Das Keyboard 4 Ultimate Blank Wired Mechanical Keyboard, Cherry MX Blue Mechanical Switches, 2-Port USB 3.0 Hub, Volume Knob, Aluminum Top (104 Keys, Black)

This keyboard is a fine keyboard indeed! very impressed with it. It arrived just this morning but I do have some really good first impressions. I have been hopping from keyboard to keyboard lately trying to find something that really fit my needs long term. I am a typist that spends work as well as down time typing out documents and spreadsheets. I have tried so many keyboards over the last month and was beginning to lose hope. The Das keyboard revived my hope.Typing:First of all this is the best typing experience I have had in a long time. The strokes are clean and light. Lighter than most blue switch key boards I have been trying which surprised me. I suspect this has something to do with the keycap quality. I feel fluid and just as fast typing on the Das as I would on any of my other preferred keyboards. Something I hold to a high regard is the acoustics of the board when I am typing. Many keyboards that I keep trying, often over 130 dollars and "built like a tank" sound dreadful. Notably the Razer black widow and the Code 104, both of which I wanted to love. But again their over the top hefty construction of plastic made it sound like you were hitting wood against Nerf Guns with each keystroke. Often times it would just completely drown out the sound of the clicky keys themselves which was infuriating. Again the keystrokes on the Das are crisp and the sound it makes is satisfying and not obnoxious at all, at least to a person who likes mechanical keyboard sounds.Appearance:The Das keyboard looks amazing. I went with the ultimate version with the blank keycaps and the black lettering in the top right corner. Man is it clean and professional. The aluminum front plate is super clean and sharp. Doesn't reflect a bunch of light and still has the nice cold and textured touch. Super lovely choice on their part. Again, I love the blacked out look of the keyboard. I dont mind the red accents on the volume knob and the ruler either. Subtle and slick. A part of me wishes those accents came in something more neutral like gray but again, its so subtle that it would never compete with a set up up that had a theme to it.Materials:The keycaps are very nice. While they are still ABS plastic they have to be some of the best ABS caps I have every used. Sturdy and slightly textured as well as being kinda light too. I love them honestly. The plastic and aluminum body is super nice. It's got heft but it's light by comparison to other boards that strive to be built well. The cord is a thick rubber cable. I hear a lot of reviews wishing it was a braided cable and I can vouch for that desire but I really dont think its worth docking any points for something like that. especially because a lot of braided cables I've had, especially with Logitech, which unravel, fray, and start looking gross after a while. This rubber cord is sturdy and will look the same throughout its shelf life so I am happy with it.Functionality:On top of all the great things I can say about the board from a minimalist and professional use standpoint, it actually has some of the best feature sets for me. The volume knob and media controls is fantastic and super well done. The knob is tactile and gives you some clicky feedback when you turn it which is a pleasure to use. The ruler on the back is something I might use? The addition of the ruler is not a con whatsoever in my opinion. It's implementation does not interfere with the experience of the board at all and its there if you need it. Some have said that they wish it lifted the board up a bit more. I understand where they are coming from but for me it's actually perfect. The Das also has 2 USB passthroughs which is a luxury I have been living without since my old Black Widow days back in 2012. I am very happy to have that again.Other biased pros:Fits perfectly with my favorite wrist rest which is a HUGE plus for me. It doesn't take up a ton of room on my desk which is niceCons:I do have just one small complaint. The keyboard had some blemishes right on the box which kind of upset me a bit at first. Theres a scuff on the aluminum on the right side of the board as well as on the long + key on the same side. They are small enough to where I will live with it because you cant notice unless you really look but again that's a little upsetting. For 165 dollars I just think that is pretty sloppy and unacceptable.All in all I love this keyboard and I think finally my hunt for a keyboard can finally be put aside for awhile as I will most certainly be using this keyboard out of the rest of mine going forward.Update: 6/4/2018So I've had this keyboard for a bit now and it's still a daily driver. I do swap it back and forth between my Filco and that will most likely continue to happen just because I like hopping from board to board. But this thing is such a beautiful beast. I HIGHLY recommend getting a new set of quality keycaps for it though. It was a huge game changer. I bought some ninja font thick PBT keycaps for it and wow does it sound and feel amazing compared to the stock caps which were cheap by comparison but still pretty good for stock caps. Anyway get some fancy caps for this thing as the mileage from the upgrade will be more worth it than other keyboard in my opinion.

