Royal Kludge RK 61 - Review

Wish I could say I am in love with my Rk61 keyboard. Don't get me wrong. The keyboard is tactilely awesome, the keys do not jump out of their sockets like my Razor Blackwidow Tenkeyless does, and the lighting effects are fantastic. While I am writing these words down, the keys light up in flames and die in a sweet red tone.

However, as a programmer, I find the lack of arrow keys is a bummer. I mean they exist, and considering this is a 61 key keyboard some sacrifices had to be made. I know all that but still it bums me. To activate the arrow keys you need to ˋFn+Enterˋ and then use the lower 4 keys right next to the space as the arrows. However, the FN key is situated where my muscle memory recognizes as right arrow and whole thing fells flat. I need to think - or worse look at the keyboard - to navigate on the screen.

This kills the momentum when you are writing code. You write a function, do the curlies and then when you need to return back to the inside you either have to delete the ending curly and write it back after you are done or activate the thing. Moving in the code becomes a hassle, selecting words become a hassle.

But apart from all these functional bumps - if you are writing pure text like this one - this is a dream. And the form factor is superb. Just chef's kiss. I am using it with my Steam Deck (and my phone and everything really) and it is just so hard to beat. Small size, offering Bluetooth, USB dongle and wired connection all in one package is just so hard to beat. The cable is just run of the mill usb-c port and detachable. Makes it a wonder to carry and use.

All in all I like the keyboard, and I checked the 80 key version (the one with the arrows) it feels bulky and way way more expensive.

My two cents.