Razer Blackwidow Ultimate 2014
Linus Tech Tips
·Linus Tech Tips
·2014-05-07
·
1,635 words · ~8 min read
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Razer is making some pretty bold claims
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about their black widow ultimate 2014 when you consider that on the surface it
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appears to be entirely unchanged from
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their last generation Flagship is there really Innovation left in mechanical
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keyboards I guess we'll find
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out with its Factory tuning and data center DNA an Intel 7 30 series SSD is
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an amazing choice for gamers and performance enthusiasts first up is the
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packaging which razer's reviewers guide informs me is the way to tell the New
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Black Widow ultimate from the old one and that it's great because of the
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cleaner lines and new artwork but none of that really matters to me because
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Razer missed one small nearly insignificant detail it doesn't say 2014
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edition anywhere on it I sure wish whatever product naming School Razer and
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Apple's iPad team went went to would go away Razer I've told you guys this
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already but come on I don't care if you ran out of snake spiders and mythical
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creatures different products need to have different names or at least numbers
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that clearly indicate the revision or generation of the product to your
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customers anyway with that out of the way let's get into the important
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differences Razer has done an under the hood update that turns the Black Widow
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ultimate into a completely different Beast gone are the Cherry MX Blue and
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brown switches were used to finding on their clicky and stealth versions and
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they've been replaced by what Razer is calling razor mechanical switches in
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green and orange variants respectively
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so your first reaction to this is probably what the devil is a razor
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mechanical switch and honestly I said the same thing the answer is both simple
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and complicated the simple version from Razer is that they recognized that the
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key switch designs on the market were optimized for a great typing experience
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and while they happened to be superior for gaming to membrane key switches
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especially if you pre-sorted them or bin them from the factory like razer's been
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doing gaming isn't what they were designed for that is why they set out to
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create the first key switches made from the groundup for gaming the complicated
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version is that in addition to what I just said Cherry MX switches are
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expensive and constantly in short supply
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and cherri's patent on their MX key switches very recently expired so now
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elements of that design can be used by other companies without any legal
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ramifications and Razer can move from having their key switches made that
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cherry corporations factories in Germany to less expensive manufacturers in China
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such as kale or even build their own facility if they wanted to now to be
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clear I'm not saying that razer's new key switches are a Chinese Cherry clone
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because while the design Bears many similarities to Cherry MX it is
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different and the changes are positive ones first up the actuation point the
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exact position where the downward keystroke is registered by the computer
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is Spec 3 mm higher this has the obvious
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effect of making your key presses register sooner when you press down and
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it also moves the actuation point itself 3 mm closer to the reset point or the
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position when you let go where the key is ready to be activated again both of
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these things are designed to improve the keyboard's responsiveness which is defin
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Ely good another effect of this is
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applicable to razer's clicky green key switch not to be confused with cherrymx
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greens totally different and that is that it moves the actuation point closer
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to where the tactile bump is felt by the user meaning it's
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easier to feel when you've successfully pressed the key without needing to
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bottom it out or press the key all the way down to be sure this has perhaps
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less relevance for typists but for gamers it makes double tapping or any
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other quick repetitive actions easier to do by feel next up their design calls
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for more gold on the contacts which razor determined allows an increase in
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the rated durability on each key from 50 million keystrokes to 60 million
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keystrokes and finally they are improving quality by employing their own
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QA staff on the factory floor to achieve
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A4 mm variance in pre-travel distance
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versus cherry 6 mm variance this should improve the
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consistency and feeling from One keyboard to another and even across all
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the keys on a single keyboard not being Elite hack or gamer like the Esports
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players who Razer has had testing the keyboard since last year I didn't notice
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the raised actuation Point much but I
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also really didn't find anything to complain about the green Razer key
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switch keyboard here definitely felt different from my ducky shine 3 with
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Cherry MX Blues but but it didn't feel much different and in fact if I didn't
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know I was using different switches I would have guessed it was just batto
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batch variance between Blues rather than a completely different manufacturer but
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I really like cherrymx Blues so if they feel like Blues to us regular folks but
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they have added benefits for more demanding users then that's great now
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Cherry's pitch for their switches is unparalleled quality due to German
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manufacturing but if razer's solution to combat that notoriously inconsistent
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Chinese build quality is to submit their own specifications and put their own
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staff on the floor for quality control then I think ultimately the question
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Gamers need to ask themselves is this
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are you buying a keyboard or a key switch do you really need to know where
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the bread came from you know at Subway
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if the sandwich Artisan delivers a delicious and nutritious sandwich to you
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do you need to know where Razer is sourcing each individual component of
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their keyboard or do you trust Razer to deliver you an exceptional product as
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long as they're overseeing the manufacturing leave your comments under
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the video and let me know your thoughts
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speaking of exceptional products I've spent so much time talking about the key
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switches that I haven't actually given you much information about the keyboard
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itself it's got fully programmable keys and five additional gaming keys with
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support for on the Fly macro recording individual per key back lighting with 13
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levels of brightness all the way from off to a phenomenally vibrant beautiful
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green it's got media keys with the function key to control them on the
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right so it takes up less Prime gaming real estate on the left side of the
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keyboard 10 key rollover so you're not going to have to worry about ghosting
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and both USB and audio pass through
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ports over here on the right hand side the build quality of the keyboard is
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solid as we've come to expect and the matte black finish is fantastic a huge
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improvement over some of their previous designs that used glossy plastic if I
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had to point out something I don't like about the design um all I really came up
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with is that uh there's no wrist rest included but that is becoming um a more
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common thing in general and I guess I don't like this at symbol very much
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seriously Razer like what is that but anyway all things considered those are
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really minor complaints and if this product is an indication of the kind of
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more affordable mechanical keyboards that will be available for gamers with
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these switches which are not exclusive to R are in any way they're saying well
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yeah sure whoever can use them then I think the future is very exciting
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pronounced intrigued not intrigued and it's in like every single Nancy Drew
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