CM Mechanical Keyboard and Cherry BROWN Switch

[Pete.B.]

Will you be stocking the red switch Quickfire Rapid soon?

opppps it was waiting to go live http://www.scan.co.uk/search.aspx?q=45982

also a bit of bad news as we are the first people to request stock in the UK there is no stock available and it again has to be built at the factory in Taiwan - so im now told the ETA is SEP2012 for the Keyboards as we keep adding more

[RichieLee]

Just got the standard CM quickfire rapid with the mx black keys from Scan and I have to say I'm very very impressed with the keyboard. I didn't think I'd ever spend £60 on a keyboard but this thing is great! Really nice build quality and my typing speed has seriously become a hell of a lot quicker. Recently I've been using a 'chiclet' mac style keyboard and it was cramping up my fingers because it was so flat and I use shortcuts alot because I work in photoshop and illustrator a lot. No such problems with this board though. Wont be going back to dome boards any time soon. I dunno what difference these brown switches are but all you guys that have preordered wont be disappointed.

[Hicks12]

opppps it was waiting to go live http://www.scan.co.uk/search.aspx?q=45982

also a bit of bad news as we are the first people to request stock in the UK there is no stock available and it again has to be built at the factory in Taiwan - so im now told the ETA is SEP2012 for the Keyboards as we keep adding more

excellent stuff, delay isnt to bad atleast we are getting it! Deciding whether to put in a preorder now or wait till stock lands though .

[dragossk]

Was quite surprised when the keyboards appeared for pre order. Now I see why they are on the way. Ever since I was looking to get a mech keyboard I've been wanting to grab the Quickfire Rapid but not with black switches. Bought the QPAD Mk-85 from scan, since it was the only one that had full cherry mx red...and some nice features.

In the mean time I also grabbed a Filco Majestouch-2 Ninja Tactile from keyboardco.com. These are the higher quality mech boards, but at an extreme price for lack of features. Still, as a keyboard it feels very good.

What I learned over the last few months is that there's a few major manufacturers for these keyboards, at least the two keyboards I have belong to each. The Filco is made by Costar, while the QPAD is done by iOne. Almost every mech keyboard with backlight with less quality comes from iOnes and basic keyboards with good quality come from Costar.

I keep seeing more from iOne having problems around the internet, such as Razer Blackwidows and exact copies of the QPAD different branding (ione xarmor, max keyboard nighthawk) having dimmer backlight after some months or certain keys input getting stuck until pressing it again... usually due to poor soldering.

The odd thing about Coolermaster keyboards is that they went for Costar for only the Quickfire Rapid, while the Trigger and the Quickfire Pro are iOne. So, rather than pay for £120 for a Filco, the Quickfire Rapid is a bargain at almost half the price for a keyboard that it's likely to have less problems.

Probably have been spending too much time reading what keyboard enthusiasts write on the internet...

[Pete.B.]

The odd thing about Coolermaster keyboards is that they went for Costar for only the Quickfire Rapid, while the Trigger and the Quickfire Pro are iOne. So, rather than pay for £120 for a Filco, the Quickfire Rapid is a bargain at almost half the price for a keyboard that it's likely to have less problems.

thats a lot of info you have thanks a lot for sharing as it was very interesting

Not sure why you think iOne make the coolermaster trigger and im trying to confirm if its correct for everyone.

BUT... so far it seems they dont make this keyboard for coolermaster. nobody knows for sure who is making it but looking at the iOne website they dont have anything that looks like it.

http://www.ione.com.tw/2009/6pA_kb_Mech.asp

[Pete.B.]

