GMMK Pro: The ultimate guide (in-depth review + modding tutorial)

since the custom mechanical keyboards hobby started to gain more and more mainstream followers in the last three to five years we all knew that at some point larger players in the pc peripherals industry would eventually pay attention and try to capitalize on this trend and while industry giants such as logitech corsair steel series razer and others dip their toes into higher quality mechanical keyboards in the last few years with slightly better construction smaller form factors smoother and more modern switch designs and better keycaps none of these had the courage or the foresight to actually jump in headfirst and try to offer a product that could actually make keyboard enthusiasts pay attention but then none of those big players could either predict the meteoric arrival of an industry newcomer that while almost unheard of until 2018 would eventually take the market by storm later on with the 2019 debut of their lightweight gamey mouse the glorious model o and after hitting them with that hook glorious hard balls kept on coming at a breakneck pace and all the while flashing their irreverent branding spawned out of internet memes and its gorilla tongue-in-cheek marketing antics but then after leaving their mark on the my segment with over 1 million model olds and model ds sold worldwide gloria stroke again last november with yet another curve ball no one saw coming the announcement of their enthusiast gm mmk pro hot swappable mechanical keyboard while not their first foray into mechanical keyboards that would in fact be their original gm mk release all the way back in 2016 which was the first widely available mechanical keyboard with hot swappable switch sockets the gm mk pro was designed to achieve a much more ambitious go this time they wanted to kick the doors into the booming enthusiast custom mechanical keyboard scene with a product that checked all the right boxes for the features these enthusiasts were looking for while drastically undercutting the pricey and luxurious small production designer boards that had been proliferating on geek hacks group buys and today we are grinding this keyboard io sam style to see if after all the hype glorious is indeed delivering the goods with their 170 gm mk pro as we do things around here we're not only going to give you a honest review of the product out of the box but we'll also dig deeper to see what kinds of simple and inexpensive changes you can make to this keyboard to improve it even further without having to buy any of the additional overpriced accessories from glorious so without further ado let's get this thing rolling hello and welcome to iosam my name is sam franco and this is a channel where i do tech reviews and show you how to build fix and mod all sorts of computer gear today we are reviewing the gm mk pro from glorious pc gaming race and yes i know we all have been bombarded by a blitzkrieg of launch day reviews and first impression videos already but as those who have been around this channel before already know we do things a little different here so if you're new to the channel first welcome and second while i don't put out too many videos per month when i do i try to do my homework and go beyond just giving quick impressions ratings and recommendations i always take upon myself the task to not only show products pros and cons but also to help you improve their shortcomings if at all possible and always without spending too much money at that and today's video is no different first we'll do a thorough review of the stock gm mk pro that i have used for a full month of daily use then we'll move on to some suggested mods that you can do on your own to fix some of its problems one thing i made sure to do here was to not buy any of gloria's dozens of accessories they try to push when you order this keyboard i wanted to give you a super in-depth review of specifically what comes in the gm mk pro box and then show you how you can make it better without having to purchase extra plates knobs or tools from glorious while i think the actual keyboard is fairly priced for what you get i'd say a lot of the accessories glorious offers to go along with this board are a bit overpriced of course i had to use switches and keycaps on my own since this keyboard does not come with those in the box so that obviously does not apply to these and for those i use switches and keycaps from other suppliers which i'll detail later in the video as usual i'll break everything into chapters with progress bars in the bottom and top of the screen to help you navigate my long-form videos in case you want to jump to any specific chapter and as a disclaimer while i do have an affiliate program relationship with glorious they did not send me this keyboard for review and i bought this gm mk pro with my own money but regardless of how i obtain products for this channel you should know that the scripts for my videos are always my own and you can trust that my views and opinions about all products showed here are 100 percent mine always derived out of my own experience using the products for at least a few weeks if not months and with no inputs or influence from manufacturers resellers or their marketing teams as i mentioned before i do have affiliate links for everything i show in this video and if you buy anything out of those links i might get a small commission without any additional cost to you but that of course does not play any role on the context or the content of the video i do this video solely out of passion for technology and while this channel is 100 a hobby it is one that i take very seriously the gm mk pro is an all-aluminium constructed keyboard that comes pre-assembled with case plate pcb stabilizers and damping phone it is designed to be ready for you to just install your favorite switches and keycaps and be done with it it has a 75 layout meaning it keeps almost all the same keys you would have on a tko board but on a smaller footprint with exploded navigation arrow keys function rope and a volume knob that also functions as a mute key it has a gasket mounting system for its plate in pcb which you can think of either as a shock absorption system that eliminates vibrations and noise or as a suspension mechanism that supposedly improves the typing view and sound of the board it has hot swappable switch sockets meaning you can use any mx style switches in it and replace them without having to solder anything which is one of this keyboard's main selling points it has south facing per key rgb illumination as well as some accent side lights it also offers software programmability through its own glorious core application as well as qmk compatibility for those brave souls out there who would like to completely reprogram the layout and layers of this keyboard through firmware flash while glorious has advertised this board as via compatible such compatibility has not happened yet when the script was written it sells for 170 with free shipping in the us when you buy it directly from gloria's own website which is where i obtained my copy after paying a 70 reservation fee in november of 2020 and then paying the remaining 100 in march of 2021 and receiving the product on the following april glorious promises that once the initial reservations are fulfilled they will keep this keyboard constantly in stock going forward which should happen