This is a new website and is under active development. There will be some odd-looking layouts and colours while this is happening. Please bear with me and check back again to see any updates.
Iāve been using a Corsair K50 keyboard for quite some time. This is a nice keyboard, fairly quiet and responsive and it has some programmable keys that I like to have. However, it does occasionally miss a key when working fast. So I wanted to look at a replacement.
The requirements
- A mechanical key keyboard with full anti-ghosting and multi-key.
- Something relatively quiet, so āredā keys.
- Some programmable keys.
- A full-size keyboard with separate cursor keys and separate numpad.
- As a UK user, I also wanted to start with a UK layout.
- I didnāt want to pay a fortune for my first full mechanical keyboard.
The choice
That combination of requirements turns out to be really hard to match against anything. ā¹ļø
In the end, I settled on the Redragon TRUNDLE K668 wired RGB mechanical 108 key gaming keyboard as it was on a Black Friday deal even though it was a US keyboard layout.
Another partial reason was that the seller had just refunded me for another purchase that Iād reviewed on Amazon UK with a poor rating. Something that they didnāt have to do and I greatly appreciated their customer service.
The good
- You are getting a lot for your money.
- The keys are very smooth and responsive.
- The RGB isnāt as intrusive as I feared! Actually quite soothing once youāve turned down the speed and brightness.
- Separate RGB side and front LEDās. These are on a different setting to the main keys.
- You donāt need to load PC software to control the keyboard. This is really nice, especially for quick changes such as the backlight brightness.
- You can create application-specific RGB layouts that might be nice for gaming, a few pre-defined layouts are already on-board.
- You get a complete alternate keycaps set in contrasting colour.
- You get some spare keys and a puller.
- There are 4 reprogrammable keys above the number pad.
- The cable is not permanently wired, it is a USB-A to USB-C (at the keyboard end) separate cable which is much appreciated. Appears to be a good-quality cable as well.
- The keyboard indicators (num, cap, etc) are easily visible. This isnāt true on all keyboards. On this one, they are below the ins/del etc keys rather than the more normal above position. Nice.
The bad
Note to keyboard manufacturersThe Return key on the right-hand side of the main keyboard is going to be used a LOT more in the majority of languages than the right-hand Shift key. Therefore, it should be LARGER than the shift key! Not smaller.
- Small return key. This keyboard has a split return key with what would have been the top 1/2 given over to \, |. Whereas the expected position for that is just to the right of the z key. And is missing the key that tucks in next to the lower, normally narrower, part of a full return key. This is not a helpful layout. Especially when your PC is expecting a UK layout.
- US keyboard layout only. Iāve asked the manufacturer about this and they said they had no plans even to make the UK keys available. Also asked the seller who has also asked the manufacturer.
- It may simply be that I am not used to mechanical keyboards, but this is certainly significantly noisier to type on than my previous keyboards.
- Not really a ābadā thing, but not sure how the light-coloured keys will look after a while. But you do get the dark keys as well so certainly canāt complain here.
The conclusion
Would I recommend this keyboard? Yes, I think I would as long as you remember the limitations of it.
For UK users, you would want to be sure you could deal with the limitations of the layout.