Peripherals Does it make sense to pay £30+ for a keyboard?

I have just paid £45 for a Logitech Illuminated Keyboard (920-001165) that is on sale at most places for £60. But is it cost affective to spend so much on a keyboard?

The most I have paid before is £10 (mouse included). It looks superb and gets some great reviews. It is NOT for gaming as such although I will play a few from time to time. I will use it a lot so comfort and functionality are important AND I will say it again - it looks gorgeous!

 

I love my G15 keyboard, worth every penny in my eyes,

My Logitech G9 mouse, was worth every penny too,

 

You get what you pay for dont you ??

 

I paid almost 90 pounds for my Das Keyboard and it is the best money I have ever spent.

 

I paid around £50 for my Logitech Illuminated keyboard and have never regretted it. It's really nice to type on and use it for gaming all the time - the only thing gaming keyboards get you is fancy coloured backlighting and a load of useless macro keys. Price is directly proportional to quality, so you could pay £10 if you want, but don't expect anything near as good. In fact, my mouse and keyboard combined set me back over £120.

 

True. I've always paid bottom dollar for keyboards & mice. In fact most I've ever used are re-cycled. But I've just about had enough of those chunky, loud keys. I've got a new build PC so why not a quality keyboard. I'm just not sure that I should be spending so much on an input device.

 

Well, you wouldn't be able to use that shiny new PC without a keyboard would you? The way I see it, input devices are just as important as the components inside the case. If you don't like using them then you're not going to enjoy using your PC as much.

 

This G15 was perhaps worth less money than I paid, but I did get it on sale.

Going to try out the Razer BlackWidow next month.

 

I managed to pick up a Microsoft Sidewinder X4 for 28 quid

Top bit of kit

I also managed to get A CM storm Inferno for £20

You get what you pay for or not as in this instance

 

I bought a G500 and G15 on a combo deal at scan for ~£70. I love the mouse and the backlighting and screen are useful on the G15 but I never use the macro keys and haven't got used to it in general, don't love it for gaming or typing really. I am tempted to try and find a decent quality backlit mechanical but I really want to try one out before I spend that much money on one.

 

I dropped quite a bit on my Lycosa (or rather, my girlfriend did. :3 Christmas present.) and (if I had bought it myself) I would not have regretted it one bit. Nice typing action, no keyu lockups, nice illumination... just a very very nice keyboard. I will be getting the BlackWidow Ultimate when i get the money, and I fully expect that to be worth every cent of that crazy price tag.

I think much the same way about mice, too. Prices may seem high, but most of the high end mice I have used, all but one or two have felt worth the price tag.

 

my uber awesome gorgeous enermax aurora premium, cost £50, which imo is a good price considering its made out of brushed aluminium. i <3 it

 

i did have a G9 and then it broke (bloody stone floor ) and i could not afford another one and had to down grade to a g5 and i have to say the G9 is miles better so worth the extra money

 

Most I've spent on a keyboard is about £10. Mice? Typically go top dollar for a good mouse. But keyboards have never really made a massive difference for me. There are some exceptions, some designs are just unworkable for me, such as Apple keyboards or ergonomic keyboards which I'm not used to (though could likely get used to), but generally anything will work so long as it has all of the basic buttons. When going cheap the only thing I keep in mind is to go for office keyboards, not low end "gaming" boards. Office keyboards are meant to last, such as the cheap ones from Microsoft or Dell. They may not be flashy, but they're meant to take a good deal of typing.

 

I'll echo Ficky Pucker with the Enermax - I winced when I splashed out for it, but have had no regrets whatsoever since! Here's a review as many people have never heard of it, compared to the Razers and Logitechs of the world...

 

Where'd you get the Das? I always wanted a buckling-spring 'board but I hate the Model M colours. Do they do a backlit one?

Peripherals are more important for most PC usage - watching films is no fun on a 15" TFT from 2001 (trust me on this), typing for a few hours is no fun on a laptop keyboard, and doing anything is horrible on pointing sticks. Peripherals are your connection to your machine, which is the most problematic bit of the whole computing experience.

 

The keyboard + mouse + pad combination (Sidewinder X4 + G700 + Steelseries 9HD) I'm currently using costs about 180 €. Before it was even more due to the G15 rev2. Is it worth it? Oh I don't know, but if I use it 10 hours a day, the cost is nothing.

The thing with cheap keyboards from my experience is that when brand spanking new they have a lovely touch, but it only takes a short while for the typing touch to change and the board to get noisier and.. Well overall worse. With more expensive keyboard you get an even better typing touch out of the box and the aging isn't such a problem. So if you aren't too critical about the touch or the noise, just got for the cheap stuff, but if you are, you will want to spend some extra.

And really, £45 for the Illuminated isn't much. I haven't had one, but from what I've read, it's easily worth that money.

 

To be honest keyboards don't really matter as long as its comfortable and easy to use for you, I meant some people will buy certain keyboards so they can play long ways (so the keyboard is 90 degree to the norm). Mice should be comfortable for you to hold/use but you normally get better performance from more expensive ones and ones with a better build quality.

The amount of Razer products I have been through and broke (mainly the middle buttons of mouses) hence I now use a Xai which hasn't broke yet!

Most Razer items these days are crap and aren't worth the money. I won a whole Razer suite at a LAN and the only thing I actually kept to use was the lycosa. Had the Mako also but when you can sell it for £175+ you sell it!

 

Ask and you shall receive

http://www.daskeyboard.com/

They do not do a backlit version, but since I ordered the version without print it does not really matter to me anyways. From the build quality it seems easy enough to mod a couple of LED's in it.

The mechanical keys are fantastic. They are a bit noisy, and people complain whenever I use Skype but you get used to it fairly quickly.

 

I was about to ask if you'd gotten the Silent version, which I'd have to get because of the close proximity of others to my 'board. Like the Ultimate, though - might have to get that too!