at some point before the second half of 2021. the keyboard comes well packed with some basic accessories and sports a two years limited warranty while the focus of this video is the actual product and not necessarily the company behind it i think it's worth spending a few minutes here to cover the topic of glorious as a company and its practices as well since i know a lot of people out there have strong opinions about these things and might even have stronger ones about glorious as a player in the pc peripherals industry in general and in the mechanical keyboard segment in particular besides i think this will also give a better context to understand why this product is what it is but if you're not one of those and you don't care about the company behind the product or any of the drama they've been involved with in the past sure feel free to skip this chapter all together and go straight to the next one where i cover the gmmk pro options and accessories glorious is a relatively young pc gaming peripheral brand established in 2014 out of dallas texas by their own words glorious is a lifestyle gaming hardware company built by passionate enthusiasts on a mission to change the status quo of an industry that they think is in dire need of a shakeup they want to help enthusiasts and professional gamers ascend their battle station with the best quality gear possible and reasonable prices that sounds like a good photo for a pc peripherals company as far as i'm concerned and i guess we can all agree that they have been really taking seriously the part about changing the status quo of the industry they started selling mouse pads and keyboard wrist rests but then moved quickly to actual peripherals like keyboards such as the original gm mk that i used as the basis for my first project video on this channel in september of 2020 which you can check here and their popular gaming mice with their line of models o o minus or wireless d and d minus their products have for the most part being well received by the market at large considering how many gaming mice they were able to sell so far they seem to have been executing very much in line to their company goals by releasing innovative products for very aggressive prices as for the quality of their products i know lots of people who had good experiences with them myself included but also some very loud few who swear they'll never buy anything from them again but since this tends to be the same story for pretty much any brand of almost any type of product out there i'd say glorious is not a standout in this regard in my own experience here i have been pretty happy with my glorious products purchases overall i now own two glorious keyboards three mice and one wrist rest and they all performed according to my expectations for the most part certainly not perfect but again within my expectations for what i paid for the products and these are the keywords here expectations for the price take their most recent mouse release for example the model o wireless while not a 100 perfect product by any stretch it has been by far the best value in a gaming wireless mouse i ever bought for a very competitive 80 us dollars which is far more accessible than what the big boys such as razer logitech steel sears and others had been charging for their equivalent products so far while their first versions of the model o had issues with their cable and packaging glorious did a good job in listening to their customers and fixing those issues and subsequent versions of their products as well as trying their best as the small company they are if compared to other competitors to offer a decent customer service experience at least here in the us and the impact has been felt across the industry razer in particular has been gradually cutting its own gaming mice prices as what i can only imagine to be a response to glorious and other smaller and similarly aggressive gaming peripherals brands that have popped up in the scene in the last few years same thing can be said about their first four into mechanical keyboard switches with their glorious bandit not the best tactile switch ever made but a damn good one for the price that is always in stock you can check my own video review and comparison of invert yoke and glorious pandas on the link i'll leave in the description below and on the card up here and while glorious is no stranger to keyboards since their original gmmk hot-swappable board was released all the way back in 2016 they now decided to gun for a different spot on the market you see when they released the original gmk they were basically aiming for the gaming market but also with a keen eye on the burgeoning enthusiast mechanical keyboard scene that was starting to break into the mainstream at the time but while the original jmk was very much a value oriented product trying to innovate its way to the top with an aluminium plate hot swappable sockets multiple layouts and sizes in a removable cable the gm mk pro is a much more ambitious project very much designed to appeal specifically to a much more demanding and lucrative segment of the market the aspiring mechanical keyboard enthusiasts out there you know who you are and if the number of new youtubers covering mechanical keyboards of all types is any indication of how much this industry has grown and how much more growth potential it still has i take lawyers is right on the money here once again now i know that their talking cheek branding and marketing style originated from a gamer's meme no less is not everyone's cup of tea as a company who spends pretty much no money with traditional advertising or sponsorships their use of social media and influencers have roughened some feathers out there for sure but hey this is a classic case of don't hate the player hate the game right this is a cutthroat competitive market and if they had any hope to compete with behemoths such as logitech and razer they had to resort to guerrilla marketing i don't think they had any other choice in my particular case i honestly don't care about marketing as the value-oriented consumer i am as long as their products fulfill my expectations of quality and features for a fair price i'm more than happy to overlook marketing gimmicks and the last thing to cover in this chapter is the fact that gloria's can certainly be accused of over promising and under delivery in some areas and that is another thing that has roughened some feathers as well and while they are not the first ones to do it and will certainly not be the last they and any other company who does this should be called out for these instances and they surely have been by many reviewers out there and will be in this video as well the gym mk pro comes in two flavors black slate which is the one i have here and white ice which as you certainly heard by now is actually silver just silver the color also applies to the included plate pcb and cable which are black on the black slate version and silver plate and white pcb and cable for the white ice version now where glories really went overboard here is on the mind-numbing amount of accessories they'll try to push on you when you order this keyboard and as i said before i didn't buy any of those i mean there's nothing particularly wrong with their choices of switches they're fairly priced new pbt keycaps options or any of the dozens of other accessories but as an enthusiast i wanted to evaluate the gm