Is the K95 good yet? (Prospective customer)

All new technology has its hiccups, and those with problems are often louder than those without. That said, I've read some horribly worrying things about the K95 ranging from software with issues that make the product not competitive with similarly priced mechanical keyboards and indeed the well known lack of true macros (onboard).

I can look past the macro memory negligence on Corsair's part, I primarily want macro keys for non-gaming application. However, are all the problems resolved with LEDs ceasing to function, CUE crashing with games, CUE freezing, or really all major issues with CUE? The primary competitor for Corsair's K95 have resolved all of their software issues but they lack the Cherry MX browns and are therefore inferior (as they use replicas from a shady company).

I like Corsair, solid PSU and memory. Have they/you made good on the K95? By that I mean, when I purchase a keyboard that is $170 (Amazon), I will get that premium experience you ask for in your pricing? Many of the problem threads were posted in 2014, have things changed substantially and can I expect a $170 experience from CUE and the hardware? Thanks.

Are we talking about the old K95 (non-RGB) or the newer RGB model? It is true that the old non-RGB model had some issues with the LEDs failing after some time. Several peoples posted here on the forum about it, but that was just a small part of them anyway. Peoples don't tend to post anything if all goes well, and only post on the official forum for issues so it gives a distorted view of the issues.

That said the products of the new RGB series don't have many reports about failing LEDs and such, the main issues so far are only when people spill liquids on them or if they receive a defective product from the start and have to RMA it (a bad soldering for example). And defective products reports are not that common on the forum here either.

Are we talking about the old K95 (non-RGB) or the newer RGB model? It is true that the old non-RGB model had some issues with the LEDs failing after some time. Several peoples posted here on the forum about it, but that was just a small part of them anyway. Peoples don't tend to post anything if all goes well, and only post on the official forum for issues so it gives a distorted view of the issues.

 

That said the products of the new RGB series don't have many reports about failing LEDs and such, the main issues so far are only when people spill liquids on them or if they receive a defective product from the start and have to RMA it (a bad soldering for example). And defective products reports are not that common on the forum here either.

Sorry for my poor description, I mean the RGB. The macros with the ability to be color-coded is an amazingly rich feature for creative software so it was the one of interest.

EDIT: You did not mention the software, has it been ironed out now?

Sorry for my poor description, I mean the RGB. The macros with the ability to be color-coded is an amazingly rich feature for creative software so it was the one of interest.

 

EDIT: You did not mention the software, has it been ironed out now?

K95 RGB LED flickering on 16.8M colours.. need I say more? I'd say go for something else if you need to buy a keyboard now, or wait until they release a revised edition with a better LED controller

The software has been updated a lot since the release, there have been a lot of improvements. That said the flicker issue ombadboy mention is indeed an issue if you plan to use the 16,8m colors mode with specific complicate light effects. If you're going to use simple ones you won't notice it. Additionally there is also an option to disable the 16,8m colors so the flicker goes away, that results in less colors for gradients but honestly it is not that much difference (at least to me).

If you want to avoid the flicker issue completely then you might want to wait for the soon-to-be-released Strafe RGB which has a different LED controller from the K70/K95 RGB. But the Strafe has no volume scroller, no additional macro keys, no dedicated multimedia keys, and it's built with plastic instead of aluminum. They will probably release a new v2.0 version of the K70/K95 RGB with an updated LED controller to fix the flicker issue but there is no known info about it so far.

Personally I would just get the K95 now and disable the 16,8m colors if you notice flicker. If you don't care about the macro keys and the other things I mentioned above wait 1 month and get the Strafe RGB.

I just bought one, was a little worried, lighting effects are wonderful, I'm very happy with it. Really, the downside is, it's a bit of a timesink, it's so customizable that the first few weeks you have it, you're going to spend a lot of time working out how things work, and getting them to work the way you'd like.

Very highly recommend getting idlekey, so when you step away for anything over 10 minutes, it shifts to a profile that has all the lights off.

I also really enjoy being able to have macro keys custom lighted and assigned for photoshop tools, or common work tasks, it's been very handy.

I just bought one, was a little worried, lighting effects are wonderful, I'm very happy with it. Really, the downside is, it's a bit of a timesink, it's so customizable that the first few weeks you have it, you're going to spend a lot of time working out how things work, and getting them to work the way you'd like.

 

Very highly recommend getting idlekey, so when you step away for anything over 10 minutes, it shifts to a profile that has all the lights off.

 

I also really enjoy being able to have macro keys custom lighted and assigned for photoshop tools, or common work tasks, it's been very handy.

Do your 18.6 million colors work on most lighting effects as advertised?

I havent tested ALL of them, but from what I've tested, it seems good. If you really take notice, you can see the flicker some people have mentioned.

I'd been using g-keys for text so far, today I tried to setup some macros and notice that macro's do not work at all, trying to troubleshoot now, as others seem to have no issues with macros on W10.