Features:

  • Three-zone dynamic RGB backlighting with 10+ preconfigured vivid RGB lighting modes allow you to choose immersive lighting effects
  • 6 programmable macro keys enable powerful actions, key remaps and combos;Adjustable Height :Yes
  • Dedicated Volume and multimedia controls for direct Audio control without interrupting your game. Matrix- 110 keys
  • Quiet and responsive keys give a satisfying feel. Compatibility and System Requirements: Windows 10, Windows 8, Windows 7, or Windows Vista. PC with 2 USB 2.0 ports
  • Multi-key anti-ghosting ensures the most accurate simultaneous key presses
  • Comfortable wrist rest for fatigue reduction
  • Compatible with Xbox One to play keyboard-enabled games
Been waiting almost a year to buy this and was not disappointed

Reasons I bought mine: Competitive price at $50 USD Quiet high profile keys Included wrist rest No software needed for RBG lighting Programmable keys Included media buttons It’s quiet, it’s beautiful, the keys do feel a bit slick and like a potential grease magnet but that just means it’s up to me to keep my area clean. The included wrist rest does feel cheap, it’s like a mostly hollow piece of attachable plastic with a little rubber grip texture on top, but it was freely included unlike other keyboards. However as a negative I do see myself replacing the wrist rest with something more comfortable in the future. I haven't been able to test out the programmable keys yet so no comment there. I hate loud keyboards! I know the signature cherry key click is a must for many in the mechanic keyboard fandom (the k55 is NOT a mechanical keyboard for the record). But I love the tactical feedback when typing without the loud clacking. The keys feel great to press and naturally are obviously louder than low profile keyboards. But this keyboard doesn't have that drag and heavy typing experience that comes with low profile keys. I bought this on black Friday for $40.47 (that's with free shipping and US tax). Even at full price after all the research I've done this is the most competitive expensive but budget friendly high end keyboard. It looks so professional, but it's decorative enough that even with the lights off it's a subtle flair of design to add to any office space without that in your face "gamer" aesthetic.

As I type you can feel the difference in your fingers.

I am not sure the material or the finish but it all most feels like touching a warm glass as my fingers punch away. The back-lit RGB effect is quite pleasant on the eyes the hand rest really makes typing on this a dream. Though not a true mechanical keyboard this feels very nice for the price. I like the programmable key sets. I don't use them for gaming, for common programming statements they are amazing. Although I feel like it is something to get used to having those G1-G6 keys there. I wish it had the usb plug in so I could attach my mouse to it. I gave it a 3 star for gaming because I am not using it for that so I don't feel qualified to rate it for that. Not that I have bought other gamming keyboards, So far this feels like the best one I have owned to this point. I would say that this is not the high end of what Corsair puts out and if I was able to find someone who sold this locally, I may have greatly considered the K95 version.

Best "quiet" gaming keyboard on the market

I've gamed on PC for 3+ decades. Used to be a solid mechanical keyboard advid player. Well, since carpal tunnel surgery a few years ago, I just can't type on mechanical any more without pain. So I was tossed to the world of membrane keyboards whether I liked it or not. That said, I've grown to love membrane keyboards. My favorite for just typing is the Logitech K750. But for gaming that keyboard is slow and often misses key presses in the heat of the action. Terrible. I've been looking for a keyboard up to the task of gaming yet still provide a light key press and most of all to be quiet as my children have often asked me to stop typing when they are studying or doing other work that they clicking bothers them. This keyboard is not the most quiet by any means, the K750 being the most quiet I've ever used. But compared to other styles, it is extremely more quiet than those. Plus, the key response is awesome for the key press height for a membrane style keyboard. If you need less noise, and love to game, this is the key board for you. Hands down.