mk pro on its own merits for its asking price of 170 but if you want to go crazy with plates made with different materials fancy keycap and switch pullers openers lubricants as well as lubing brushes and stations coiled cables pbt keycaps switches cleaning kits toys and more glorious definitely has you covered here in the box you get the keyboard properly packed and some tough foam to protect this heavy boy as well as some basic plastic keycap puller that is worse than the wire one i got on my 85 echo board a pretty much unusable switch puller two cards with some basic instructions about where to get support firmware upgrade and warranty and a standard cable black in my case which i immediately proceeded to mod on my own to make it a golden coil cable with some yellow tech flex i had laying around come on don't judge me and no dust cover included but at least they were nice enough to include some extra gaskets in case you want to mod the board's blade mounting which as we'll see later on in the video will come really handy props to glorious for being mod friendly here if you want an in-depth menu for the product you have to get it from gloria's website which is fine i guess most people don't care about reading the freaking menu anyway right and the other thing you have to download from their website is their app the glorious core you need it to do the first firmware upgrade that is designed to fix some issues the keyboard already has right out of the box as well as to remap keys and control the backlighting while the software is a bit basic in what it allows you to do it at least covers all the bases and it is miles better than the one glorious had for the original gm mk but we'll get to more details on that later in the video the 75 layout of the gm mk pro is of the exploded variety that was a clear attempt by glorious to follow the trend from custom luxury boards such as canon keys satisfaction 75 the gox 7v or the txhj75 which all helped making the exploded layout popular in the last year or so traditional 75 keyboards usually have a very dense layout with no empty space between clusters which is great to save space but can be an issue to some people for being too cramped and difficult to locate keys without looking down at the keyboard while i like the traditional 75 layout specifically for their space-saving qualities i have to admit that the exploded variation is indeed easier to use so it is totally worth trade-off taking a bit more space for better usability the build quality of the gm mk pro is one of the high points of this board in my opinion it is overall a very solid build keyboard the case and the plate are anodized aluminium with mostly thick walls especially on the bottom half of the case with the exception of the side walls of the top frame that are on the thin side and can even bend if you push them the anodization process here at least in my copy is clean with a bit grainy and free of any visible blemishes my only gripe here is how much of a fingerprint magnet this thing is on my black collar which i suspect it won't be as bad if you get the silver one i'm sure you can find some minor marks here or there if you really look for it but for this price point i don't think you can get anything better than this really and i'm also sure you can get higher quality anodized aluminum out there for more money but i'm definitely not complaining about the gm mk pro in this regard this is on a completely different league when compared to plastic production and entry-level custom boards which is what this will compete with to a certain extent the aluminium parts of this keyboard seem to have been cast and stamped instead of c and c milled and while metal cast or stamped parts might not have the same precise and sharp cuts as milled ones it is still great to have an all metal construction like this nonetheless a metal cast case is for sure cheaper and quicker to manufacture in scale than a milled one so it makes total sense for a product that is certainly being made by the thousands such as this one as already mentioned this keyboard comes with pre-installed gaskets on the bottom case and on the top frame the material used seems to be poron and it has the right resistance and flexibility for this application but looking at some of the bottom gaskets you can already see how tight the whole assembly really is which is something we'll look into in more details later on in the video the top frame also has additional bumpers on the perimeter to help guide the positioning of the plate which provides a solid fit with no horizontal wiggle which is perfect they used four different types of screws to hold the two halves of the case together to attach the plate to the pcb on the perimeter for the standoffs in the middle and to secure the light diffusers on the sides at least in my copy they all have withstand the abuse of the half a dozen times i have opened this keyboard for all different experiments i did here the foam included as sound dampers are of good density and come pre-installed so if you're buying this keyboard to just install switches and keycaps and move on you'll never see them but they are there and have good quality the pcb is well laid out seems to have decently thick layers and use glorious own branded hot swap sockets the rotary knob has worked fine for a month but is one area of concern for long-term durability since it is one of those moving parts with a much greater chance of failure alongside the hot swap sockets than the rest of the solid state components used here the actual knob has what seems to be a plastic fitting inside which is another potential failure point but it uses a standard shape and size and will be super easy to replace so no big deal here overall all the parts and their fittings are a very good quality again for a larger scale production keyboard with a 170 dollars price tag while there are some questionable design choices made by lawyers in the way they designed the gasket mounting system or the side accent lights here we can at least commend them for striving for using quality materials that are meant to last the keyboard measures 33 centimeters in width 13.5 centimeters in depth 2.1 centimeters in the front side and 3.4 centimeters in height on the back side since it doesn't offer adjustable height you get a 5 degrees typing angle when measured on top of the third row of the keycaps which at least for my typing style is fairly comfortable to use at any rate i always use a wrist rest for high profile keyboards like this here i'm using gloria's own wood tkl sized wrist rest in their onyx collar which i had already purchased from drop surplus website jumbo's closet in early 2020. the board weights 1.7 kilograms or 3 pounds and 12 ounces with switches and abs cherry profile keycaps already installed needless to say this thing is heavy enough to not budge on your desk no matter what you do while looks are subjective i'd say glorious plate safe here with this design there's nothing in this keyboard that screams gamer for example and the black or silver colors are not offensive and will go well with keycaps of any profile or color schemes the glorious branding indented on the bottom is huge but then again is on the bottom so no points taken for this since i'm not the type who cares too much about what is displayed on the bottom of a keyboard it is basically straight lines and sharp angles everywhere which