Product On Review: Corsair K70 Mechanical Keyboard
Manufacturer and Sponsor: Corsair
Street Price: ~£119.99 (inc. V.A.T.)
Corsair are swiftly becoming a veteran manufacturer for gaming peripherals. Long gone are the days of focussing on performance RAM; with their recently updated Vengeance peripheral range they now cater for audio and input needs with a definitive line-up of keyboards, mice and headsets. Thanks to the new Raptor range also presenting more affordable options, Corsair have a wide variety of products for gamers with both constrained and liberated budgets.
This week we’re looking at the Vengeance K70 Mechanical Gaming Keyboard, which is a substancial evolution of the Vengeance K60 Richard reviewed early last year. The K70 comes a little over eighteen months after the K60 and K90, the first mechanical keyboards Corsair released, but by virtue of the price point doesn’t quite replace either directly. It’s also a part of a refresh which includes the Vengeance K65 and K95, keyboards that occupy lower and higher price points respectively whilst retaining the mechanical switch feature.
The first release designs for the K70 incorporated the switch type which is fast becoming the standard for mechanical gaming keyboards: Cherry MX Reds. During Computex 2013 Corsair also announced Cherry MX Blue and Brown switch variants which offer tactile feedback rather than the smoothly linear actuation of Reds. The Vengeance K70 is therefore shaping up to offer choices for even more discerning users of mechanical gaming keyboards, but that is not an end to the options.
Our review sample has a black anodised aluminium frame, but those who prefer a lighter look can opt for a silver colour scheme. The variation is purely aesthetic - whilst the black version includes red per-switch LEDs, the silver option swaps these out for a blue LED. With these exceptions there are no differences between the two keyboard’s feature-sets or RRP; you’re not losing out by choosing one over the other.
About the Vengeance K70
The new Vengeance K70 gaming keyboard is built on a rugged, brushed, aluminum chassis and features highly responsive Cherry MX Red mechanical switches under every key. The high performance switches combined with the keyboard's 100% anti-ghosted matrix, 20-key rollover and 1000Hz reporting rate provide fast, accurate input for gaming.
The Vengeance K70 gaming keyboards are available in two color schemes: silver aluminum with blue backlighting, and anodized black with deep red backlighting. Overall backlighting can be adjusted to four levels of intensity and each key is individually backlit, enabling the lighting for each key to be independently enabled or disabled. The key-by-key lighting customization allows users to highlight just the keys they need to emphasize and then save the setting directly to the K70's onboard memory. In addition, the Vengeance K70 comes with alternate colored, contoured keycaps for the WASD and 1-6 keycaps to allow additional customization.
The Vengeance K70 gaming keyboards are available in two color schemes: silver aluminum with blue backlighting, and anodized black with deep red backlighting. Overall backlighting can be adjusted to four levels of intensity and each key is individually backlit, enabling the lighting for each key to be independently enabled or disabled. The key-by-key lighting customization allows users to highlight just the keys they need to emphasize and then save the setting directly to the K70's onboard memory. In addition, the Vengeance K70 comes with alternate colored, contoured keycaps for the WASD and 1-6 keycaps to allow additional customization.
The Vengeance K70 addresses many of the weaknesses we identified in the K60, including a full-length wrist-rest and replacing the previously rubber-domed Function and Command key switches with mechanical ones. Although these updates have come at not inconsiderable cost, they should result in a far more well-rounded experience overall. Apart from those obvious plus points we’re very interested to see both how well key-by-key highlighting works in practice and if there are any advantages to the contoured keycaps.