Perfect keyboard for general use

For $50, this is a great keyboard for general use. I'm comparing it to a Corsair K65 with Reds, a Razer DeathStalker, and the horrible Dell chiclet keyboard that my work provided to me. The K55 is actually my favorite for typing: it's comfortable, they keys are easy to press and if you don't mind bottoming out it's a fine experience. The wrist rest is quite good, although it does wear in quickly. Note this is only a cosmetic issue, after a month of use it hasn't progressed much beyond what my greasy hands did to it the first few days. The backlighting is simple but easy to use; I usually keep it on low blue light at work, just to give me a little light in a dark office. Bottom line: if you don't want to get a mechanical keyboard with Blues because of the price or concerns that your coworkers might murder you, this is a good compromise. I much prefer the K65 and DeathStalker for gaming. The K65 is great for quick stuff with its Red switches, and the DeathStalker is best for slower, longer sessions (think Skyrim) because of the integrated wrist rest, short key travel and light actuation force, but it's not great to type on. The Dell chiclet keyboard makes a good doorstop.

Great value, very pretty

So this keyboard was a gigantic upgrade to me. I was previously using a wireless $10 logitech keyboard. That keyboard was smaller, it did indeed feel cheap, and it was just a keyboard. This however... The RGB lighting is the first big difference. I'm not too big on the whole "rainbow" thing but with the iCUE software I went for a pulse theme between "white" and light blue, looks very nice. Although the white looks blue, minor gripe though. There are 3 brightness settings. I thought the button for it was broken because I sometimes turn off the lighting, I had to press it a few times for it to turn off, but it turns out there's just different settings. The maximum setting is a good setting for me, not blindingly light like my last keyboard. This keyboard feels very solid. It is not mechanical, but I think this is about as good as you can get without going that route. It feels well built and has a handy wrist wrest. That was very unsettling to use at first as I'm accustomed to cheap keyboards with no wrist rests, but it feels infinitely better already. One thing I will note is, this keyboard is MASSIVE. It takes up nearly half of a panel in my desk, or my XXL mousepad. Be prepared for that, and don't stick this thing on a small desk. Thankfully I still prefer my keyboard to be shifted a little to the left of my monitor so I get that space back in the end. Last few things to note, I had a few initial bumps with my iCUE software but the customer service over at Corsair was very helpful and presented a solution which I would have NEVER figured out! I got it working again and now I can tune the lighting again. Worst case scenario, you can still use the keys to cycle between different colors and a few presets. All in all, this is a fantastic keyboard at a good price. The best you can get without going mechanical. I would highly recommend getting it. I will update this in awhile if anything comes up and after it has had a few months of use under its belt.

10/10 would RGB again

colors are amazing,just wish purple and cyan were a little brighter. easy to set a custom settings and adjust speeds,this keyboard doesn't slip around and i can easily see the keys in the dark, the detachable hand guard is a plus and doesn't impede my use of the keyboard. overall i'd say this keyboard is a very good buy.

Typical Corsair quality and function at a great price

I have this keyboard paired with my Corsair M65 mouse over an MM200 mouse mat, and I absolutely love it. After a solid 12+ years with a Logitech Elite keyboard, a coffee spill took it out and I wanted a straightforward and well built replacement with a cable hookup to suit my workspace that didn't cost an arm and a leg. This board is just the right size, and the tactile feel is great - the keys have almost a matte rubber feel to them that is grippy and resists smudging from the oils on your fingers. The keystroke is a satisfying muted "plunk" but not the over the top click-clack sound of a mechanical board or older plastic components. Overall just feels very robust. I originally didn't care much about the LED lighting but I have to admit its pretty cool and compliments the lighting in my M65 to make for a pretty trick desktop appearance at night. I'm not a big fan of the column of "G" keys up the left side...I tend to hit them a lot by accident when making a reach for the CTRL or Shift keys but I'm sure I'll get used to it.