i'm always happy with they also follow the high profile trend of the custom keyboards community which is nice although it would have been better if they had made the sidewalls a couple of millimeters higher to completely hide the switches but to me at least that is a minor gripe the other thing they could have made better is the side accent lights even on their maximum brightness they don't cast any glow on my desk and i'm of the opinion that if you go through the trouble of adding a light bar on the side of the keyboard you might as well allow me to dial it up until i can see a glow right while i don't think these side lights are ugly i think they don't add anything to the design with the way they were implemented here now i obviously can't say if an exploded 75 layout with a knob is the kind of thing that will be visually appealing to everyone i've seen all sorts of opinions on the matter from this thing looks amazing all the way to this thing looks hideous so my aesthetics i love the way it looks especially when i put black and white spherical keycaps on it the usb-c port is on the center which i do like and recessed enough to hide the metal part of the usb-c prong from sight it is housed on a daughter board screwed to the bottom case and connected to the pcb via jst connector which has its own cable channel nice touch although it is slightly inclined upward and not parallel to the desk which can make it a bit tricky to connect the cable when you're not looking directly at the port the gm mk pro already comes damped with both a case foam installed in the bottom and a plate foam to close the gap with the pcb this one came glued to the plate and i didn't remove it as i mentioned before this is fairly dense open cell foam and it really does a good job of muting this keyboard as you hear on the typing test later you might not like the tone of this keyboard sound but you can't deny that these pieces of foam do a good job to lower the noise levels of this board and basically kill any ping noise from the switches now one piece of criticism i heard from other reviewers about the foam used here is that they reduce the range of motion and the flexibility of an already tightly squeezed blade which while true to some extent might not necessarily be a problem to everybody as we'll discuss in a minute i think this keyboard sound damping should work fine for the majority of people who buy this keyboard and only those who like a slightly louder type and experience will bother to remove one or both pieces of phone if you pick this board to use in an open office environment or any type of shared room the stock configuration with some decent linear or tactile switches should work really well to ensure you don't annoy the people working close to you in my case i ended up replacing the case foam for a sheet of thin silicone as i'll explain later on the modding chapter but honestly i wouldn't have any problem using this keyboard with the stock case foam if i had to the plate of the gmmk pro is sandwiched between the bottom case and the top frame but isolated with foam gaskets and if you have been anywhere near the custom mechanical keyboard seen in the last couple of years you know that gasket mounted plate keyboards have been all the rage amongst enthusiasts to a point where the vast majority of custom designed keyboards sold through group buys in the last year or so had this type of plate mounting mechanism inside in most industrial applications anytime you use elastomeric gaskets meaning gaskets that are made of soft elastomer materials they're usually applied to reduce friction and vibration between solid parts especially metals or to seal against gases or liquids and while i'm fairly confident that the first uses of gaskets on keyboard's blades had the implicit go of reducing vibration between metal parts and thus reducing unpleasant friction and rattling noises with time it seems that this type of design acquired a new purpose rather intentionally or not plate and pcb flexing and this particular meaning of the gasket used in keyboards kind of took a life of its own so today whenever you mention gasket mounting to keyboard enthusiasts out there i'd say the vast majority of them will immediately think of a shock absorption mechanism not unlike the suspension between a car's wheels and its chassis for example and thus they expect a keyboard that has a soft and bouncy typing view now i'm not going to get into the mine field that would be to argue if this is a correct or incorrect interpretation of the role of gaskets on keyboards i'm not touching that one with a 10 foot pole but i'll just say that outside of softening the plate for your fingers gaskets also are very good to absorb the energy coming from them when you type and thus reducing the friction between the plate and the keyboard case which are both metal in the case of the gm mk probe and the immediate result of this is the complete absence of friction and a severe reduction in resonance that usually causes rattling and pinging noises when you type in other words the gasket mounting system of the gm mk pro in conjunction with the included damping foam sheets work very well to tame the acoustics of the board at least in that regard the gasket mounting system here does work very well and this is an area where this keyboard really excels at overall noise levels which of course are also a factor of the type of switch and keycaps you use but under normal circumstances say using lube linear or tactile switches this keyboard will be quieter than most now having low noise levels and sounding good are of course two very different things and i'll leave it up to you to decide if this keyboard sounds good or not after you hear the typing sound test later on in the video but at least i can say that even if you don't intend this keyboard to be a silent keyboard with damped switches for example this board will still be far less noisy than most other production keyboards you can buy out there and again it is up to each one of you to decide if this is something you want or not i know that a lot of keyboard enthusiasts out there actually want and like louder keyboards as long as the noise follows a certain pattern that they appreciate and for those enthusiasts they might find the gem mk pro to be too muted what about the plate in pcb flex you might ask well that is the part where glorious didn't necessarily get right here because there isn't enough space between the top frame and the bottom part of the case the gaskets here don't have a lot of room to flex and that compounded by the fact that the plate and the pcb are attached by no less than 12 screws on the perimeter and two more in the center with the standoffs between them this means the gmmk pro has almost no plate flex to speak of and while this shouldn't be a problem to most people out there it might be a problem to some keyboard enthusiasts depending on their expectations derived from the use of gaskets here if you expect a super bouncy typing feel you're not going to get it with the gmk pro out of the box with its stock aluminium plate but there are ways to work around this issue of course for one whenever you use switches with heavier springs for example you are already maybe unintentionally diminishing the importance of super flexible plate since the switch's springs themselves will already cushion your typing force to some extent if that's not