You Had Me at Knob and LCD Display! (Epomaker Ajazz AK820 Pro)
13Epomaker Ajazz AK820 Pro.
When $60 USD get you Hotswappable, gasket mounted, tri-mode (wired type-c, 2.4G USB dongle, Bluetooth), dongle hides in bottom held in by magnet, south facing RGB, flex cut PCB, silicone base pad, factory lubed switches, metal knob for volume and other adjustments and last but certainly not least a small color LCD display for stats and animated GIF's who can complain?
This keyboard is insane for the price. It's very popular and considered by many to be one of the best budget mechanical keyboards out there today.
I sold my Ducky One 2 SF yesterday (sent off right after making this video!) to justify buying another keyboard and this destroys the Ducky in so many aspects despite being quite a bit less! I also like the %75 layout. The Ducky was a %65 meaning it lacked dedicated function keys. This is a great middle ground between %65 and TKL giving most people everything they need (numpad not withstanding) with dedicated function keys while not being any wider than a %65. This keyboard as shown in the video is the exact same width as the Ducky SF. This keyboard was also significantly cheaper than my two Durgod's and again offers a lot more features! Chinese keyboards have got better and better over the last few years and it REALLY shows! I remember just say, 4-5 years ago when Ducky was considered a great value (compared to Corsair etc) but now even they look overpriced! Big gaming brands like Steel Series, Corsair and Razer? Forget about it! IMHO they've completely failed to evolve still pushing black on black boring SKU's at inflated prices (looking at you Corsair K70!) while these smaller Chinese brands have improved so much while keeping the price the same.
There are a few minor complaints as mentioned in the video but honestly for the price they're so nit picky they're almost not worth mentioning at all! Screws would be nice and it could be a little heavier (it doesn't feel any heavier than the Ducky and I'm pretty sure it's lighter than the Durgod's despite having more dampening materials and a battery inside. Granted the Durgod TKL's are a little bigger. So size for Size (it's in the middle) and it probably sits there in terms of weight too. So again, this is more a want than a complaint given the lower price than those others. It uses proprietary software rather than some open source firmware like some other higher end keyboards but honestly I've never used those so I'm not missing anything. The software is something you'll probably only use a few times to change settings and then never use again. But it could prove to be an issue further down the road with new OS's or perhaps Linux? Luckily you can change some settings like RGB modes and brightness on the keyboard itself using the knob and display.
Anyway, I certainly have no complaints for $60 (or even more!) as at the end of the day it offers more than the other keyboards shown in this video for less. So really even if it was the same price as those I'd have no real complaints. But at this price it's just a damn good bargain!