the accepted wisdom for a long time has been that if you want a truly enthusiast
class typing or gaming experience you need a mechanical keyboard and with
features like superior build quality satisfying tactile feedback and quicker
response times perhaps there was only one thing that
could actually have made them even better and that would be freaking laser
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optical key switches like the ones that we are looking at today promise
extremely quick response times and shorter actuation distances than popular
mechanical key switches from manufacturers like cherry
but for some reason they remain a niche item the fact that the big boys of
current keyboard manufacturing like Corsair and logitech haven't picked them
up yet probably isn't helping
so we turned to bloody tesoro and wooting the only three companies we
could find that are currently incorporating them into their keyboards
to see if this technology has a bright future let's start with a quick look at
how they work currently there are two main types of optical switches one uses
a plunger that blocks a beam of light and when the key is pressed a gap in the
plunger moves down and allows the light beam to hit a sensor that registers a
key press two of our keyboards the bloody b720 and the tesoro excalibur se
spectrum use this process with the bloody switches branded as light strike
abbreviated as lk for some reason while the tesoro uses
swappable switches from gatoron gataron
gaturon either way both keyboards incorporate
waterproofing as well a nice value for you mountain dew fanatics the second
main type flaretech instead uses an upwards firing beam to determine how far
downward the key has been pressed meaning instead of simply registering a
key as pressed or not the keyboard can
instead register a partial key press
similar to how an analog trigger on a game controller can be pushed only part
way down to accelerate a little bit more slowly than a full press in a driving
game so our third keyboard the wu ting one is available with these flaretech
switches in two flavors red linear switches or blue clicky ones which are
user swappable and we'll start with a closer look at this one wuting actually
markets this granular level of input sensitivity control as analog which is
not technically correct because the keyboard is really just registering one
of 256 distinct states of pushed
downness but for the sake of helping users understand the tech we see why
they did this and in practice the action is very smooth i doubt that most users
would actually even be able to notice the difference let's demonstrate how this works with
forza 3. here you can see how pushing down the keys that are mapped to the
steering wheel only part way results in a much more gradual turn while a gentler
throttle press also allows finer control over acceleration neat huh
you'll also find a surprising amount of customizability in wooting one's
software package which is called and no do not adjust your headphones you heard
me right wutility not only can you remap keys to
functionality like triggers on a gamepad but you can set up multiple analog
profiles with different sensitivity curves since you might want the keys to
react differently depending on whether you're piloting a tank in battlefield or
controlling a soccer player footballer in fifa something to note is
that this analog functionality doesn't actually kick in until after the two
millimeter actuation distance which is similar to most cherry mx switches so
while wooting is looking into the ability to build a hair trigger capable
version in the future for now the utility can only be used to
make the actuation distance longer if you prefer less sensitivity in
something like a turn based game or if you're just
typing and of course all this additional functionality doesn't mean the wu ting
one is automatically the best option in every scenario let's move on to the
bloody b720 its lk switches lack the
fancy analog functionality but it boasts a very short actuation distance of 1.5
millimeters the shortest of any of the keyboards in our roundup to see if
there's a tangible benefit we had our resident cs go wizard edsel test out
each of the keyboards and while he didn't feel that the wooting or tesoro
were appreciably different from common cherry mx reds he really liked the quick
response of the bloody saying that while
the difference wasn't huge it definitely
was noticeable kind of like going from a 144 to a 240hz monitor in his words and
we didn't even tell him the actuation point specs before he tried it out so
give bloody some credit here they're claimed to have the world's fastest key
response might just be true at least when
comparing to other optical solutions the mx speeds claim a slightly shorter
actuation distance at 1.2 millimeters
and although edsel didn't think this made a difference in game responsiveness
he did think the lk switches were a bit heavier so keep that in mind if you use
a light touch on your keyboard and this leads us into our impressions
of overall build quality and usability in our opinion the wooting one walked
away the clear winner in this department its deck is quite rigid which often
indicates a well-made keyboard and its understated brushed finish and subtle
logo at the bottom give it a higher end appearance not to mention i really liked
how this thing felt under my fingers it was soft but in a good way kind of like
typing on boobs for whatever it's worth and then when you use the clicky
switches it was sharp and satisfying the
bloody with its giant blood-soaked logo
on the other hand practically screams we
tried to make this look as gamer as possible at any cost
and the keys felt a bit mushy for my liking though ed didn't seem to mind so
that's something to note and the build quality overall seemed solid if
unexceptional unfortunately i can't say the same about the tesoro i was able to
twist the keyboard way too much even with a minimal amount of torque maybe
that's what they meant by break the rules at 92 dollars it isn't a bad piece
of hardware it just simply doesn't do anything better than the other two the
bloody however presents an interesting alternative to mx speed switches thanks
to its very competitive price of 75 bucks u.s
the wu ting one is by far the most interesting one we checked out today
possessing a unique feature set with solid build quality and customizability
but i would probably only shell out the
160 euros it'll cost you if the games
you play specifically benefit from their pseudo analog functionality or if you
want a typing experience that matches your tacky mouse mat
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LTT thanks for watching guys this video
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anyway yeah check out this video which is uh
seeing the first video i ever made which was on my own and it never got uploaded
anywhere and it was on a ducky keyboard from like way back my mom filled it
filmed it on a flip hd camera in our kitchen at the time
see you later