Roccat SOVA
Bridging the desk to couch-style PC gaming.
The matte black monster you see above is another of the burgeoning new category of ‘lapboards’ — lounge-room PC gaming peripherals designed to sit on your lap so you can game in comfort from your couch. And compared to the petite Razer Turret ( APC 431, page 40), you’ll really know the Sova is there. In the words of Douglas Adams, it’s “big, really big” and, at 2.35kg, we reckon it’s also been sneaking down to the kitchen in the middle of the night and snacking. But that extra weight does mean it sits steadily on your lap and that’s arguably exactly what you need when gaming from the couch.
Sova combines a generous mousepad and wrist rest with a compact-sized keyboard — the model we tested had TTC-made Brown mechanical switches, but there’s also a membrane version — but you’ll have to BYO mouse. Roccat has emphasised that the Sova is quite customisable, with both wrist rest and mousepad able to be swapped out for different materials and designs. Which is good, because the hard surface of the default mousepad is quite rough and noisy when a mouse quickly moves across it. It didn’t affect performance, but the noise did cause this reviewer’s eye to twitch quite a bit during use, mainly due to the loss of immersion it caused.
The keyboard features multimedia keys and per-key customisable blue backlighting, but no macros. Anti-ghosting and N-key rollover is great, with only the odd occasion where a letter gets lost when typing at speed (which, we imagine, won’t be this keyboard’s main occupation, so it’s hardly more than a niggle). There are two USB 2.0 ports on the board itself, nestled down the back next to the detachable power cable — so you can plug your mouse into the keyboard itself (and use the nifty cable channel to hide the excess cabling) and also connect a USB headset, or even charge your phone or tablet. However, there’s no audio jack here, which was a bit of a missed opportunity in our mind. The Sova’s main USB cable is amply long at 4m (and has a Y split at the PC end) but that length introduces the inevitable risk of tripping.
So it’s huge and offers a reasonable array of features — but how does it feel when in use? Pretty good. That generously-sized wrist rest means it’s more ergonomic than a lot of desktop keyboards and the cushioning underneath keeps the board comfortably on your lap for long gaming sessions without complaint. Setting the board up is also a piece of cake — get it out of the box, plug it in, plug in your mouse and go.
One small annoyance was the fact that, unlike the Razer Turret (which had a nifty magnetised mouse), if you tilt the keyboard a little, the mouse slides off the end. So if you’re getting up or shifting yourself on the couch, keep a hand on your little guy.
Bridging the gap between desktop and couch is an ambitious task and the Sova has done a pretty good job. But the sheer size of this thing and the $359 price tag (without including a mouse) might be enough to give you pause — especially with the Razer Turret going for $220. Plus, you need to consider storing this monster when it’s not in use. Still, the Sova absolutely beats using a regular gaming keyboard balanced on your lap, and for that, we’d say it was mission accomplished.