Cynosa Chroma
RAZER £58The best membrane keyboard for gaming
If even mecha-
membrane keys don’t
suit you and you
demanda fully membrane
typing/gaming experience, the
Cynosa is the deck for you. It has
some of the best feeling, low
profile membrane keys I’ve ever
tested, and at a retail price of
under £60 is one of the most
affordable gaming keyboards out
there (past a certain threshold of
quality). While it may lack some of
the features a number of gaming
boards pack in these days, stuff
like a dedicated wrist rest or
media controls, it does boast
Razer’s extensive RGB lighting,
which can be programmed on aper key basis or applied by zones.
It’s a solid, no frills, nice
looking keyboard that’s the best
membrane option of a huge
range that I’ve tested. There is a
step-up version of the Cynosa
available, but for slightly more the
only real addition is underglow
RGB, so unless that kind of
‘ground effects’ package is
massively appealing to you, I
recommend you save your cash
and invest in the basemodel.Bestfeelingmembranekeys
Affordable
PerkeyRGBlighting
LacksextrafeaturesVERDICTSPECS INTERFACE: WIRED USB / KEYBOARD BACKLIGHTING: PER-KEY RGB / PROGRAMMABLE KEYS: ALL / FEATURES:
PER KEY RGB LIGHTING, SUPPORTS WINDOWS 7+ AND OSX 10.8+4
MK850
COOLER MASTER £187
The best keyboard to replace a gamepad
Cooler Master may not
be the first name that
springs to mind when
youthink of gaming keyboards,
but the MK850 may very well
change your mind. The headline
feature of their latest peripheral
offering is the aimpad technology
built into a subset of the deck’s
keys, which transform them with
the push of a button into analog
inputs not unlike the analog stick
on a gamepad. This means that
you can push a key part of the
way down and it’ll register the
input differently than pushing it all
the way to the floor. It’s a useful
feature, particularly in stealth or
racing games.
It’s not just the aimpad that
makes the MK850 a great board,
though. It’s packed with the
additional features that elevate a
gaming keyboard, stuff like a row
of dedicated macro keys and
media controls, USB
passthroughs, and Cherry MX
Red switches. And it’s an
attractive deck, with raised
keycaps and a supportive
magnetic wrist rest and anodized
aluminium backplate.Unique,analogaimpadtechnology
Fullmediacontrols
Highresistance
SlightlyawkwardmacropositioningVERDICTSPECS SWITCH: CHERRY MX RED / SIZE: FULL SIZE / BACKLIGHTS: FULL RGB / PASSTHROUGHS: USB / MEDIA
CONTROLS: DEDICATED / WRISTREST: YES
3
GROUP TEST
PACKED WITH THE
ADDITIONAL FEATURES
THAT ELE VATE A
GAMING KEYBOARD