Just got the standard CM quickfire rapid with the mx black keys from Scan and I have to say I'm very very impressed with the keyboard.

ah thats great news; im glad that your happy with your purchase and the quality of the CM quickfire rapid i have passed your nice comments onto coolermaster

[Hicks12]

yeah pete the quick fires are made by Costar as dragossk mentioned, they are the OEM behind Filcos and its widely known that Filcos are the best built boards, not feature rich but extremely well built but price is not exactly the best (worth it though). The quickfires offer so much value for money as the quality is pretty much the same as the filcos as far as i know anyway, they are the better buy compared to the trigger which im also told is made by the iOne so im pretty sure dragossk is right.

It wont appear on their website, as they actually sell their own units aswell, its a bit like... buying in a reference GPU and slapping scan on it for a bargain price, youll still see that OEM selling it along side it but the branding is normally removed from your one . (thats the only suitable comparison i could think of in regards to what you sell ). Not that the iOnes arent bad its just they dont compare to Costar.

The quickfire is exactly what i need, a tenkeyless board (no numpad) and a BQ close/onpar of my Filco, and a chance to try these red switches .


Oh and maybe the reason they used iOne instead of Costar is due to having the backlight, i dont know of any Costar board to have it as standard so might be the reason!.

[Pete.B.]

It wont appear on their website, as they actually sell their own units aswell, its a bit like... buying in a reference GPU and slapping scan on it for a bargain price, youll still see that OEM selling it along side it but the branding is normally removed from your one . (thats the only suitable comparison i could think of in regards to what you sell ). Not that the iOnes arent bad its just they dont compare to Costar.

but they do http://www.ione.com.tw/2009/Product/6A_SC-U9%20BL.asp & http://www.ione.com.tw/2009/Product/6A_SC-U9%20Plus.asp

are indeed the keyboards used by http://www.maxkeyboard.com/max-keybo...-keyboard.html and QPAD http://www.corporate.qpad.se/modules...hp?storyid=248

and there is another thing that is also something different on the cm trigger which I have not seen before and iOne dont do.....

near the rear USB ports on the keyboard there is the DC power in port to supply extra power to the keyboard and USB hub. - and without this power cable you can only have 3 lighting levels instead of 5 when you have power cable plugged in. now i have not seen this on any other Mechanical Gaming keyboard ??

[Hicks12]

Hmm im a bit lost, what i meant is that you wont see on iOnes website listing a QPAD MK-85 board but instead their own board name (i.e the XArmor). They can be the OEM, it doesnt have to be exactly the same unit though, maybe power supplies is a more suitable comparison, can be made by CWT SEAGATE etc but they can have their own quirks /modifications.

No idea though, maybe my memory fails me I just recall from my research when looking for a new board that they were made by two different OEMs and thats why the quickfire was in higher praise as it was made by the better one(Costar). Geekhack is down for a few more days so maybe the info will be back on there at some point .

Oh ive looked more and it is actually an iOne OEM, but i think im casting an unfair brush over these boards... when i say its better made i dont mean that one will die within 1 second compared to a costar lasting many many years, its just they tend to be the cheaper OEM and thus cuts are made on the way and generally something gives. Most costars have little to go wrong, they dont have all this unnecessary backlighting and hubs etc, i used to love all those extras but after a while they get boring to me and unused , i prefer a simple and reliable design which is why the quickfire wins for me as its
cheap to .

[Devastater6194]

Can someone clear something up for me? What switches does this quickfire pro use?
http://www.scan.co.uk/products/coole...d-backlight-on

[Hicks12]

cherry MX reds as it says in the title, look here and compare the product code http://www.cmstorm.com/en/products/k.../quickfirepro/

[Devastater6194]

Thanks. Never noticed the codes on their website before. Way to make me look stupid

[phinix]

So are we getting Rapids UK layout with brown switches?
In shop it says 10/08/2012 - this Friday.
is that correct? Are they going to be in stock?

[phinix]

Anyone?

[kelvincool]

I sure hope they're going to be in stock, I pre-ordered mine a month ago. I haven't had any emails about any delays so that's a good sign I suppose.

[phinix]

But that's UK layout and brown switches, is that correct?
Photos show ANSI US layout...