KBtalKing Pro First Impressions

[keyboardlover]

Hi Folks.

KBtalKing sent me one of their new "Pro" keyboards with MX reds to review. I am not going to post an entire review here (if and when I end up doing one, it will be on keyboardlover.com). However, thus far things have not gone well. The keys are extremely thin and one of the extra ones came with a big ugly crack down the side. I am not surprised since they are made of thin PBT plastic. The keyboard has wireless capability but didn't come with batteries so I haven't been able to test that. But I plugged in the usb cable and it didn't work at all (installed drivers fine, but then nothing). Tried it in three different usb ports too as well as on two computers, same thing. I have an email into Andy at KBTalking USA but wanted to warn GHers. Thus far I am not impressed with their QA at all.

A few other things I noticed: Cherry Corp. Stabilizers, Filco-size std. spacebar, weight is decent but closer to Rosewill weight than Filco weight (lighter than my tenkeyless Filco). They are manufactured in Taiwan here: http://www.zippy.com.tw

I will update this thread once I get more info from Andy, before doing a full review.

[Binge]

Recently had my blue switch with black on black pro's keycaps get nasty on me.  Looking to replace them.  None of them were cracked like that luckily.

[keyboardlover]

Ahh, the keyboard works now...I had just not realized how to properly enable it for USB since it supports Bluetooth and all kinds of stuff. So far only major negative is the keys. Review will be coming soon.

[soulctcher]

I'm glad you figured out that you have to actually enable the USB capability...I was going to mention it.

The first thing I really did on mine was to swap the keycaps, so I can't really comment much on the original caps, other than that the font is horrible.
Outside of that, the board is pretty awesome.  I've not had to replace (and wouldn't expect to) the batteries yet since my first pair.

My only complaint about it is the same complaint I have with other Bluetooth peripherals; every once in awhile, there's interference that noticeably affects their performance.  Basically, I'll be in the middle of typing something and it completely locks up on whatever key I was pressing.  That has happened on a bunch of BT keyboards I've used.  (Even BT headphones and mice have the issue...it's common to Bluetooth.)

[kbfreak]

Cool pre-review. It actually makes sense that the cracked keycap was one of the 4 extra Mac keycaps in the little bag rather than one of the pre-installed ones on the board, as the board itself will probably undergo a pretty thorough inspection...having worked in a packaging facility when I was in school, I can totally see one of these bags drop on the floor in the packing area, got stepped on by another worker by accident (or whatever force it came in contact with), and later got picked up and put right back into the pile without a second thought. 

[keyboardlover]

Full review is up!

http://keyboardlover.com/kbtalking_review.php