Corsair K70 RGB TKL
Slick updates all around
TENKEYLESS KEYBOARDS— you’ll either love them or hate them. Or, if you’re like our other resident keyboard reviewer, Dave, you'll think they don’t go far enough, and want to chop off the top F keys, too. This reviewer, however, falls firmly in the former camp—namely, what’s wrong with a good old numpad? Well, ergonomics mainly.
TKL keyboards and their skinnier counterparts position you far better during long sessions at your desk, and it’s all to do with your mouse, bizarrely. Get rid of the numpad, and you shorten the length of the keyboard, meaning you naturally bring your mouse closer toward you. In an ideal world, you should be sitting with your hands shoulder-distance apart, one resting on the WASD keys, and the other placed on the mouse, somewhere near where a numpad traditionally sits—not sprawled out across your desk. This is, we’ve been told, better for your posture, although there doesn’t seem to be much research on this. But many a game developer has proclaimed their messed-up right shoulder as proof of this concept. And what’s to blame? The numpad.
You can probably see where this reviewer’s opinion lies on the matter. Yep, nothing but full-sized key-switchladen goodness for him. But, that said, we can’t ignore those who appreciate the slimmer side of keyboard life, so here we’re reviewing Corsair’s latest and great K70 RGB TKL, and there’s a lot to love about the plucky little underdog, too. Our sample comes in a linear Cherry MX Red SKU, but it is available in MX Speed and a Silent variant as well. For those not familiar with the smoothness of an MX Red, it’s very sensitive to the touch, requires minimal force to actuate, and has an actuation distance of 2.0mm (1.9mm for Silent, 1.2mm for Speed).
The K70 RGB TKL has also inherited a lot of traits from its big brother, the flagship K100 RGB, including the supernippy AXON processor, capable of up to 8,000Hz hyper-polling, aluminum frame, PBT double-shot keycaps, and general design cues, too. And you get the full suite of dedicated media keys, volume scroll wheel, and even a detachable USB Type C cable rounding it all out. Corsair’s also adjusted the font face to be a little less “gamery,” and there’s subtle visual cues here and there echoing the design language the company adopted in summer of last year. RGB backlighting is there, of course, on a per-key basis, but sadly still no Capellix LEDs just yet (still too expensive, we’ve been told, although we’ll keep harassing the PRs about it).
SOLID METAL GEAR
All around, it’s a solid piece of gear, with fantastic build quality, a super-slick aesthetic, and a feature set that’ll make anyone happy. It’s hard to criticize, and at $140, it’s not too expensive either, although it could be a touch cheaper.
Another nice touch is the update to Corsair’s iCUE software suite. We’re running a beta version to test out the K70 TKL, and it is glorious—a massive improvement over its predecessor. We’re talking a new UI, per-key assignments (both on a software and hardware level, the latter for when iCUE isn’t running), complete lighting customization, and performance and device settings, all in sensible, easy-to-understand locations. Corsair’s clearly spent some serious development time on making sure everything about it is easy to understand and useful, and it really does show. Dare we say it, it makes SteelSeries’s Engine software look a little basic.
The K70 RGB TKL is a fantastic little board, filled with enough tech to make your eyes bleed. In its MX Red configuration (our preferred switch of the three), it’s quiet, fast, and versatile enough that you’ll be more than content using it from your day job all the way to late-night gaming sessions. If we had one complaint, it’s the lack of Capellix LEDs, but that’s just nitpicking, and would no doubt bump the price up by $40. This is an exceptional product, and with the update to iCUE, if you can afford it, you won’t be disappointed.