent your coworkers keyboards will sound loud in comparison. Their tactility is still awesome. If you go less tactile you'd have zilents v2 which require some lubing to remove annoying spring pings but after are a good option. Silent alpacas are like a whisper when you prefer linear.
With brands like keychron and ducky now providing hotswap options on Q1 or Ducky 3 entering custom builds became a lot easier as these provide big runs which allow you to buy from a shop rather than joining limited group buys with nowadays 6-12 months lead times (and selling out in minutes or taking raffles). It isn't the quality of say Monokei, TGR or Keycult but that is expected for the budget range they play.
Having gone beyond entry market years back I'd say it today still brings me the most joy of any hardware upgrades I make to my computer setup. Walking up to my desk seeing a full custom is something I like.
The matias quiet click arent really meant to be very silent. I think it alludes to the tactility of their clicky switch minus the click. Their quiet linears are dampened light linear switches, and sound less than most rubber domes.
Matias boards are just no-nonsense boards for typists. I dont like fiddling with my keyboard. No keycaps. No lubing. No swapping switches. I have done that. It is a distraction for me. I like typing on my matias board. When that dies I will get another one or maybe just use my old no-brand dome-with-slider keyboard (probably BTC) that I have used since 1994.
After five years, I gave up my Matias quiet click due to its abysmal reliability. I had three units during that period: my original and two replacements under warranty. I love the keyboard and their customer service. But the interruption and administrative hassle were too much.
I use a Leopold with Topre 45g silent switches now. It’s not as nice IMO but it works all the time.
You share that experience with what seems a lot of people. The quiet clicks seem to have chattering issues.
I have probably been lucky. A friend had one switch that chattered, but I opened it up and cleaned out some of the lube and it was fine.
That is why I usually recommend the clicky switches. They seem to not have that problem. They feel even nicer to type on IMO, but I am not the kind of guy to spend $150 on a keyboard when I have one that I like (a 2015 secure pro that never had issues).
The matias has the nice tactility of a snappy rubber dome with the benefit of not having to bottom out. I DO bottom out, but I am such a light typer that I sometimes miss keystrokes on other keyboards.
The BTC (??) is sort of a poor man's topre. I like it a lot more than my friends realforce which hardly seems to have any tactility.