Dat Backlight Tho
Dat Backlight Tho
The backlight on the Realforce RGB is gorgeous. It looks crisp and clear, and the colors it produces are very nice. Possibly the best colors I’ve seen on a keyboard. But, there are two problems with it. The first is that there’s a noticeable blue shift with some colors in the blue range. Anything blue, kind of looks the same blue. I’ll go out on a limb and say that perhaps the blue LED dice will settle down after a few thousand hours, making the RGB much closer to the possible 16.8 million color figure. The colors do blend extremely well, though, giving a smooth, colorful look.
The built-in controls for the backlight have 7 solid colors to choose from, and eight if you count the rainbow light mode. I tried forever to get a proper lipstick red out of the backlight, because Valentine’s Day, and was immediately confounded by the keyboard controls for it. With a Ducky Shine 5 or Shine 6 keyboard, the Fn+Spacebar lights up with a palette chooser. Not so with the RGB. To get the proper lipstick red you need to use the software. For those that bought a RGB on release day, the software followed a month later, leaving them with the default colors for a little while.
There are three brightness levels, four if you count the Fn+PgDn off setting. The brightest setting is just about bright enough, but I could use a couple more. The more serious problem with the RGB is that it just doesn’t get bright enough. In a sunlit room, you cannot see the backlight at all, even at maximum brightness. This is a dark room, hermit loving keyboard.
Brightness matched with a Ducky Year of the Goat (One/Shine 5). Out of the Ducky’s 9 brightness levels, this is level 3, matched to the RGB’s full bright setting.
Yes, it’s completely unfair to compare the RGB to the Ducky YOTG, but the camera settings were identical in both exposures.
There’s also the relatively small set of 7 backlight modes. Of these seven modes, four are customizable with the software. I’ll cover these more in-depth in the software section, but my general impression is that there needs to be more and better customizable backlight modes.
Overall, the RGB lighting is done very well. There is some perceptible flicker in some of the modes, but otherwise, it feels high quality and classy. The combination of white mounting plate and clear switch tops give a nice glow around the keycaps. Uniformity is quite good. There weren’t any dim or dull LED’s, and no overly bright ones either.
If you want to, please watch the informational video below for all the modes available:
Competition in the RGB keyboard space is fierce, and Topre need to be a little more competitive in modes and controls to be the best-of-the-best. The RGB’s software does have provision for updating the firmware, so let’s hope that future revisions will make the RGB even better.
