Royal Kludge, a Chinese made mechanical keyboard that has made its way to the international market through various channel including Massdrop, are said to be one of the best Chinese made keyboard you can get. We've never actually tried one yet, not until today. Special thanks to Novero Gaming Store for providing us with a Royal Kludge RG-987 mechanical keyboard for our review here today.
The Royal Kludge RG-987 retails at RM 250 and it's probably the cheapest RGB mechanical keyboard we've seen to date. Let's see what kind of quality we can expect from the RG-987, aside of being a surprisingly affordable option for RGB mechanical keyboard.
Unboxing
The packaging is surprisingly simple for its name, unlike majority of the Chinese made keyboards with fancy or over exaggerating packaging.
At the back of the box, you'll find its prominent features all written in chinese - NKRO, Windows key lock, ergonomic curve, mechanical switches, Gold plated USB connector, FN function key, Doubleshot keycaps.
You're not getting much from the box, the user's manual and product certification label is the only accessories you'll get.
The RG-987 keyboard comes available in 2 color, black and white. The key alignment are surprisingly good, uniform spacing between each keys, solid build quality, all the basic requirement of a good quality keyboard can be found on this baby.
The ergonomic curve which Royal Kludge claims can be seen from the side of the keyboard, a design that has been around for decades to allow you to type on more comfortably for longer hours a flat profile.
A Ferrite core is attached to the cable to eliminate any potential interference, something that has been done by majority of keyboard manufacturer for the past decade. The gold plated USB connector gives it a stronger resistance against oxidation, keeps it nice and shiny overtime.
The multimedia control keys on the F1~F6 and the LED profile keys on the right of the keyboard can be triggered using the FN key located at t he right of the space bar.
Doubleshot keycaps has becoming more prominent nowadays and it can be spotted on quite a number of Chinese brand keyboards. It's not the kind of doubleshot we've used to seen on Cherry keyboards, but it'll definitely last a whole lot longer than the usual black paint coated keycaps.
Cherry stabilizer are seen used on longer keys like the space bar, shift key, enter key, etc.
The mechanical switch used, Kailh, one of the most popular Cherry MX imitation and it has been used by a numbers of renown brand i.e Razer, SteelSeries, Tesoro, etc.
The bottom of the keyboard, nice and clean.
The keyboard feet comes with a rubber pad for that extra grip you'll need to keep the keyboard in place with or without the keyboard feet raised.
While Royal Kludge never specifically mentioned anything about voiding the warranty by breaking the seal, but it's best to stay away from the seal if you need the 1-year limited warranty from Royal Kludge.
The LED Profile Preview
Key Rollover Test (KRO)
The key rollover is really commendable overall, we're able to hold down each and every key with no signs of signal blocking and ghosting effect, just wonderful.
Final Thoughts
The Royal Kludge RG-987 has that fancy lighting but limited that's good enough to impress your friend, the built quality isn't perfect but it's surprisingly good, full key rollover (NKRO), doubleshot keycap, consistent switch alignment. All these qualities are available at the price of RM250, pretty sweet deal indeed and it's definitely one of the best bang for the buck mechanical keyboard that we've come across so far and will not hesitate to recommend it to those who wants a budget friendly and good looking mechanical keyboard.
Pros
- Clean, solid build quality
- Doubleshot keycaps
- Good LED modes
- Full key rollover (NKRO)
- Good keyboard feet design
- Very, very good value
Cons
- LED color transition isn't smooth
- Very limited LED modes
- Inflexible LED modes toggle