enough for you then you can opt to buy a glorious optional polycarbonate plate which should give a bit more flexibility since plastic is obviously softer than aluminium but not by much since the plate will still be tightly sandwiched between the parts of the case the same way in this design and thirdly there is a very simple mod you can do using rubber o-rings that can reduce the pressure from the two halves of the case against the plate and we'll give it a bit more room to flex but we'll get to that in a minute at any rate to close this very long play chapter we can say that the gm mk pro does benefit acoustically from having gaskets between the plate and the two halves of the case in the sense that it eliminates vibrations and thus reduces unpleasant noises but the gaskets here do not offer a softer typing feel out of the box than what you'd get on a top mount or sandwich mount keyboard for example now moving on to the stock stabs included with the gm mk pro remember when i mentioned earlier in the video that there were some cases where glorious had over promised and under delivered well this is one of those and here's where glorious tonkin cheat marketing backfired they decided to call their new stabilizers the goat stabilizers greatest of all time used to refer to or describe the person who has performed better than anyone else ever nah nope not even close now don't get me wrong these are not the worst stabs i've ever used but they are definitely not the best that's for sure when marketing something one has to know how to set expectations they are pcb screw mounted which is great and they come generously lubed and sounded pretty okay for the smaller stabilized keys the issue though was the space bar which while not super radley or loud still had a bit of a tick noise in its right side that was basically impossible to get rid of with luke the pcb as mentioned before is attached to the plate with 12 screws on the perimeter and two in the center through little metal standoffs it has smd leds for per key elimination plus two rows of eight additional leds on each side to illuminate the two side accent lights the perky illumination will work well with the included aluminium plate if you use translucent switches such as the get around ink yellows i'm showing here but if you go with opaque or worse opaque switches with no opening for smd leds at the bottom such as the alpacas and the sp stars i tested with then you basically get no light under the switches whatsoever and that would be a case where the polycarb plate could be a good option for you if you care about having rgb glow under the switches and i say glow because that is the best you're going to get here since this keyboard has south facing switches which means you're not going to find keycaps with translucent legends at the bottom the best you'll be able to do here would be with putting style caps but then good luck finding one that has a 1.75 units right shift key you need for this layout this loop pudding v2 double shot pbt set i got from drop does come with one but the majority of the pudding sets on amazon do not as for the south facing orientation of the switches this is something enthusiasts usually praise since some switches when paired with some cherry profile keycaps can interfere with each other in some roles and create supposedly unpleasant noises and while the chances of that being a real problem for most users is slim at best glorious decided to go with self-facing switches to please enthusiasts at the expense of most gamers that would prefer north facing switches for better backlit keycap compatibility which is a clear indication of which audience lawyers was planning to target here the hot swappable sockets are unlike the original jmk finally compatible with five pin switches so no more clipping switches here these are glorious branded but they don't look very different from the kale and gatorade ones we're used to see on other boards it also has a rotary encoder which was clearly manually soldered in giving the large amount of solder in the joints and the excess flux residue left on the board the controller here is an st electronics arm 32 bits chip which as mentioned before is qmk compatible the gm mk pro is the second glorious peripheral to be compatible with their new glorious core application which is designed to be a hub for all their future products and while this program is certainly a step up from the one used with the original gmk it is still a bit limited in the ways you can customize the rgb lights and remap keys you still get the basics though you can create export and import profiles with all your macros remap keys and lighting schemes and you have three layers that you can customize with those which is nice on the negative side you cannot change layers with temporary key presses such as accessing a secondary set of functions only while holding a function key for example and you cannot change the rotary encoder function which is permanently set to adjust the audio volume in windows but at least you can't change the function of pressing it down which is set as the mute key by default at any rate lawyers has promised to address all of these issues in future versions of the software to record macros you click on key binding and then on the right side column you click on macro then you type in a name for your new macro click on the record button start record type your key presses sequence then click on stop record adjust the timing of each key press if needed and save once that is done just select the layer and the key you want to assign the macro to pick the newly created macro from the drop down menu and then click on save again and you're done the process to assign any of the predefined functions such as other keyboard and mouse functions multimedia urls or browser commands and others to any key or any layer is basically the same for configuring the rgb backlighting you click on lighting and then on the right side column you can choose either a predefined preset or create your own per key scheme for predefined presets you can set specific parameters such as colors brightness and rate which is the speed of the animations and for per key schemes you can either select individual keys or one of the predefined groups of keys on the bottom such as wasd numbers afro mods arrows and side lights and then their color and brightness here you don't have any of these sophisticated rgb programming capabilities such as stacking layers or painting and drawing twos that can be infinitely tinkered with such as those you have on razer's synapse for example but for simple color schemes which is what most people need anyway laura's got you covered glorious advertised the gmk pro as compatible with qmk and via but as of the time when this video is being produced only qmk compatibility exists which given the complexity and risks involved in reprogramming and flashing keyboards firmwares with q and k most people will probably stay clear of it as for via while it is super easy and intuitive way to reprogram compatible keyboards without the need to flash the firmware the gm mk pro is currently pending via compatibility completion but no one knows for sure when it will happen unlike umk the via framework is not open source and to be granted compatibility on it a keyboard's pcb designer or manufacturer needs to go through the approval process of vs creators and moderators so my