| A solid keyboard, but a little pricey. Please read full review |
| Quick summary and a little about me to let you know where I'm coming from, in case people don't want to read the full review:
I'm a 20 year old college student (male), who plays games quite frequently, and is pretty particular with his keyboards. I loved my previous keyboard, the Eclipse I, which I had for about 2 years, and decided to buy this on a whim as a replacement (I spilled soda on my previous one).
APPEARANCE (cool factor): 9/10
-LEDs look great, laser etched keys are high quality
FUNCTIONALITY: 7/10
-a little on the long side, but I've got plenty of desk space
-hotkeys aren't especially useful
-touchpad with updated drivers works great and is very convenient
-headphone/microphone jacks are just pass-throughs from your sound card, meaning that if you want to use the feature, you'd have to plug your speakers into the keyboard (though you could buy extra splitters/audio cables)
QUALITY: 9/10
-Saitek still makes great keyboards. everything about this board looks like it was made with care.
-The keyboard feels like its going to last years
PRICE: 6/10
-Way expensive compared to the alternatives. Its a great keyboard, but only like $50-60 great. Not worth the $80 retail price, unless you've got the extra cash lying around. My advice is to wait for it to go on sale, if you're not in a hurry.
OVERALL(not an average): 8/10
PROS:
-Recently released drives from Saitek fixed all issues regarding the functionality and sensitivity of the touch pad: volume indicators work, media control works better, visual notification when touch buttons are being pressed (the buttons flash a few times when pressed), and no more accidentally activating touch keys (they're less sensitive but still functional)
-The quality of the keys and the feel of the keyboard is the same, if not better, than the Eclipse I (I wouldn't know how to compare it to the Eclipse II as I've never used one)
CONS:
-Yes the size is mislabeled as 18" instead of the actual 21" (but the original Eclipse I keyboard was 21" also)
-The $80 price point is a little steep; wait for the price to drop or for it to go on sale. I'd say a fair price would be in the $50-60 range.
IN DEPTH REVIEW:
First off, let me say that this keyboard isn't as bad as the other review(s) say. I've previously owned a Saitek Eclipse I keyboard, which this keyboard replaced after I accidentally spilled soda on my Eclipse I, and it's way better in construction, feel, and functionality.
The keyboard is in fact 21", not the 18" listed, but now that you know, if it isn't a problem, I'd recommend it. Sure, the Eclipse II was a compact 18", but the Saitek I never was, and it got phenomenal reviews despite its size.
[...]
The soft-touch keys feel great, and the two height adjustment is a very nice little feature to help you get the proper typing angle. With the updated drivers, the touch pad functions like it should, with a "lights off" button (turns all LEDs off until it is pressed again), 5 four-stage LEDs for the volume indicator to show current volume level, 4 media buttons (mute, pause/play, prev, next), and buttons to control the 4 brightness levels and 5 different colors (blue, purple, magenta, pink, red).
On the note of the LED colors, I don't find the touch pad being constantly blue, or the numpad/caps lock/scroll lock being green an annoyance. I think it actually looks pretty cool, since the LED colors provided contrast nicely with blue (especially red). Though if you find it an annoyance, I could understand.
To be honest, I don't use the hotkeys much, since I got pretty familiar with the windows equivalent of the hotkeys, though I'm sure someone would find them useful. To my knowledge there isn't a way to reprogram them, though I'm sure there's some software out there which would let you do that.
FINAL THOUGHTS:
In all, its a well made luxury keyboard with lots of good, convenient features. If you know your desk can't fit it comfortably, look for an alternative, like the more compact Eclipse II. The price point is high, so I'd only pick it up if it was on sale, or if you extra cash burning a hole in your pocket. If you're worried about how it feels, I'd see if a local store has it so you could try it out.
ONE FINAL NOTE:
In truth, I would have only given this review 4 stars (mainly due to the audio/microphone pass-through and the hotkeys that I don't really use), but I believe that many people would overlook this product if they saw that it only had a 3 star average, which incorrectly reflects the product. So I'm sort of counter-reviewing the 2 star review that went out. It seemed that the few things that he really was looking forward to disappointed him (which I understand when that happens), but that shouldn't be a reason to mark a 3-4 star product down to 2. So sue me.
[...]
| | Good Keyboard, but a little wide |
| I don't agree with the other review, touch panel is working perfectly for me. However you need drivers for the volume indicator to work, and the saitek site is having issues as of this review, so i can't get those drivers.
Anyway, its a good keyboard, a little wide, but i do like the buttons. its got a new tab button, very useful in firefox. However i wish there was a way to remap or disable those keys in gaming, i hit the calculator button when playing TF2, threw me out of the game! ahh.
Its a good keyboard and i like it, the top panel is only blue, not a big deal since i like the blue color. A little better design would of put the side keys on the top and made them touch.
| | Sweet keyboard for late night gamers. |
| Pros: The LEDs are very bright and easy to see and the dispersal of light is very even despite what some reviews I read said. The color options are nice, but I really only use the red and blue and the magenta and pink are almost the same color so it's really more like 4 colors. The shortcut tabs are turning out to be more useful than I thought they would be. It's nice having the ports in the top right of the board because my speaker cord is very short, as is the cord for my stereophones. Volume control is really nice when using headphones, but make sure you download the drivers so the level bar changes or it's useless.
Cons: The palm rest is nearly useless, it's only like an inch long and my palm doesnt even really rest on it while gaming. The only reason I've kept it on is for aesthetics. The plastic coating on the volume control has started to bubble up after only a month.
Other Comments: Over all I've been really pleased with this keyboard. I love having it lit up and it matches all the LEDs in my computer case. The palm rest is oh so useless. They tried to match the sleek design wth the rest of the board, which I can respect, but it's so small it does nothing. I also would have preferred buttons for the LED control and volume, but that's more of a personal taste as I hate touch interfaces (lazy design in my opinion). It's not a big deal, but the buttons are a little flat and that may bother some people, but it's fine for me. One last thing to note is that there are 2 adjustments for height. One give the board like 2 degrees tilt and the other adds 2-3 more degrees to that. So it doesn't really tilt up much more than flat, matching the ergonomics of the palm rest -_- If you want a LED lit board this one is a very good buy, though more for gamers.
| | This is a well built product and I have no complaints about it. I have already recommended it to a friend.
My usage is really basic. I wanted a keyboard that I could use at night without turning on the room lights and this works very well. Not a gamer, so I can't comment on that usage. The keys have a nice feel to them. The keyboard has three colors that are easy to adjust in intensity. It has some keys on each side that control some basic browser functions, along with opening some apps. Some of that is nice, but does make the keyboard wider. My desk is big enough for this not to be an issue with me, but I do need to stay aware of these keys to avoid opening an app. Also, as others have noted, this version III keeps the color selection on reboot.
| | I can't say enough about the great quality of this keyboard and of course the great service from Amazon. If you want a quality keyboard and top flight service then buy this one.
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