Usually, I'm a professional fence-sitter. I prefer to posit arguments than state a direct opinion.
But that keyboard is an affront to the word "Stylish". It looks like a bad fisher-price toy in a colour that only an insect would love.
So many mechanical keyboards put function ahead of form. Put less charitably, they're ugly as sin. The Logitech Pop, a $100 wireless mechanical keyboard, tries to play both sides of the field. frontal shot of Logitech Pop Its design is reminiscent of an old-school typewriter, with rounded keycaps on thin pillars. To assuage …
Oh god, why did you do that to me?
The first looks like someone dropped their sherbet sweets, the second is the aforementioned flattened bumblebee, and that last colour scheme has so many different shades of red and pink it looks like someone cut into the guts of a horse.
Usually, I find Logitech quite a sane, functional brand. I can't think what possessed them to make this.
That's the weird thing. They make a song and dance about it being mechanical, typewriter-esque, which would usually appeal to dedicated keyboard nerds. The kind of people who usually have to use a keyboard a lot every day. Then they colour it in a manner that, as you say, would only appeal to a young teenager.
I can only think of one overlap on that particular Venn diagram, and it's labelled "annoying youtuber".
Spot on. First thing I thought when I saw the girl in the promotional image for the pink version (*) in particular (**) was that this looks more like it's being marketed at my 13-year-old niece than myself or your average El Reg reader. It's all very "Claire's Accessories".
Why you'd bother putting mechanical keys in something that doesn't look like it's intended for serious typing is, admittedly, a good question (emoji keys, FFS). Likely because mechanical keyboards are fashionable now (and a good excuse to charge more), even though a well-designed membrane mechanism would be more than good enough here.
Similarly, the apparently half-baked and contradictory nature of the "typewriter"-style mechanism and aesthetics make more sense in light of that youth-based target market, i.e. people born decades after real typewriters became obsolete. Kids detached enough from that era that the clash of retro/"real" and garishly "pop" aesthetics don't stand out or- more likely- just don't matter.
That would also explain the use of softer "Cherry MX Brown"-style key switches rather than clickier, more resistant "MX Blue" derivatives. I strongly suspect the target audience (most of whom will have never even used a typewriter) would like the idea of a typewriter-style keyboard rather than the literal reality of using one.
As you said, it's not aimed at us.
(*) The girl in the picture already looks pretty young, and that's on top of the marketers' understanding that kids generally prefer to see someone a bit (but not too much) more "aspirationally" grown-up than themselves.
(**) Here and here are the other pictures, which are somewhat similar in that respect.
You hit where page up and down would be and you get a laughing or crying emoji, although this keyboard is still useful as it offers conclusive proof of the decline of civilisation as we know it.
Another recommendation for a Keychron, in my case the K8.
Okay, I checked and you've reviewed keyboards before. So this isn't a one-off joke review, but a bad review of a joke.
If you meant to educate, couldn't you have included subject domain words like 'tactile' instead of your 'bump'? Trying to select a mechanical keyboard these days is so fraught with gushed over meaningless differences and glossed over realities, you don't need to add to that pain, entertaining us with 'charm', 'fun' and 'interesting'.
Same happened with one of ours; well, not a Maglite but a "heavily inspired by" (fairly decent one, it seems; quite expensive too replace now, anyway). I never quite got to the bottom of what ended up being dissolved after quite an interesting albeit fiddly disassembly but couldn't quite bring myself to chuck it out.
I asked the same the other month and it's a good question. By reducing the keyboard size you have more space for paper to design/take notes (or can work on a smaller desk). It also reduces the amount of arm movement (and hence arm strain) to access the mouse.
It led me down the rabbit-hole of trying vim. Being modal vim does very well without requiring nav keys. it ended with me installing an extension to chrome to navigate using vim keys without a mouse or dedicated nav keys. It was quite effective, though old habits die hard. It also got me to improve (after 30+ years of bad typing habits) my touch typing.
Serious answer, because it's not required or even desired functionality for a lot of keyboard users. I've never in my entire career done numerical data entry so a number pad is just a useless dust collector. I'd rather have the desk space for something else, that's all. Just personal preference for what you want to use a keyboard for. Someone with a 24-inch wide ocean-going monstrosity of a keyboard with every conceivable key on it is just as strange to me as my HHKB Pro2 is to their eye. I'm not prejudiced against yachts; I just prefer my little dinghy. So to speak.
Not really sure why you got a downvote for what strikes me as an uncontroversial explanation. :| Anyway, yeah, I can understand people who like huge keyboards (I mean there are still plenty who view the Space Cadet as their Holy Grail of Keyboards and a fair few mostly UK-types who feel the same way about the '70s-era ICL type with its plethora of editing keys; and having used IBM beam-spring keyboards myself back in the mists of time, a variety which might not have so many keys but makes up for it in size and weight somewhat like a VIC-20's bigger and meaner body-building cousin, I can see some of the attraction) and tiny ones such as the HH and even smaller, even though neither are quite for me and I'm most at home on a 80%/TKL. I suppose it'd be dull if everyone liked the same thing.
If you're doing something that involves a lot of entering numbers, then a number pad is an essential thing.
If you're not entering lots of numbers a lot of the time, then dispensing with the number pad saves a lot of space on your desk.
That said, while I don't enter a lot of numbers these days I still miss a number pad on my crappy wireless Mac keyboard. I also miss proper keyboards with proper keys - which this logitech ain't.
The problem with this particular keyboard seems to me that the keys aren't concave and there's no rake to the keyboard.