advice is that you should not buy the gmk pro with the expectation that you will be able to use it with via even if the vr project overlords decide to grant compatibility for the gmk pro that process can still take a very long time before i can discuss my proposed modifications to the gmnk pro let's first take a listen to it in its talk form for this first test i equipped the gm mk pro with stock alpaca switches from prime keyboards which are jwk switches that already come pre-lubed from the factory these have polycarbonate top housing nylon bottoms and palm stamps for the keycaps i used drops artifact bloom series which is a pbt set with cherry profile on the black on white color scheme you you while the gmmk pro in its stock config doesn't sound bad at all i decided to make a few experiments here to see if i could improve both the sound and also to increase the flexibility of the plate and pcb arrangement here since i know a lot of you out there will probably want to see that as usual the idea in all the mods i show in this channel is to give some easy to moderate difficulty options to folks depending on how much they're willing to tinker with the board it just so happens that the solution i found to all problems with the gm mk pro were actually on the easy side alright first let's open this bad boy up for that i'll be using what has become the number one two among keyboard enthusiasts everywhere i look the wow stick and yes while banggood provided this one to me i have to admit this thing is every bit as good and useful as advertised it comes with all the bits and accessories you need to open not only keyboards but basically any other type of gadgets highly recommended to open up the gmmk pro first you have to remove eight screws in the bottom remove the top frame and then unplug the cable connecting the pcb to the usb-c daughter board [Music] here the first thing i tried was to replace the bottom foam with a thinner 1.5 millimeters sheet of silicone baking mat the idea here is to test the impact of a different material on the sound and to give a bit more room under the pcb for the other mod we'll do later that will increase the flexibility of the plate what i did here was to use the included foam as a stencil to cut my own sheet of silicon in terms of softness the silicone sheet is way more dense than the included foam so even though it is thinner than it it might actually have a bigger impact in the way this keyboard sounds as already mentioned before the included stabs are not bad i'd say they're better than 90 of production keyboards out there so if you're coming from a big box store keyboard you probably will be very happy with the stock steps but since i operate more on the enthusiast side here i actually tried to fix the tick noise from the right side of the space bar i tried band-aiding the stabs adding more lube and even tried a fairly sophisticated hit shrink mods suggested by the folks at ramaworks but not even those were able to completely fix the annoying tick since i didn't want to go through the trouble of cleaning all the lube masks from these steps to try a holy mod i just replaced them with some c3 equal stabs i got from the key dot company which are usually very good as other reviewers have noted as well the gmk pro plates have very tight cutouts for pcb steps so not all brands of aftermarket stabs will fit without some filing of the plate it seems they did this to allow you to also use plate mounted stabs if you choose to which while not recommended is at least an option here you can see that a gmk pcb screw-in stab housing doesn't fit without applying enough force to jam it in the cutout luckily though c3 stabs fit perfectly since they seem to be smaller than gmk and durock steps since i had band-aided the pcb area under the stabs housing already here i just lubed the stems and the wire with my usual mix of crytox 205 grade 2 grease and 105 oil and then dunked the tips of the wires on permatex dielectric grease no need to clip these steps since they already come pre-clipped as i explained in the play chapter while the stock configuration already offers pretty decent acoustics i wanted to test a few modification options here to see if there was any way i could increase the plate flexibility for those who want more flex in their gym mk pros the first thing i notice here is that the gaskets on the top frame are so recessed that they basically have no range of motion so i proceeded to add a few more strips of gasket that were thankfully already included in the box on the top side of the plate where they'll touch the pre-applied gaskets installed on the top frame then i tried a few suggestions i've seen from other reviewers out there first i checked to see if just replacing the thick included bottom foam for a thinner silicone sheet would make a difference in terms of flex it didn't while the pcb could use more space in the bottom unless we somehow loosen up the plate having more space under the pcb doesn't solve the problem by itself second i tried removing the middle screws attaching the plate and pcb on the perimeter honestly the difference was negligible then i tried removing the two standoffs between the plate and pcb but immediately run into the issue of having switches popping off the blade too easily so it seems there is a clear reason for these standoffs to be there on a hot swap keyboard with this design then i tried removing the light diffusers between the plate and the pcb on the sides to see if that would increase the range of motion at least a little bit on the extreme sides of the board nope while we made the lightly for dimmer it didn't help anything with the plate flex as a result of all these experiments i figured that removing the phone between the plate and the pcb would probably make no difference in the flex issue as well while potentially making the board louder so i decided not to mess with it since again i don't have a problem with the way this keyboard sounds with the foam and my only goal here is to find a way to increase the plate flexibility after all that i finally realized that the problem here is not necessarily the number of attachment points between the plate and pcb nor the softness of the material used in the gaskets or even in the plate itself the issue seems to be primarily how tight the plate is sandwiched between the two halves of the case so i decided to adapt my favorite mod for tray mounted keyboards which is to use small six millimeter rubber o-rings on top of the screw posts but instead put them between the top frame and the bottom half of the case here where the eight screws attach them together the idea here is to reduce the excessive pressure between the two halves of the case to the plate gaskets by giving an extra two millimeters of space or more like one millimeter after you compress the o-rings from the soft rubber material that the o-rings are made of while increasing the space between the two halves of the case will compromise the aesthetics of the keyboard to some extent since you now have a one millimeter gap in the seams between them i figured this would be a worthwhile trade-off for anyone who wants a more flexible plate assembly besides at least in the black version of this keyboard you can barely see that gap anyway you certainly won't be looking at it from the top when you're using this keyboard that's for sure and well did it work i'd say yes with the extra