Welcome back to nearlucid.
Today we’ll be taking a look at the Hope 75, a new premium keyboard from velocifire.
This board was sent to us for review, but as always that will not affect our statements
in any way.
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Let’s get into the unboxing.
First off we get two goodies, a black and silver aviator cable and some stabilizers.
Thanks to velocifire for sending these out along with the board.
So the hope comes with this magnetic latched box, which is always a nice touch.
Besides this, the packaging is pretty standard for the price range.
Under this packaging is our board foam, polycarbonate plate, and orange hotswap PCB.
Under this additional layer of foam is the board itself.
I got the black case and gold aluminum weight option.
Under here are our build components, like a light blocker for
the badge, bottom feet, stab shims and a hex key, top gaskets, and bottom gaskets.
So the hope75 is an aluminum screwless gasket mounted 75%, offering hotswap and soldered
PCBs with daughterboards.
Hope is also multi layout, and you can choose between exploded and compact 75.
The hotswap PCB for exploded is fixed, while the soldered PCB can swap to split backspace,
ISO enter, split left shift and stepped caps.
The hotswap pcb for compact 75 can swap to split left shift and split backspace, while
the soldered PCB can swap to split backspace, ISO enter, split left shift and stepped caps.
Both soldered PCBs can swap to the same configs.
Color options for the case are white, cream, black, yellow, mono, blue and black, burgundy
and black, gray and black, silver and black, and yellow and black.
Weight options are silver, black, and gold for aluminum, and silver and gold for PVD
brass.
Plate materials are polycarbonate, brass, FR4, POM, and aluminum.
With velocifire being a pretty big vendor, it makes sense to have a ton of options.
QMK and VIA are both supported, and the typing angle is 6 degrees.
Finally, the price for a hope75 kit with the alu weight is 360 dollars, and a hope75 kit
with the brass pvd weight is 450 dollars.
Hope is also screwless, meaning the build process is going to be a little bit more difficult
than usual.
In the PCB already are velocifire PCB mounted screw in stabs, lubed with 205g0 and XHT BDZ.
I’m going to add on the plate foam, polycarbonate plate, and in here go stock musetsu tactiles.
These are sharp tactiles with very long poles, so they should make for a pretty interesting
sound signature.
Next I’m going to disassemble the board.
First are the screws under the feet, the LED strip and its diffuser, some inner case screws,
and some more case screws that insert from the top.
Next I’ll apply the gaskets.
We have 5 different types, which all have designated locations on the plate.
If you are considering picking this board up, I highly recommend familiarizing yourself
with the build guide.
With the gaskets installed, we can start the reinstallation process.
First I’m going to remove the ribbon cables from the LEDs and the daughterboard so I can
put them into the PCB first.
Once they’re connected to the PCB, I’m going to route the cables through their holes
and connect them back to the components.
I really wish these were JST cables instead as I find those much easier to work with.
The first time I built this board it actually didn’t even work because the ribbon cable
fell out.
I’ve never had that happen with a JST cable.
After this, we can screw in the weight, And the case screws accessed from the top.
I had to remove some switches so the posts could fit into the plate.
THere is an issue with these screws interfering with the switches, but this will be fixed
for the group buy units.
Finally, on top goes GMK blue samurai.
Let’s take a listen.
The sound without pcb foam is pretty average.
Even with plate foam to cover up the cuts in the plate, it’s still pretty dull and
lifeless.
The sharpness and pitch of the musetsu tactiles in the first sound test really didn’t help.
The F row is particularly hollow, so I would recommend using both the plate and case foam
in this board.
There are also some special PCB foams included.
Along with PE, you also get IXPE and regular EVA, which might be able to help with the
liveliness of the sound.
With SOTCs and case foam, the sound was better, but there was still some hollowness near the
edges.
I think the feel is a little bit similar to the space65.
There isn’t a whole lot of room to bounce, but the pcb and plate both have tons of cuts.
It flexes very easily until it bottoms out, and then completely stops.
Musetsus are very unique.
It’s a very large and sharp tactile bump, but the pole of the stem is also extra long.
This means that pretty much the entire travel distance is just the bump, which in my opinion
makes the topping out feel almost sluggish.
Usually, there is a decent amount of distance after the tactile bump for the stem to freely
travel, like in a U4T, and when topping out it’s easy to feel it.
But in musetsus, this distance is almost nothing, making it an almost unsettling change from
the tactiles I’m used to.
Of course, we already have our review out on SOTCs, so if you are interested in those
very good switches, I would highly encourage taking a look.
The design is pretty nice.
On top is this lighthouse-shaped badge with 2 LEDs.
there is a bit of light bleeding but foam is included to mitigate this.
the top edge has pretty large chamfering.
I’m not exactly sure what the lighthouse badge is included for because nothing about
the name hope really connects with it in any way.
Maybe a beacon in the darkness, but that’s a bit of a stretch.
Overall, even though the design is quite disjunct from the name, I quite like it.
Moving to the side, we can see the clear separation between the top and bottom case and the jagged
cut on the top.
The bottom weight also pokes out here.
Turning it to the back, we can see how the top case hangs over the bottom case and the
large LED bar on top of the weight.
There’s also an engraving of the same lighthouse icon on the bottom.
The only gripe I have is that the magnetic feet are a little bit loose.
It’s great that they thought enough to implement easy-to-remove feet because the screws are
under here, but they tend to fall off because the magnets aren’t really strong.
I really like the implementation of the back RGB as it provides this really unique glow
to a setup.
With velocifire being a pretty big company the material quality is great as expected.
The anodization and machining is flawless on the inside and outside.
To sum it up I think this board looks great but still has some areas of improvement, particularly
in the foamless sound.
But overall, the hope75 is a very interesting and flashy addition to velocifires lineup
of group buy boards.
And that's all I have for you today.
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