Change Audio Volume Increment Size on Windows Keyboard

Under Ubuntu, an easy (usually) way is to install KeyTouch. If your keyboard is not supported out of the box, you need both the keytouch and keytouch-editor packages. Run the keytouch editor, and configure your keyboard.

Other relevant Ubuntu wiki pages are Hotkeys/Troubleshooting (but try KeyTouch first) and Hotkeys/Architecture (explaining this is not as simple a it should be under the hood).

I don't know how relevant this information is for Crunchbang, which is based on Ubuntu but might have changed things related to keyboard configuration.

I wouldn't suggest opening up a keyboard - scissor type keyboards are a pain to work with, and simple enough that there's very little you can do.

Granted that i'm a thinkpad fanboy, i don't think there's very many laptop keyboards that are better. I've also taken these apart, and its simply a little rubber tube which a button pushes down - and these are bonded to a circuit board. I suppose if you could change these tubes (hard) or somehow weaken them (airgun?), you could soften it

Good news is, any standard rubber dome keyboard should be lighter than your thinkpad - just get the cheapest you can. Its not what i'd normally recommend, but in this scenario, its the cheapest option

If you want to do it more scientifically, the thinkpad has a force of between 61 and 67 grams according to geekhack.You can look at other actuation forces there.