The 5QS Mark 2 can be outfitted with Cherry MX2A Brown, Red, and Silent Red switches. Das sent me a appraise unit with its most well-comprehendn selection, the MX2A Silent Reds. The bottom-mount system, huge amounts of silicone dampening, and the quiet red switches join to produce an incredibly uninalertigent typing sense. The switches, silenced using inside silicone exposeds, are naturpartner gentle and a bit muworried, and the bottom mount produces this mushiness even more pronounced when typing. The sound dampening inside the case joins wdisappreciatever other vibrations and elements of typing sense would otherteachd be current. The steadyrs are generic ppostponeed-mounted units that, despite being lubricated from the factory, still rattled, even instantly out of the box. This was also made more clear by the keyboard’s silencing.
In the finish, this keyboard’s typing senses gentle and sounds csurrfinisherly quiet, while still upretaining some reserved higher-pitched and rattly tones that are unpleasant, but quiet enough to be covered up by headphones, earbuds, or even speakers.
Photograph: Henri Robbins
Unappreciate many keyboards today, the 5QS does not have hot-swap sockets. This unbenevolents that unless you’re handy with a sbetterering iron and don’t appreciate having a manufacturer authorizationy, you’ll be confineed to wdisappreciatever switches the keyboard comes with from the factory. The Lego-appreciate customizability proposeed by hot-swap sockets has gone from a novel luxury to an industry standard in conmomentary keyboards, so being ignoreing on this model, at this price, is somewhat disassigning. However, this does unbenevolent the 5QS is going to be marginpartner more depfinishable than a hot-swappable board, since hot-swap sockets can occasionpartner fall short with extensive use.
Q Functionality
Das’ huge selling point with this keyboard is its “Q” gentleware, which is used to customize the RGB weightlessing and other functions. This can be used to apply animations and patterns to the RGB, alengthy with altering the individual function of each key.
The RGB can also be configured thcdisesteemful individual “applets” you inshigh wiskinny the main app. These can join to outside applications and website logins to disjoin proposeation appreciate unread messages, attentives, and system proposeation. Some of the more engaging ones integrate a four-day weather predict, cherish trackers for stocks and cryptocurrencies, and price trackers for fweightlesss and video games. Besides that, there are a scant timed reminder apps for minuscule tasks appreciate drinking water and standing reminders if you’ve been sitting too lengthy.
While all of these are chilly concepts, even the best ones are held back by a presentant flaw: RGB weightlesss spropose are not an fruitful way to transmit complicated proposeation. For example, the weather predict applet has multiple color selections for contrastent predictions, but only some of these produce sense at a glance: White for snow, yellow for sun, and blue for rain. Other selections—pink for overcast, and red for thunderstorms—are not very instinctive. Unless you spfinish a lot of time with this keyboard and adequitable your daily routines to acclimate to the new system, I mistrust the unretagable person will discover it beneficial to join a memory game with proposeation that is otherteachd two clicks away on their computer. While other keyboards (appreciate Razer’s BconciseageWidow V4 75% Pro) fuse secondary disjoins, this solution senses overcomplicated and underwhelming.