millimeter or two provided by the o-rings the plate has way more room to flex which you can clearly see and feel when pressing on the plate or on the keycaps on the finished board now for a light typist like myself who doesn't bottom out hard on linear switches and sometimes doesn't bottom out at all on tactiles the difference in feel is not particularly noticeable but in sound i think it is which you'll be able to hear in the next typing tests so here's what the final modded board looks like for the next few tests six additional gasket strips added to the top of the plate where they touch the top frame of the case 1.5 millimeter silicone sheet instead of the included bottom foam lubed and band-aided c3 equals stabs instead of the included glorious stock ones eight six by two millimeter rubber o-rings between the bottom half and the top frame of the case and a modded cable where i used the usb cable included in the box as the basis to mod it i first cut off the usb-a plug slipped it with some yellow tech flex coiled it with a zap cable's aluminium coiling rod and collars soldered a gx 16 aviator male plug to the end and heat shrunk everything with some black and yellow heat shrink tubing for the sound tests i also added two additional configurations of switches and keycaps to see if they would change the sound and typing field the first configuration was the same one i used for the stock test 62 gram stock alpacas from prime keyboards for 54.44 cents with drops artifact bloom series with cherry profile and pbt on a black and white color for 50 both had shipping and taxes already included the second configuration was with 67 grams sp star purple tactile switches i got from aliexpress for 51.15 for a bag with 100 units these were lightly lubed with my 50 50 mix of crytox 205 grade 2 grease and 105 oil and they feel great on the modern gm mk pro these have nylon housing and palm stamps and have a huge rounded bump that is very reminiscent of a cherry ergo clear but smoother really nice tactile switch these were paired with this gorgeous abs gmk kaiju set on cherry profile i got from drop for 150 dollars in january of 2021. gmk sets are crazy expensive and i rarely buy them but this mix of green orange and light cream colors with hiragana japanese sub legends were just too nice to pass on especially considering that i got it without having to go through a painful year-long group buy to get them both switches in keycaps prices already included shipping and taxes as well and the third and final configuration was with 67 grams getter on ink yellow linear switches also looped with the same krytox mix while gatron does not disclose the materials used in the switch the housing seems to be polycarbonate and the stem probably a proprietary blend of palm with other types of plastics these i had to lube with a slightly thicker coating on the stems compared to how i looped the sp stars to try to match the same level of smoothness i got from the sp stars and the factory lubed alpacas here i paired the inks with drops high profile mt3 white on black abs set that they always have it in stock for 110 dollars again on the pricey side but this is my favorite high profile sculpted keycaps shape like sa these are also spherical but they are deeper with a slightly larger surface area that makes them easier to type on i have to say i really like this caps profile and as you hear later they sound really nice and deep with the inks on the gmk pro and final note no switches were spring swapped nor filmed for this comparison just lubed [Music] [Music] and now take a listen to the sound test of the modded gm mk pro with all the aforementioned modifications you you you you you to my surprise the modded board with the same alpaca switches in pbt keycaps sounds considerably different than the stock one the sound is cleaner with a bit less resonance while they seem to have a crisper pop on the bottom out they are not perceivably louder than on the stock configuration the sound is still very much muted and well behaved for non-damped switches on a metal enclosed keyboard though but in my opinion they definitely sound more pleasant not to mention that the c3 stabs sound way better and quieter than the stock glorious ones with the tactile sp stars under the abs gmk set the sound is a notch deeper in pitch than with the alpacas but still very crisp and pleasant and the typing feel of the sp stars is amazing here with its well-defined but smoother bump if compared to other super tactile switches such as holy pandas for example and finally with the inks under the mt3 abs set while the bottom out is too crisp and defined as with the other two configurations which is probably a factor of the aluminium plate the sound here is considerably deeper which is a known characteristic of getter on inks while ink's v2s are not as smooth as the original older v1s lubing took care of that with no issues and i'd say this is the configuration i'm keeping for this board the keyboard not only feels and sounds amazing but it also looks badass with a yellow glow between the black caves and keycaps but let me know in the comments below which combination of switches and keycaps you like the most here as usual i love spending time on the comments section and i'm always there to answer any questions you might have about everything i show in my videos so what are my conclusions about the gm mk pro after all these experiments in stock form the gm mk pro with stock alpacas v2 and pbt cherry profile keycaps felt and sounded really good not the end game some people might have expected but good very good almost everything in the gm mk pro feels high quality from the aluminium case and plate to the pcb and damping materials included and while it's included stabilizers are not exactly the greatest of all time it is still better than almost any other production keyboard out there sure typing on it doesn't feel soft and bouncy nor does it have the crisp and defined bottom out sounds of fancier gasket mount custom boards costing two or three times as much but then again that's not what i'm comparing this keyboard with anyway the sound of this stock gm mk pro is actually pretty nice if a bit too muted for those who would prefer some extra pop but outside of the ticking space bar in my case there was virtually no creaks no hollowness and no pings whatsoever for the majority of people out there a muted keyboard out of the box will be considered an advantage since it makes this keyboard well suited to be used near coworkers and family members without driving anyone crazy the companion software while not setting any gold standards is very usable it does pretty much everything 90 of users will want including macros key remapping and backlight customization without having a big learning curve and without too many zero-day bugs and if i had to point one of the best qualities of the gm mk pro would be its ease of modding glorious is being friendly to anyone who wants to open this keyboard up and tinker with it since this will not void its 2 years warranty which is more than you can expect of pretty much any other large scale profile maker out there and thanks to that you can make this keyboard even better if you decide to put some elbow grease in it as you saw on the modding chapter adding some more gaskets to the plate which are gracefully provided by glorious in the box and then some simple rubber o-rings and