The LAST Keyboard You'll Ever Need for $50 - G.Skill KM360 Review

within my first six months here at LTT I worked on a roundup of the cheapest mechanical keyboards on Amazon where we actually identified a couple of really good value boards however there was one thing that all those cheap keyboards had in common none of them had cherry MX key switches arguably the industry's gold standard when it comes to reliability feel and sound but hold on to your key caps because g.skill has announced what they say is the most affordable Cherry MX keyboard on the market at just $49.99 so today we're gonna do an actual real test to see if this is the last keyboard that you ever need to buy or if no one can even tell the difference between true cherries and their cheaper Chinese clones anyway right after this message from our sponsor C Sonic the C Sonic prime ultra titanium power supplies are ultra efficient with an 80 plus titanium rating backed with a 12 year warranty check them out at the link below [Music] okay so here under this cloth I have three different keyboards we have our new g.skill km 360 with cherry MX red switches then there's a Corsair K 65 also with cherry MX reds and then there's a viper 770 with red equivalent kale switches now admittedly this isn't the most scientific test because we're not controlling variables pretty well because we're not using the same keyboard all the time but with different switches they are different keyboards so they will feel a little bit different but we are going to do a future video where we put all the different kill and cherry and Z leo switches all against each other in a more scientific comprehensive and controlled manner so subscribe if you're looking forward to that video for now we're just gonna get all the weird tech enthusiasts and gamers we have in the office to come here try these keyboards and see if they can spot the not captain stick at home I use Romer G's and so I don't think I have the best indicator I'd say three and one feel the most similar to me I'm gonna guess that one in three are the actual Reds and two is the fake red they all seem pretty linear to me there's actually a little bit of variance I think in terms of the the weights I feel like some are going down easier than others this actually feels a little better I think this one who's a little bit stiffer I would say that the smoother action of number three would probably be cherry I'm not sure if this is cherry or not but it's also pretty smooth this one is a little rough actually which is strange because people would usually want a red switch for its smooth linear action cherry Kayle now dude my gut instinct that's always the worst wait definitely not that one this one feels the best these two I think of the cherry switches I think this one's the kale switch I know this feels like cherry Reds number one although these also might be the kales I could be totally wrong there I feel like number three feels a bit different so I'm guessing that the middle one is kale and the two on the outside are the cherries although I don't really like the feel of any of them and wouldn't use them Reds are not great in my opinion so much of the sound actually comes from like the key cap smacking the switch it's not even from the actual switch itself which makes it really hard to I think the middle one is kale and the other two are cherry hello my name is Riley that's a different weight I think I know I think number three is number three is kale visit this one that one's cherry that one's kale number three that's kale number one and two that's Cherry MX and I know that because I played piano I'm very familiar with keys see you later okay so literally zero of our participants were able to correctly identify which were Cherry's and which one was kale but I mean they thought they feel the same like regardless the km 360 is still a good deal at fifty dollars it's a minimalistic ten keyless with narrow bezels a detachable braided USB type-c cable and every marketers favorite anodized aircraft-grade aluminum top plate which permits only modest tech Fleck both black and white varieties come with a white LED backlight and looks so good that it's really tough to choose a favorite but I think I'm leaning towards the black one I'm also leaning towards wearing lgt merch the rest of my life and we're in the underwear right now so head on over to LT T store comm and get these garments on your body anyway the double shot injected ABS plastic key caps are marked with a very clear and professional legend and of course underneath Cherry MX key switches note though that unlike many mechanical keyboards which give you the choice of which switch type you want the came through 60 is only available with Cherry MX Reds well except for under the spacebar which uses the slightly harder to press Cherry MX black key switch so why just Red's our guess is that limiting the km through 60 to a single SKU helped g.skill achieve that low $49.99 price point and they chose red specifically because they're tarting gamers many of whom seem to opt for the linear low activation for switches so what other corners did they cut in order to sell this thing for just 50 bucks well the easiest way to assess that is to compare the new k3 62g skills existing Ripjaws km 560 which they sell for $30 more the biggest difference typing wise is weight this thing's just 685 grams while the km 560 is 960 grams while it is true that the lower weight makes the board more portable many types prefer keyboards with thick metal back plates because they like the solid feel that this gives it this is actually one of the reasons that people love the original model M keyboards which I highly recommend learning more about here next there's the lack of media keys now the rip draws km 560 also lacks dedicated media keys like the kind you'd find on say a Corsair k-6 t5 but it does have media playback control on a secondary layer the new km 360 doesn't even give you that and finally neither and finally neither have dedicated macro keys the km 560 does support on-the-fly macro recording whereas the new km 360 is not programmable in any way sorry Taryn but even compared to the cheapo keyboards from our roundup that we did at least all those ones have multiple backlight effects but this one only gives you the ability to dim the backlight through various levels than off though it does it does indicate key activation by adding extra brightness to the key which is kind of cool I guess so should you buy this keyboard let's set aside the Cherry MX switches for a moment because even without them this is quite a nice port it definitely has better plastics and build quality than your typical Amazon Cordy plus it's coming from a reputable company with an actual warranty it might be worth of 50 bucks just for that when it comes to the actual key switches though it's a bit harder to say whether they're definitely worth an extra of fifteen or twenty dollars because as we saw most people won't even be able to feel the difference others can and they'll tell you that the mainstream consensus is that cherry makes the best key switches in the world period especially when it comes to reliability and lifespan but then there's the enthusiast community where more than a few people claim that these Chinese clones like the kales now equal or even surpass cherry regardless of all that though in my humble opinion this is a great value no-frills keyboard that most people will feel great purchasing the cost GMR 54x iso gaming headset is audiophile approved and based on a popular cost headset it's got custom engineered acoustics so you can get positional cues to hear where your enemies are coming from and it's got some changes from the original they reduced the tension in the lightweight headband for extended comfort they included a cord splitter an inline microphone with remote and a detachable boom mic and of course it's compatible with more than just PC you got your PlayStation 4 Xbox and Nintendo switch so grab it today and new users who sign up on drop com can get $20 off this headset so thanks for watching guys and subscribe to LTT