My first mechanical keyboard with modern switches (instead of the older buckling-spring assemblies) was a Velocifire VM01. It served me well, but I decided recently to splurge and go for a more premium deck – in this case the Das Keyboard Prime 13 with Cherry MX Brown keyswitches. It does, I must admit, have a very different feel to my significantly cheaper VM01 Keyboard. It’s not unpleasant. The switches feel very similar to the way my old Unicomp Model M buckling spring keyboard felt. There’s a very satisfying buoyancy to the keys (for lack of a better word). It’s a genuine joy to type on. I look forward to using this keyboard for National Novel Writing Month.The backlighting is even and strong – much more so than the VM01. The steel faceplate is cool to the touch and very solid. There’s no noticeable flex, even when I press very hard down on the center of the keyboard or pick it up and twist the corners away from each other.The keycaps feel nice, have a clear and professional-looking font to them, and have very little wiggle which is a nice change from my VM01. That’s a difference that $75 will get you. I may still need to put O-ring dampeners on the keys. We’ll see how loud the keyboard actually sounds once I get it set up in my office.I don’t notice the audible “PING!” when releasing larger keys such as the space bar and backspace buttons that annoyed me with the VM01. That’s a level of quality I expected – but it’s nice to see that my trust in the Das company wasn’t unfounded. This is definitely one of the nicest premium keyboards I’ve ever used – if not the best period.One very minor criticism – on keys that have two legends on them (like the number/symbol keys along the top and the bracket/curly brace keys on the side) the backlight only illuminates the top symbol and not the bottom. This is probably due to the fact that Cherry switches have their LED on the top of the switch…but it would have been nice to have both light up still.I don’t know if it’s just my unfamiliarity with the Cherry MX Brown switches, but I notice myself adding a lot of extra spaces in my writing. I’ll have to see if that goes away with more regular use. It could be that the space bar on my old Velocifire VM01 was just less sensitive and I’m used to really banging it to get it to actuate. Haha. The large buttons on this keyboard do require what seems like a lot less pressure to register than I’m used to on the VM01. I’m not sure if that’s real or imagined.Although I was assured when I bought the VM01 that the OUTEMU off-brand brown switches were comparable to Cherry MX Browns – I’m going to have to disagree. There’s a decidedly different feel to these branded Cherries on the Das. Again, this may just be confirmation bias since I paid almost twice as much for this keyboard as the VM01 – but I feel like the Cherry switches are just smoother, and require less actuation force.This is the closest feel I’ve found in a post-Model-M keyboard to the buckling spring monster I used back in the day. The keys pop back up in a satisfying and strong way. The sound is nice and clacky without being *completely* over the top. The overall look and feel of the keyboard itself is very high-end and professional looking. I see some of my coworkers bringing in high-end VGA keyboards and realize that the “gamer” aesthetic isn’t really for me. I would feel juvenile using a board with multi-colored lights on it like some twenty-something’s sports car.The cord is braided, which you’ll either love or hate. I personally like the look and feel of it myself. It terminates in 2 USB 2.0 plugs – one for the keyboard and one for the USB pass-through port on the top right of the keyboard. I like to use this for my wireless mouse receiver. It’s discreet and keeps it out of my way.This was my first purchase from Das, and I don’t believe it will be the last. It took me a long time to be able to justify the price to myself but now that I’ve used it first hand I don’t know that I’ll be willing to go back to squishy ten dollar membrane keyboards again. Das may well have ruined me for them.