replacing the bottom foam with a silicone sheet made a huge difference in improving the flexibility of the gasket mounted plate resulting in a nicer typing feel and a noticeably better sound the gem mk pro felt even better with these mods with all switches and keycaps i tried here linear stack tiles low and high profiles abs and pbt keycaps i could daily drive this board with any of the configurations i tried here and i'm confident that this board can feel and sound great with pretty much any combination of switches and keycaps you throw at it at 170 us with a two years warranty that does not prevent you from modding and upgrading the keyboard and the promise to be an in-stock item starting sometime in the second half of 2021 the gm mk pro is basically what this market needed right now i'd say that in 2021 this is likely the entry to mid-level keyboard for anyone who have played around with some value or performance production keyboard or maybe even some budget hot swappable keyboards before and is now ready to take the next step in the world of custom keyboards without making any of the required commitments nor taking any of the risks usually involved in group buys with this board you have the chance to experiment with the ever expanding world of max compatible switches and keycaps and if you feel brave enough to try out your first keyboard mods this board will be the perfect laboratory for you to experiment with stabs different plates gaskets and damping materials now to talk about the competition for the gm mk pro first we need to decide what are we comparing it to while i saw many people setting expectations that were maybe a bit too high and unrealistic for a version one of a 170 dollar semi-custom keyboard from a relatively new player in this industry i say this keyboard can still be considered a resounding success if you compare it to basically anything in its price range in the entry-level custom keyboards market while the gmm mk pro straddles the line between ultra premium production boards and entry-level customs i'd say that it wins in both categories while you can get really good production boards between 180 all the way to 300 such as premium models from vermillo leopold and realforce which will come with good switches and premium keycaps no large scale production keyboard will give you the flexibility you have here with hot swappable switch sockets and stabilizers that are easy to replace nor the build quality with its heavy aluminium construction and while some production keyboards can offer more polished companion software glorious core is already good enough for the vast majority of users and going forward it can only get better it is definitely worlds better than what gloria's had in the past for the original gm mk which goes to show how much ground glory has gained in such a short few years and what if you compare it to the entry-level custom keyboard options that are getting more and more popular nowadays well the gmk pro makes a very interesting case against pretty much all of them sure the nk65 entry edition is way cheaper at 95 dollars and comes with via compatibility out of the box but you don't get the build quality and the pcb mounted steps the portico is also cheaper at 120 dollars also comes via ready and does give you a softer and better designed gasket mounting system as well as better stabs out of the box the portico review is coming soon to the channel as well so subscribe if you don't want to miss it but it comes completely disassembled which can be a barrier to some users and like the nk65 entry edition it is made out of plastic and doesn't give you the sturdy aluminum construction the ramakara also has via compatibility and costs the same 170 dollars than the gm mk pro as the portico it also has a very well designed gasket system but it is also polycarbonate and doesn't bring the sturdy construction it doesn't even include a case foam or silicone damper that has to be bought separately besides it uses an hhkb layout that only die-hard enthusiasts will be willing to use and what about the semi-custom aluminium options from drop well those have been basically murdered by the gmk pro starting at 140 dollars for the low profile drop alt going all the way to 200 for the high profile drop control with super stiff integrated plates plate mounted stabs that you have to immediately replace no support for 5 pins pcb mounted switches and no easy to use configuration software interface these are basically non-starters when compared to the gmk pro as i said before in 2021 the gm mk pro is probably the entry to mid-level semi-custom keyboard to beat in my i o sam scale i think this keyboard is perfectly priced for its performance and it sits comfortably on the top shelf of entry-level custom keyboards and if gloris continues to evolve this platform as they have been doing with their line of gaming mice for example i think they will also become a force to be reckoned with in the large scale semi-custom production keyboards market all right before we go if you made it all the way here let me take this opportunity to thank you for your time and your support of this too young and small youtube channel thanks to viewers like you were growing much faster than i could ever dream just a few months back and that means i'll keep bringing more in-depth content such as this one and hey if you enjoy this type of content why not subscribing and helping me build the best resource for in-depth gear reviews and diy projects on youtube what are you waiting for and if you like what you saw here please leave that thumbs up on your way out always super helpful as usual if you want to check out any of the products and tools mentioned in the video there are links for everything in the description below and if you have questions about anything you saw here feel free to leave them in the comments below and i'll be happy to answer them thank you again and see you all soon [Music] you

Channel: IO Sam

Views: 384,958

Keywords: gmmk pro, glorious, mechanical keyboard, 75% keyboard, glorious pc gaming race, gmmk pro sound test, custom mechanical keyboard, alpaca switches, alpaca switches sound test, sp star purple switch, sp star purple switch sound test, gateron ink yellow v2, gateron ink yellow sound test, drop mt3 keycaps, drop artifact bloom bow, drop artifact bloom, drop mt3, drop mt3 bow keycaps, gmmk pro review, gmmk pro o ring mod, gmmk pro modifications, gmmk pro mod, glorious gmmk pro

Id: J_axv-TkjkE

Length: 67min 14sec (4034 seconds)

Published: Tue Jun 15 2021

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[u/IO_Sam]

Join me on this super in-depth review and modding tutorial of the new Glorious GMMKp Pro, where we'll explore this keyboard's main features: metal construction, hot-swappable switch sockets, per-key RGB illumination, interchangeable plate and stabs, gasket mounting, sound damping foam and software (including its claimed QMK & VIA compatibility).

We'll also go through its pros and cons as well as teach you how you can improve the sound and typing feel of this US $170 board to make it one of the best entry level choices in the semi-custom Mechanical Keyboards market today.

And, to show you how it can sound with different switches and keycaps configurations, we'll sound test it with Alpaca and Gateron Ink linears, SP Star Purple tactiles, as well as with PBT (Artifact Bloom) and ABS (GMK and Drop MT3) keycaps.