Channel: Linus Tech Tips

Views: 2,517,839

Rating: 4.878737 out of 5

Keywords: gaming, keyboard, g.skill, corsair, logitech, razer, cherry, cherrymx, blue, red, tactile, kailh

Id: yGFZK6Ru28o

Length: 9min 40sec (580 seconds)

Published: Sat Sep 07 2019

Reddit Comments

[u/ei-krem]

HOW TO YOUTUBE.

• RGB = high end
• cherry mx = high end
• braided cable = high end
• priced over 120 usd = overpriced af

funny how much these youtubers rant about prebuilt PCs when they all use cheap mainstream prebuilt keyboards.

[u/mmaruda]

I do like Cherry MX, but this smells like just shilling. And the funniest part is, they have this misinformed view that Cherry is somehow super smooth. They do a blind comparison test and it turns out they all point to Kalih as being Cherry, because it's the smoothest.

[u/Str0nkk]

Why does every major tech youtuber always shit on non-cherry switches?

[u/fadetoblack1106]

Hardware Canucks has a video discussing the emergence of the keyboard enthusiast community. Whoever wrote the script for this LTT video clearly never saw that video.

[u/Qu1nt0n512]

I watched this earlier and my first thought when it was over was when The Verge made their video about PC building. All the tech youtubers were saying since the Verge clearly wasn't informed on the subject, the people that are interested and watch the video could end up deterred or misinformed when it comes to PC building. This feels like a similar situation

[u/urdnot_maul]

What switch is that at 0:12? Looks kinda like alps but clear housing?

[u/Im_humble]

ok, u have triggered the beast first off for tactile switches zielios switches and holy pandas are so much better and even more so if u go deeper into the Frankenstein switch market. For linears which I swear to hecc if u say are good for gaming, you have novel keys creams, gat inks, and gat yellows all of which are smooth and much more so when they are lubed. For clicky switches, kalih box navies and jades use a click bar instead of a click jacket and as such soun better and also feel much better as well. James, you have stirred up in custom keeb community and they shall smite u down with their expensive gmk keycaps and their 13 pound IBM model Fs

[u/killerpollo23]

It seems that LTT's video quality depends greatly on who wrote the script for the specific video, I just wish they could make their homework better for their next keyboard video.