BENGALURU: Six months ago, Akshay Bhalotia, a programmer at a fintech startup in Bengaluru, met with a road accident which left him with a fractured wrist. After correctional surgery and a monthlong recuperation, Bhalotia joined back work. But, it wasn’t business as usual.Using a flat-keyed laptop hurt his carpals — bones in the wrist that connect the hand to the forehand — causing him pain. “Each time I pressed a key, there would be aphysical impact of the key to the bottom of the motherboard, making it a painful exercise,” recalls Bhalotia.That’s when he turned the clock back and switched to a mechanical keyboard. “Using a mechanical keyboard has improved the number of words I type per minute significantly,” adds Bhalotia.Remember the keyboards in the late 90s, in which each key jutted out, and which when typed produced a unique click-clock sound? Those keyboards are now making a comeback with new-age coders who are lapping up these retro devices for their greater ergonomic comfort and their unique acoustic experience. “Almost 12 of the 25 coders at my office alone use these keyboards,” said Bhalotia.Mechanical keyboards are a throwback. Like typewriters, each key when pressed produces its own sound, to some programmers, its own music.Also, like old-fashioned desktop keyboards, a physical switch is pressed each time you hit a button. This is in contrast to the almost-soundless membrane keyboards — which are used in everything from laptops, modern PC keyboards and microwave ovens — that have a mushy circuit board underneath.But mechanical keyboards aren’t music for everybody’s ears. “The sound from this keyboard sometimes disturbs people at our workplace,” said Bhalotia. “Imagine 15 coders typing simultaneously on these keyboards at high speeds. It produces noise similar to 15 stenographers working in sync.”However, in spring-based mechanical keyboards, the impact of the key press on the finger is reduced by the spring, making it more ergonomic. Coders swear by these keyboards because they can type faster on them. “Using the external keyboard over the standard laptop keyboard is smoother and reduces miskeying,” says developer Saurav Chowdhury, who has been using such a keyboard for two years.But quality mechanical keyboards aren’t exactly cheap. “Though I was fascinated by these keyboards, I was able to afford one only after I got my first job”, said Abhay Rana, a lead programmer and author of the book 'The Joy of Software development’, who goes by coding avatar ‘Nemo’.Mechanical keyboards are priced anywhere between Rs 5,000 and Rs 30,000 depending upon the quality of the switches used. Das Keyboard, CM Storm, Filco, Corsair are a few internationally known brands which cater to this niche market. “The cost and availability add a luxury factor to these priced keyboards. One cannot afford it with one’s own pocket money,” said Rana.For some coders like Ravi Chandra, the love for these keyboards doesn’t satiate with simply owning one. Chandra’s obsession with keyboards turned him to ‘keyboard collector’ since 2013.The coder has four different kinds of keyboards and one of his priced possessions is the Atreus mechanical keyboard, which he purchased for Rs 20,000, from an independent keyboard builder who has now moved abroad to pursue his passion for building keyboards. The keyboard is an “ortho-linear keyboard”, geek-speak for a keyboard whose keys are aligned in columns instead of rows, like in the keyboards we use every day.World over, there are several communities who collect keyboards as a hobby. The 25-year-old programmer now wants to build his own “split-mechanical keyboard”.Chandra sourced the parts of the keyboard – switches, keycaps etc. – from China and is currently soldering the parts together. “I have been building the slip-keyboard for almost a year now,” said Chandra. “From now on, I would be building more keyboards myself rather than buying them. Once you get obsessed with ‘buying’ more keyboards, it becomes a “dangerously expensive hobby. I do not want to get into that habit,” he added.