Fantastic keyboard at a reasonable price

I am not a gamer, so cannot speak for the appropriateness of this product for that use. I bought this to replace a Logitech MK530 whose letters had rubbed off over time to the point that even for my adequate touch typing skills, it was inconvenient at times, especially working at night in my home office where I usually have dimmer, indirect lighting. Having become used to (or spoiled) by backlit keyboards on my Surface Pro 3 and other laptops, I had decided that this was a feature I would like in a replacement keyboard. With that in mind, I first looked at Logitech's offerings since I already had a unified receiver that I had been using with my old keyboard and trackball. Unfortunately, I didn't really find anything that particularly struck me that wasn't huge like their wave keyboards (which are very good, by the way, but too big for this particular space). Since the keyboard would be used in close proximity to my Surface Dock, I expanded my search to include wired keyboards, of which there were scores to consider. I did not want a mechanical keyboard as I find the clicking annoying, especially late at night with others sleeping in adjoining rooms, so ruled those out early on. After reading countless reviews both here and on other sites, I settled on this one as it seemed to offer the best combination of typing experience, lighting control (OK, big cool factor) and size for my needs. I was very happily not disappointed. Typing is a joy on this keyboard. The keys are responsive, with good travel, and it has my preferred straight Enter key rather than the larger upside-down L shape preferred by some manufacturers. For me the advantage there is that all my other keyboards have the straight Enter Key and larger right shift key, so there was no awkward relearning curve, or challenges with switching between keyboards, which I do frequently with my own and clients' different devices. I also liked the fact that unlike most gaming keyboards, this did not have the extra bold W A S D key letters, which I simply found aesthetically unpleasing. This keyboard has six programmable keys in a vertical column to the left of the main keyboard section. While these were primarily intended for gamers, they are also very useful in a more traditional office environment to create quick access to specific programs or functions. For me, I used one to replace the Calculator shortcut on my Logitech keyboard, then used others to summon my most-used programs like Excel, Word and my Epson scanner. They work very well for that, but the downside is retraining my left hand that the far upper left key is NOT Esc, nor is the far lower left key Ctrl. Other than that minor inconvenience, the programmable keys add an extra level of customization and efficiency that is quite welcome. My one suggestion here to Corsair is that they create a software program to make customizing these programmable keys easier for the less technical user. I had to research this online and found that creating shortcuts to start programs with these macro keys is somewhat of a roundabout process. In essence, you need to create a shortcut for the program you wish to launch, assign it a shortcut key combination, then record a macro of that shortcut to the key you want to assign. Not exactly the most straight-forward way of doing things, but it does the job. There's an opportunity for Corsair or an enterprising programmer here. The backlit lighting control is superb and quite extensive. Essentially you have three lighting zones, each of which can display up to seven different colors. There are quite a few pre-programmed choices, both for color and fading effects, as well as the ability to customize to your heart's content. If you are so inclined, you can quite literally spend 30-40 minutes or longer playing around with the different lighting combinations and probably still not exhaust all the possibilities. Take some time and have fun with this. It is definitely at the upper end on the coolness scale. One (for me) con, was the size of the lettering on the movement keys in between the main alpha keyboard and the number pad. In the interest of continuing their pseudo future looking typeface, which apparently assumes that pseudo future users have perfect eyesight, the lettering on these keys is uncomfortably small for my sixty-something year-old eyes. This should be a relatively easy fix for Corsair to implement, and would also make those keys more visible to gamers as well. Overall, this is a wonderful keyboard at a reasonable price, that will serve well for all but perhaps the most selective of gamers, and is an excellent replacement for mainstream users who desire something a little beyond the ho-hum run-of-the-mill basic keyboard, The typing experience is easily one of the best I've found in over three decades of computer work.

Can't beat this for 50$

For 50 dollars you can't beat this keyboard. The RGB is very nice, you can setup the lights to scroll, to pulse, you can set how fast they scroll, you can set the colors in 3 different areas individually ( left, middle, and right) you can make it all one color, like all Red or all blue... The keys are not mechanical so don't expect the sharp click of a mechanical keyboard but they don't feel cheap either, I like it better this way because a mechanical keyboard is very noisy and I find that anoying. Great value for your money it also comes with a detachable arm rest.

