- So I love keyboards.
I love mechanical keyboards.
And Keychron's pretty cool.
And they sent us the Q1,
which is their new 75% line.
It's got a badge up top.
I think you can change that for a rotary knob encoder
if you really want to.
And then the other big thing about it
is it's got these new Gateron Phantom switches,
which, I don't know, maybe they're cool,
maybe they're not.
But apparently they're better for RGB.
Only problem is they're color specific,
so if you want the blue ones, I hope you like clicky's.
The blue ones are clicky,
the reds are, I think linear, yeah,
and then browns are just tactile.
Oh, this one's open already. Sweet.
That's always good.
Quick start guide. Ooh.
Okay. So we've got just the standard stuff.
Here's a switch puller.
Here's a key cap puller.
You probably already have a lot of these already.
There's an Allen key.
It's probably for opening it.
What's this? Please be gentle,
and make sure to align the pins with the socket properly.
Yeah, it's pretty easy to bend pins,
but it's also pretty easy to just bend them back
if you, you know, jam it in there by accident.
User manual.
Ooh. They give you some 3M tape.
Can always use more 3M tape
for sticking stuff to other stuff.
Oh yeah.
Oh, that's nice and heavy.
I already like it. (laughing)
So, this is the fancy custom LTT1,
we got our own little badge,
and it's in like orange and white.
This is the...
The browns?
So there's three different switches.
They're these new Phantom switches
that are a little transparent, I guess.
So they make your RGB shine through a little differently.
The RGB in this board is south facing,
which is neat.
It's usually it's usually north facing,
or at least most of my keyboards are north facing.
- [Jono] What does that mean?
- It means that the RGB LED is on the bottom of the switch,
instead of on the top.
Flex is like nothing.
Like it's, you know, it's aluminum. That's fine.
Yeah, there's the little switch right there
between Windows and Mac.
So that's cool.
The bottom rubber feet are okay.
I would have liked having those little flippable ones
so that you can change the height or angle
depending on what your typing preference is.
So these Phantoms switches also come pre-lubed,
which I think is new for Gateron, they're usually not.
So it's just another nice little touch
that you're paying for.
Yeah, so the stabilizers are screw in.
I don't know if they've been lubed, but they sound okay.
They don't...
They rattle like a little bit,
but it's actually not that bad.
So you can probably just get some dielectric grease
and grease those up yourself if you really wanted to.
- [Jono] What kind of grease?
- Dielectric.
You can... (laughing)
Yeah, so I like lubing and filming switches and stuff.
Let's take a look and see what this one is.
I bet you it's the Browns.
Yeah, I actually prefer
when the case gives me a little bit more playroom.
Like it looks,
It looks great.
I like how every key goes right up to the edge, visually.
But then when you're trying to take them off,
if you want to start on a side, it's kind of a pain.
So usually you have to like start with the middle one.
Yeah, it's the Browns.
Yeah, so there's not much to see on the switch itself.
It's basically your average switch.
There's no side clips,
but the whole thing is hot swap.
It looks like there's room for side clips in here.
So yeah, it looks like
you can use pretty much any switch you want.
Hold on, I got some.
Lets throw like a tangerine in there.
Everyone likes the tangerines for some reason.
Cool. Yeah, all right.
You can fit basically whatever you want in there.
Let's take a look at the other ones.
I actually really want to see the blue one.
That's what I'm most excited about.
I'm not excited about the blue switches.
I hate clicky's.
But I bet you it feels really good,
even if it doesn't sound really good.
Oh, before we do that.
So you get some replacement screws for the bottom,
and they come in this nice, like brassy kind of color.
And then you get some extra key caps of course,
as per usual.
So if you want to swap between Windows and Mac.
Yeah, there's like a Windows key option.
Oh yeah, so this one actually came with Mac keys.
There's command and option, and stuff.
Super.
This is cool. I love when they always come
with like little extra ones.
Gotta love the orange penguin.
So yeah. But the...
What I'm really curious about is
they offer not only, like a coil,
but it's got aviator connectors on it too.
That's this...
So the aviator connector has this metal doodad here.
And so what you can do is you just line up the pins.
There we go.
And then you screw it closed.
Cool. So it is purely aesthetic.
Some people like them, some people don't.
- [Jono] But it's so cool.
- Yeah, it's so cool looking.
Basically, this makes it so that,
say you plug your keyboard in, right?
Where's the port on this one? Right here.
Say you plug your keyboard in,
and then you wanna just disconnect it,
but you don't want to have to reach
all the way back into your computer case
to like actually fully plug it out,
you can just unscrew this, pop it open,
and then leave that guy there.
Okay, let's look at the other ones.
Oh, that is heavy though.
That is nice.
See how much it weighs.
3.68 pounds. That's pretty good.
It's not super heavy.
I've felt like heavier keyboards.
