- ASUS sponsored this video,
and they are making some bold claims.
It's not often that a gaming company says,
"This product is guaranteed to give gamers more control,"
but that's exactly what they did here.
So let's go ahead
and get the ROG Strix Scope optical mechanical keyboard
opened up here, ladies and gentlemen.
We got some packaging, we got some documentation,
got some stickers, got some boxes,
see ya later, everything.
There it is, right there.
And you guys might be thinking,
"Linus, how can a keyboard possibly promise more control?"
And the answer is:
like that.
See right there? That's right.
The Strix Scope RX has a wider-than-usual Control key,
for more Control.
Pow-pow! You'll never miss again.
Let's talk about some of the other features, though.
So the key switches themselves, they're optical mechanical,
which basically means that they are very robustly built,
so they're rated for 100 million presses, in this case,
but that they are actually activated
by a beam of light being broken by the key moving down.
So this is a linear switch,
which means there's no tactile bump,
and what that means is that
there is nothing to feel whatsoever,
it is completely smooth.
And whether you prefer that or not,
totally down to personal preference.
Not actually my thing,
but a lot of gamers do prefer these Red-style switches.
As for the actuation point, it's about 1.5 millimeters,
but you can see it's actually kinda hard
for me to find that point because,
to prevent accidental keystrokes,
they've actually got a 55-gram actuation force,
but it takes 40 grams just to start
moving it in the first place,
to make so that when you've got that
really light responsiveness on it,
you're not going to just accidentally press them
by brushing over them or anything along those lines.
One clear benefit to ASUS' RX ROG Red switches here
is that you've got really clear illumination.
So I suspect once we light this thing up,
you can see the LED is right under the legend.
So that's a benefit. Nice, bright RGB backlighting.
But a drawback is, if you're the kind of person
who likes to change out your keycaps,
you are just plain gonna have a lot of trouble
finding replacement keycaps for a keyboard like this.
Those be not Cherry MX-compatible stems.
(keyboard clacking)
You know, I think I like the crispness at the top.
Even though it's a linear switch,
it gives it a little bit more...
Mmm, I don't wanna say...
Feedback, but definitely crispness.
I think it might be worth at least trying to type on.
Okay, yeah, it's still not tactile.
But definitely better than most linear switches I've used.
Probably any linear switches that I've tried,
although I'm not a huge fan.
Let's plug it in.
One handy-dandy little feature that, you know,
I don't think too many people
make a keyboard purchasing decision based on,
but can be real frustrating
when you're used to it and you don't have it,
is that it's got USB 2.0 pass-through,
so if you just want to throw a USB drive in there
'cause you gotta create a Windows ISO,
or you want to plug your mouse into it
because you still have a wired mouse or whatever,
it's got one of those, it's a dedicated port,
so it's not running off of a hub,
it's not sharing power with the rest of the keyboard.
And as expected, the backlight is extremely bright,
so even under our studio lighting,
it's really vibrant, actually.
That looks fantastic.
- [James] RGB AF!
- RGB AF!
Oh, I realize I haven't even commented
on the physical construction of the thing.
So on the bottom you've got rubber grippy pads,
here, here, here, here, and here.
You've got rubberized little feet, so these'll pop out
if you prefer more of an incline for your keyboard.
The top appears to be aluminum, so it's nice and stiff.
Even though this is a 104-key keyboard,
you can really wrench on it, there's...
(grunts) Yeah, really takes a lot of force to flex it.
Okay.
Let's give it a try.
Oh, shoot.
Someone actually advanced in this game on the test account.
That's problematic.
Hey, the good news is
I have not noticed the keyboard at all,
which is actually a really good sign.
You know what? I am liking it so far.
That crisp feel, really nice.
Bloop.
Ah! No!
No! Glory kill, yes, okay!
I only got 15 health! Oh, I got it!
Come on, that's not F! I keep...
F is my normal bind for melee.
I keep mashing F and it doesn't do anything.
Oh, man.
Oh, man, when I get flustered, sometimes...
Oh no!
We spilled water all over everything!
But that's okay, because it's IP 56*.
Which doesn't actually mean go ahead and douse it in liquid,
but I expect that it'll actually keep working.
Let's see if my expectations are met here.
It's always a risk when you're doing a sponsored video,
and it's like, "I don't know if it's actually
gonna pass this test or not."
All right. Oh yeah.
Nice!
Nice, brah!
Did I spill a lot of water?
- [Jono] I'll pour more water.
- Oh, no, no, no, no, no! I don't want any more!
(crew laughs)
Oh, I thought maybe the C button wasn't working,
but I'm out of chainsaw fuel!
So I'm in real trouble now, ladies and gentlemen.
You know what?
It doesn't matter, because whatever reason you might have
for quickly closing down a game,
whether it's because you're mad
or whether it's because your boss comes in,
this keyboard's got you covered.
So you've got all your media keys up here on your F keys.
You've also got your macro recording key right here,
so you can go ahead and record up to six different profiles,
store them on the keyboard,
and you can record macros on the fly
with this puppy right here.
You've got your lighting control,
change modes, change brightness.
But the most important key on this keyboard
is this one right here.
What do they call it? Privacy key or something like that?
I call it the boss key.
Well, let's say, for example,
that you're looking at some other kind of, you know,
unsavory thing, you know,
slightly pornographic material,
like these spicy, spicy underwear shots on lttstore.com.
There they are, underwear three-pack.
Okay, you wanna get rid of that quickly? Boom.
Press the boss-is-coming key.
It just minimizes everything for privacy.
Hear footsteps behind you
while you got your, you know, whatever it is?
Boom. Just close it all, I like.
I mean, theoretically you could just
move your mouse to the bottom corner
and you could just click that button down there.
That's another solution to the problem. But hey, F12.
Oh, and it brings it back too! Handy.
Just like I'm bringing it back to the end of this video.
Thank you, ladies and gentlemen, very much
for checking out our video on the Strix Scope RX.
Thanks again to ASUS for sponsoring this video.
And congratulations for engineering a keyboard
that is still working in spite of what I've done to it here.
Let's give a quick Notepad, make sure this puppy is workin'.
Totally.
Nice.
Oh yeah, subscribe to ShortCircuit.