4 ILLUMINATED KEYBOARDS RATED - This one is the best of the the four!

My favorite, most used keyboard in my office is my Das 4 Professional Soft Tactile MX Brown Mechanical Keyboard. I mention this so that you could have an idea as to what I look for in a keyboard. Although Das does make an illuminated keyboard, Das Keyboard Prime 13 White LED Backlit, at $129.00 it’s a bit too steep for most of us. I wanted an illuminated keyboard for home use so I could use it at night without disturbing anyone by having to keep the overhead lights on. I ended up buying 4 keyboards looking for the one that not only had good backlighting but also good typing action making it easy to see at night and easy to type on. I wanted to keep the price to around $50.00 – so here is what I bought in order: Perixx PX-1100 ($59.99) The keyboard has serious flaws that significantly interfere with it's stated purpose. It is supposed to be illuminated so that it could be used in a dark room. It specifically states that it has key and letter illumination which it does but here lies the problem - the illumination is very uneven with some keys being very bright and others just an inch or two away being very dim. As an example, the left arrow key on my keyboard was very bright while the right arrow key was barely visible especially since the keys next to it were so bright! Another factor is the brightness surrounding the keys which in some areas is brighter than the keys themselves which makes it more difficult to read them. This keyboard apparently has "zone illumination" meaning that it has just a few LED's lighting up the keys and in some places, near the edge of the zones, there are dim areas - very dim areas, even with the brightness at maximum. If you're buying this for the illumination to make it easier to read in a dark room, look elsewhere. If you want a cool looking, colorful keyboard that has relatively good good typing action this is your keyboard, it is heavy, well built, has good typing action and poor lighting. This was the first one I bought and I was very disappointed with it, hence the mediocre rating. Azio – Vision Large Font Keyboard ($29.99) This keyboard has large font: letters, numbers and symbols making it very easy to read in a darkened room. The lighting is even throughout the entire keyboard, there are no bright or dark areas and you can easily change the color of the keys for the entire keyboard or within the 5 lighting zones. For people with vision impairments, this is your keyboard. It is easy to use, set-up and change colors. The typing action on it is very unsatisfying for me as the keys are larger than standard keys so my fingers are not used to the spacing. Also, the height of the keys is somewhat shallower than standard keys and the resistance when you type is “mushy” at least for me. That said, for visually impaired people who are used to the common $15 to $20 keyboard this will be fine for you and at $30, it is a bargain. Logitech K740 – Fullsize Illuminated Slim Keyboard ($59.99) This keyboard is very slim in fact, the travel of the keys when you type is minimal and they are very shallow which I am not used to so I found typing on it unsatisfying. The keyboard reminds me of the one on my inexpensive, compact laptop which gets the job done when I’m traveling but is not designed for serious typing. The illumination however is excellent, bright white and very legible. Set-up is simple and adjusting the brightness is straight forward. If my “go-to” keyboard wasn’t so good, I probably wouldn’t have an issue with this one. Once you have typed on a quality keyboard with mechanical switches you get spoiled! At $60 on sale, I was underwhelmed. Corsair K55 Gaming Keyboard ($47.99) This keyboard basically met my expectations for typing feedback and illumination for the price but it’s far from perfect. When you first connect it to your computer you will be met with an over the top moving display of colors flowing across the entire keyboard which is very distracting and thankfully easily changed with just a few key strokes. You can make it all one color if you wish and choose the color you want or make each zone a different color. The keyboard is light weight like most cheap keyboards, lighter even than the non-illuminated Dell keyboard that it replaced but it gets the job done. The first thing I noticed is that the illumination is crisp and even throughout the keyboard. The letters and symbols are centered on the keys and a bit bolder in font than average keyboards. The keys are not individually illuminated but there are enough LED’s to give it an even appearance. The lighting around the keys is somewhat bright but not to the point of making them difficult to read as on the Perixx. Although the keys themselves are not mechanical, they feel somewhat mechanical giving it a nice tactile experience. The keys have the same height as one would find on a good standard keyboard and have about the same travel as well, so it is a good keyboard to type on or use for gaming or both! There are many illuminated keyboards out there and I spent hours shopping on Amazon and reading reviews trying to finds one that would be right for me. For some people, the typing action may be secondary and so for them, the best buy would be the Azio Vision Large Font Keyboard which at $29.99 is a bargain. It is the easiest by far to read under any conditions and very easy to use/set-up. The Logitech at $60 is also very easy to read but it is twice the price of the Azio. That said, the keys are standard size and it is very well made. For me, the Corsair K55 was the best compromise; although the Azio and the Logitech are easier to read, the Corsair is also easy to read, they are just a bit better in visibility but when I considered typing feel and speed , the Corsair wins. I hope this helps some of you make the right buying decision. Art

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