WASD CODE Keyboard : First Impressions
I have been looking for a good full size backlit mechanical keyboard for a very long time. I have been a geek and a gamer for over 35 years and I have tried many different keyboards over that time, my all time favorite being the IBM Model M. Unfortunately, there are no backlit buckling spring boards. Most of the backlit boards I have tried over the years have been very disappointing. I bought a Ducky Shine a couple of years ago, and while I did really like the MX Blues, they just never felt quite right. Back in August, I saw a post about WASD's new CODE keyboard being open for pre-orders, so I jumped at the chance to try MX Clears, one of the few switches I have never tried. I ordered the full size 104 key keyboard, and it finally arrived yesterday! I thought I would type up a quick review of my first impressions of the board.
The board arrived in simple, plain packaging, just enough to get it safely to my front door. Here are a few pics taken with my Sony DSC-WX50.
A bit of a comparrison with my dirty old Ducky Shine
The board it's self is clean and devoid of all the gaudy graphics and flashy extra lights and lighting effects that some boards come with. The font is classic Helvetica and easy to read even with the backlighting off. There are 7 levels of brightness to the backlighting, plus an “On/Off” function. The characters are evenly lit, but the multimedia functions printed on the front of the keys do not show up well at all, even on the highest backlight setting. The built in memory does keep your backlight setting, so you don't have to reset it every time you boot, or from a cold start. When plugged in to a USB port, everything works normally, When plugged in to my PS2 port however, I have noticed some weirdness, more on that later.
Here you can see the painted white steel plate that the switches are mounted to.
There are a couple of things about this board that I did find a bit annoying, and they may potentially be deal breakers for some people. The “Users Guide” is a bit lacking and consists of a 4.5 inch square piece of paper with the DIP switch settings and function key combos on it. For the function key to work, and therefore the backlighting and multimedia keys, you need to flip SW6 switch to the “ON” position. With SW6 in the off position, the Menu key functions only as a Menu Key.
You have to power off the board any time you change the DIP switches for the new settings to take effect. There is no “On/Off” switch on the board, so you have to unplug the mini USB plug from the bottom of the board, or the USB/PS2 plug from your computer to power it down. There was also a problem for me shutting the computer down while plugged in to a PS2 port. Actually it shuts down just fine, the problem comes on restarting. When I turned my computer back on, the keyboard was recognized by the BIOS as being connected, but keystrokes did not register. To fix the issue I had to unplug the keyboard from the computer, plug it back in and then reboot, it worked fine then. Plugging in to a USB port really seems to be the only option. It may be the way my mothered is polling the PS2 port as there is a lot of light flickering during the bootup process when connected to the PS2 port. Unfortunately I don't have another motherboard with a PS2 port to try this on at the moment.
Overall, I absolutely love the feel of this board, it feels fantastic to type on and gives me a solid feel on every keystroke. This board really feels solid and is great to type on! It is the closest I have come to the feel of buckling springs with Cherry MX switches. The feet are solid and stable, and the rubber pads on the back insure this board will not move unless you move it! I haven't tried any gaming on it yet, but I will the first chance I get. From what I understand, the boards with MX Clear switches are all sold out and the next version of the board will have different MX switches, but I am not %100 percent sure on that. If you are fine with 6-key rollover on a USB port, then I highly recommend this board! If you absolutely have to have N-key rollover on a PS2 connection, then based on my experiences, you should look elsewhere.