Like if you get some of the really big custom boards
with the CNC plates can be like 5, almost 10 pounds.
Like I think my friend's keyboard
is like seven pounds or something stupid. (laughing)
So they also sent us,
I mean, we'll show you the other boards too,
but they also sent us a bunch of different key cap sets.
I'm not going to open all of these,
I'll just open a couple of them.
But they've got them all on their website,
so you can go and check 'em out before you buy them.
What I'm curious about though,
is how they've packaged them.
Oh yeah, this is nice.
Oh.
Yeah, so these will fit on any switch.
They're just your typical key caps,
they'll go on any cross pattern switch.
So yeah, we've got switches and a switch opener.
It's this fancy one from Gateron.
Oh, it's not blue!
Man, I was like, actually really excited
that this would be the same
kind of like pale blue on the box there.
That's fine. This thing looks cool.
- [Jono] Aw.
- It looks great. Yeah.
It's 25? So this is $25.
That's not bad, actually.
I honestly might pick one of these up.
These are the blue clicky's.
You can obviously tell.
They do feel good.
I actually really like this.
I think it's maybe a little much, extra on the packaging.
Like do they really need to house them in all these
instead of just a little bags? I don't know.
Yeah. So it's like $15 for 35 switches, which is fine.
Normally they can run anywhere from like 50 cents
to like a $1.10 or a $1.20 per switch.
Cool, so now that we've got these out of the way
and before I show you the other keyboards,
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Another black one.
I wonder if they only sent us black ones.
Actually, yeah it is, right?
That's the short circuit thing.
- [Jono] Yeah! Oh that's dope. - Yeah.
So it's great they sent us an LTT one.
Now they sent us a short circuit version as well.
I love this custom badge.
I don't know what you can get for options,
but I know that you can customize
a lot of the rest of the board.
You can even order a bare bones kit
that is basically just like the PCB, the case, the foam,
you have to order the switches and the key caps
and everything else separately.
It's actually pretty fun putting these together.
I would very much recommend getting a bare bones kit,
especially if you already
have your own switches and key caps.
I do love the color scheme.
This like, light blue with the purple.
But yeah, I want to see if they sent us
a different aluminum housing.
Ooh. Yeah, this is that space gray.
Yeah, I actually really like
this kind of off-white, yellowish tinge to it,
within like the gray on gray
and the LTT badge up there.
It looks great.
It's like just tactile enough that you feel a bump.
Go by your preference.
Don't let Keychron tell you what to do.
Do whatever you want.
That's the beautiful thing about mechanical keyboards,
it's all preference and style,
and whatever you want to do.
It's an expression of yourself.
Here, we'll try out the browns
that all the keyboards came in.
(keys tapping)
Ugh. 100.
Yeah. Lame.
Kay, well whatever, went better than the Wooting.
Yeah, that was terrible. 90 words a minute.
If you lube and film your switches,
you don't need to film them,
filming is like a whole extra step
that you don't really have to do.
But if you lube and film your switches
they'll sound and feel better, typically.
So these are Double Shot ABS key caps that come with it.
They feel good. I prefer ABS myself.
But again, it's all kind of feel and preference.
My one complaint though,
and maybe it's just because these key caps are so opaque,
but I hardly notice the RGB on this board.
Like from the overhead, I can't even see it really.
Like I see some minor, minor lighting around the side,
and I was actually really hoping to see more of that
because one of the things they mentioned
for these Phantom Gateron switches
is that since they're that more transparent housing,
the light will shine through differently.
So like the Browns are supposed to look like coffee
when white light is through them.
The blue is like this is blizzard color,
or something like that.
And then the reds are meant to look like lava or something.
It's a really nice glow
that I was actually really excited for,
but you don't see that here.
And you can get software for this
to customize both the board
and how the keys are laid out,
as well as the lighting itself,
you can customize all that to your heart's content.
Like here, let's switch this with one of my Kiwi.
But yeah, so it's lighter.
Like, it's minimal,
but you can see how the light
shines through this even better.
So I think that, you know,
you might like the way the brown feels a lot more.
That being said,
I do think that the red and the blue
let the RGB shine through a little more, which is nice.
Make your own switches, yeah.
I make my own cables.
I should just make my own switches, right? Come on.
Yeah, regardless of preference though,
I think this is a pretty good keyboard,
and I would totally recommend this.
So you can get the bare bones kit
if you've already got switches and key caps for 150,
that's even better.
But then if you don't yet,
and you want to spend a little extra money, like $20,
you can get it with everything included.
Overall, the Keychron Q1,
I really like it.
I think that if you're looking for a new keyboard,
it's a solid option
if you don't wanna build yourself.
Thanks for watching.
Leave a comment below.
And which ones would you buy?
Do you want the blues, the reds, or the browns?
Do you have something else that you prefer at home?
Let us know in the comments.