Razer BlackWidow X Chroma

[HEXUS]

Is this the "budget friendly" mechanical keyboard you've been waiting for?

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[siu99spj]

Nice, but £140 ≠ budget.

£70 => budget (For a keyboard anyway).

[jnutt]

Nice, but £140 ≠ budget.

£70 => budget (For a keyboard anyway).

What he said

[Jowsey]

Nice, but £140 ≠ budget.

£70 => budget (For a keyboard anyway).

What he said

I think it was sarcasm.

I hope it was, because I agree with you!

[virtuo]

That is pricey when you can get better (or similar) specced units for less.

And that awful Razer logo - they just love plastering it anywhere. Get over yourselves.

[Arulmani]

Except the Price, other things are cool on this Keyboard !

[globalwarning]

I love the minimalist design. I'm currently using a Steel Series Merc keyboard with the stupid gaming pad on the side - it's an utter waste of space. I really can't stand, however, this trend of making you pay more for the luxury of not having all the crap attached, instead of it just being the base model. This shouldn't be any more than about $99US, or whatever the equivalent is in pounds - 70 sounds about right for me.

[UKnoble]

That price is a joke, especially considering they think it's a budget keyboard. I could buy a Shine 5 for the same price as that. :O

[cheesemp]

I'd love to try a mechanical keyboard but at this price not a chance! Wish someone would do a real budget mechanical keyboard so I could try one out... Even second hand they are £50+

[gordon861]

I would be willing to pay for a decent mechanical keyboard, maybe even a £100+ if I knew it was worth the money. But there are so many options for mechanical keys Cherry, Black, Blue etc that I don't want to risk this sort of money and end up with something I might hate after a couple of weeks, let alone years.

One solution would be to take advantage of Distance Selling Regs to try them out and send them back in 14 days, but I don't want to do that to a company that have been helpful in the past and screw them around.

I'm currently using a Razer Reclusa keyboard from when they teamed up with Microsoft, so the old Razer stuff seems pretty reliable.

[virtuo]

One solution would be to take advantage of Distance Selling Regs to try them out and send them back in 14 days, but I don't want to do that to a company that have been helpful in the past and screw them around

Buy one of each, then just send back the ones you don't like, least faff.

[will19565]

£140?
i got a Blackwidow Chroma and a Taipan Mouse on a short term deal from Razer for £149.99, saving £70.00

[lkarunan]

I would be willing to pay for a decent mechanical keyboard, maybe even a £100+ if I knew it was worth the money. But there are so many options for mechanical keys Cherry, Black, Blue etc that I don't want to risk this sort of money and end up with something I might hate after a couple of weeks, let alone years.

One solution would be to take advantage of Distance Selling Regs to try them out and send them back in 14 days, but I don't want to do that to a company that have been helpful in the past and screw them around.

I'm currently using a Razer Reclusa keyboard from when they teamed up with Microsoft, so the old Razer stuff seems pretty reliable.

Coolermaster's Quickfire Rapid (tenkeyless) and XT (full size) would be my recommendations. They are very favourably reviewed, on the cheaper side of the spectrum and I have personally had a great experience with the latter for roughly two years.

In terms of switches, I have tried blue and brown. Aside from the added "clickyness" of blue, there's not much difference (I can barely tell the difference when wearing headphones).

If you are expecting a mechanical keyboard to significantly improving your gaming performance, prepare to be disappointed. It doesn't make much difference, apart from improving comfort, for me. However I am able to type significantly more quickly and accurately because of the consistent feedback, which membrane keyboards lack. This benefit may not be available from red/black switches because they are linear, but I have no personal experience. Linear switches are supposedly the best for gaming, however, but I am sceptical as to whether that difference is significant.

I personally don't find back-lighting desirable. It was a novelty for a while but I now turn it off on my Dell XPS 13 laptop, although it does occasionally come in useful when typing in passwords in dark environments.

[gordon861]

Coolermaster's Quickfire Rapid (tenkeyless) and XT (full size) would be my recommendations. They are very favourably reviewed, on the cheaper side of the spectrum and I have personally had a great experience with the latter for roughly two years.

In terms of switches, I have tried blue and brown. Aside from the added "clickyness" of blue, there's not much difference (I can barely tell the difference when wearing headphones).

If you are expecting a mechanical keyboard to significantly improving your gaming performance, prepare to be disappointed. It doesn't make much difference, apart from improving comfort, for me. However I am able to type significantly more quickly and accurately because of the consistent feedback, which membrane keyboards lack. This benefit may not be available from red/black switches because they are linear, but I have no personal experience. Linear switches are supposedly the best for gaming, however, but I am sceptical as to whether that difference is significant.

I personally don't find back-lighting desirable. It was a novelty for a while but I now turn it off on my Dell XPS 13 laptop, although it does occasionally come in useful when typing in passwords in dark environments.

Thanks for the full response.

Never been one for wearing headphones, that's what the 5.1 surround speakers are for. Although I will need to start wearing a hat or something to use my new 'TrackIR type' kit which will be weird.

Not expecting a massive increase in gaming performance from a mechanical keyboard, just looking for a keyboard that is nice to use and reliable. I still remember the old WANG keyboards when I started work, weighed a tonne but were built to last.

[decends]

How on earth is this a "Budget keyboard"?

[OffWaveSurfer]

Personally I've never seen the point in RGB lighting for a keyboard, back lit keyboards only just about make sense to me and I'd agree with most of the other comments this isn't exactly budget friendly. Although for anyone looking for the mechanical keyboard feel without the price tag I'd recommend the i-Rocks K10 and similar keyboards, they eschew many of the high end mechanical keyboard features that jack up the price and while most don't have actual mechanical key switches they feel very similar for the considerably lower price point.