*sigh* - I still think the absolute pinnacle of keyboard design was the IBM Model M keyboard. I had one of those at work once and it was a pleasure to type on.
I prefer them without as I find the keypad just gets in the way. And I speak as someone who pretty much grew up with LK201 keyboards and liked them (i.e. the DEC things that heavily influenced the PS/2 layout and were a fair bit wider than even the generously-bezelled Model M) . Even more so with a mouse, and more so again as I'm a gamer and quite a clumsy one. It's not that I think the numpad is completely dispensible, I'd just like it to be of independent means. Though there are a handful of separate numpads available, they almost invariably get fairly bad reviews for something that's more expensive than I expect so to date I've gone without.
Current keyboard is a Durgod something-or-other; hadn't heard of them before but it was all I could find in the general layout I wanted with the right sort of switches (Cherry MX Reds: after an aeon of saying they would be awful it turns out I actually like them) and some heavier after-market keycaps. I'm surprised at how happy I am with it after having to be prized away from my Model M space-saver, but that was keeping my other half awake and she was perhaps understandably grumpy about my clattery overnight coding/gaming sessions!
It's not a PC or Mac keyboard, but this Lego project really got my attention.
It's amazing what people will do to generate content for YouTube.
Ugly and overpriced IMO, and (this is a purely personal preference) I much prefer Bluetooth over dongles for connectivity, having managed to lose or break more than one dongle over the years. Might not matter to someone less careless than me though.
Also don't really see the point of emoji keys over numbers, when (in Windows anyway) emojis are just Windows key + :
^^ To provide an explanation for the above, Windows and + turns on magnifier (Win and - to come back out of it).
I like Win and the arrow keys, which will dock the current window to the corresponding part of the screen. Useful for comparing two directories, or copying multiple things from one program to another.
Stylish? Emoji dedicated keys?
Good grief...
Learned "blind typing" 4 decades ago, time well spent and highly recommended, but however much I love/loved typewriters, there's no way I would ever go back to that "feel"...
Highly recommended for feel and fast typing is the Logitech's UltraX Premium. Greatest keyboard ever!
Always been a big fan of Logitech and haven't used anything else for decades. But this funny thing... I'm clearly not in the target group.
Greatest keyboard ever ...
Hmm ...
I've gone through a fair number of keyboards in the past 27/28 years.
The best* one by far was one of the first ones I ever used: the IBM Model 'M'.
Many years later I was able to get a used (ca. 1995) US made model for all of US$29.00.
Took it apart, cleaned it thoroughly, replaced a damaged spring and spliced in a PS2 to USB converter.
It has been working perfectly well ever since and will probably outlive me.
* runners up were a couple of second hand Wise WS kbs and, given the price/quality ratio, the worst one in every sense was a Sun Type 7.
O.
No I'm implying that of the cohort of consumers that search for something "cute and quirky" the vast, vast majority are women and that the venn diagram of those searching for something "cute and quirky" has very little overlap with "seasoned professionals who just want to get stuff done". There's plenty of seasoned professional women, they're just imho not the target market for a device like this. Nor is the vast majority of men.
Might be controversial, but I find the other colour schemes quite cute.
I I had the kind of money to frivolously spend on a novelty I might consider it, but what would stop me would be the sheer audacity of using a mechanical keyboard in a public place where I'd annoy everyone else - which is where I'd tend to use a portable keyboard.
The reviewer's preference for noisy keyboards is not shared by me.
I want a nice mechanical keyboard that people I'm talking to on video conference (for work) or on a game headset (for play) can't hear me using. I want a keyboard that doesn't scare my cats. I want a keyboard that doesn't get complaints from the neighbours.
Shame that the sound of the switches is the only appealing thing about this keyboard.
> I heartily recommend all commentards first open the link to the Logitech website to see the target market in an instant.
From my perspective - knowing people in the target market, the cluttered keycaps needed to support both Mac and PC keycaps does seem to go against the design aesthetics. Also the keycaps - bog-standard capitals...
I'll stick to my Bakker-Elkhuizen compact without numeric keypad thanks. >29 years of hammering on a variety of keyboards with everything from DIN connectors to USB, plus mice, trackballs and trackpads, have contributed to the delicious pains in my thumbs, fingers and wrists, and the tennis elbow that put an end to all of the latter devices.
None of my keyboards looked like this kiddieboard. Shouldn't there be an accessory baby's dummy on a gooseneck?
Numeric keypads are available as additional items for anyone (ow, yes, even phone screens hurt eventually) desperate for that data entry pathway to RSI.
Logitech used to be good, better than the competition. Now? (steps away, shaking head).
I've just recently sprung for a Corsair K70 at home with Cherry MX Brown keyswitches, since the latest work-provided Logitech was tragically awful. When I'm working at speed, I really wouldn't want anything louder than the existing snare-drum-roll volumes, so I'm not sure what the appeal is of the Blue keyswitches *designed* to be more noisy. Just on a plain old membrane keyboard, I actually had a coworker throw a strop and refuse to sit near me because I was, quote, "typing too loud". I used an AT keyboard for a while which I salvaged from a recycling bin, but the noise from that was always something to put up with rather than a positive benefit.
A tactile response on your fingers, sure - I'm well into that. But a louder audible click? If you need to listen for the click before you know you've pressed a key, you aren't a good enough typist to recognise a difference between a Cherry MX anything and an Amazon Basics knock-off of a ZX Spectrum keyboard.