I've now been representing Tt eSPORTS for quite a few months at tournaments throughout SEA and as the 'Tt' at the front of 'TtPiG' becomes more and more just another part of my name, I think it's time to give something back and remind you guys of my amazing sponsor. Anyone who's attended a barcraft, competed in a tournament or tuned into SEA SC2 tournaments would know that there's a hell of a lot of content, events and prize pool being contributed by Tt. These guys are serious about keeping up with and supporting the esports scene. So I will be writing a series of reviews for the gear they've provided me with from their Tt eSPORTS gaming range.
I won't be sugar-coating anything and will be giving my honest opinion on what suits me about some of their gear, and what doesn't suit me so well. I will also be trying to identify what preferences go with which piece of gear and how this equipment has helped me reach a really impressive list of achievements in the last 6 months.
So onto the first review:
Tt eSPORTS Meka G1 Keyboard
I've now been using the Meka G1 keyboard for about 6 months so feel I'm familiar enough to share my experience.
Appearance and Style: Mine might be layered in dust and have bits of hair and crumbs in it, but it somehow still looks pretty baller. Unlike some of the Filco's the lights for caps and numlock aren't blinding, but are bright enough to look really nice with the red shining out of the black carapace. Other then that the model I use doesn't have illumination under the keys like the Meka G-unit so if you want to game in a dark room and no light then that's probably a better choice.
Other than that, appearance-wise it is pretty solid and simple design until you get to the giant cable sticking out the back that looks like those tubes they plug into the back of people's heads in the Matrix. This big cable holds 4 cords inside it allowing you to plug other peripherals such as headphones into your keyboard's USB and audio hubs. Then using just the 1 cable with it's 4 plugs emerging on the end you can easily connect all your peripherals to a PC without the hassle of running all the cords behind it. It's easy to not get tangled because the thick cable just beats the crap out of any cord that comes and tries to mess with it. Personally I like to keep LANs as simple as possible so I can focus on my play so I just plug in the 1 keyboard USB and it works just as easily as a regular keyboard.
Gaming: The Meka G1 uses mechanical switches which allow a 1000Hz polling rate 8x quicker then a regular gaming keyboard. There's never any lag from you hitting to the button to the PC recieving the command. The Meka G1 uses the Cherry Black switches with a life expectancy of 50 million keystrokes. Essentially these switches give great responsivity and last a really long time.
Apparently these switches are best for FPS gaming mainly and aren't as good for the constant double tapping required in RTS gaming. My first time unpacking it and trying it out I had to agree. I was like wow these keys are sticky they don't bounce back at all and was really disappointed. I went to complain to a few people but was told that black keys actually take usually about a week to break in. A week later I had a big smile on my face as I smacked the crap out of my keyboard at my usual speed. Anyone that plays zerg knows just how fast you have to be on your keyboard to be constantly injecting, spreading creep tumors and producing nonstop. There was no increase in speed from the brown-switch keyboard I used previously but the decrease in speed that I'd been led to expect, from hearing other RTS gamers talking about black switches, didn't actually seem to exist, or was so small it was negligible.
The keys are spaced quite well so I find I can reach to 7 on my keyboard while holding down CTRL comfortably. So you can reach a lot of keys easily and at the same time I find I rarely mishit the keys. An odd feature of the keyboard is no windows key on the left-hand-side which takes a little getting used to for tabbing in and out but has no effect in-game other than not wasting key-space so you can reach spacebar a lot easier.
Quality: The quality of this keyboard is bloody good. It's very solid and reasonably heavy design that has handled my many interstate LAN trips with 0 damage or issues.
Suggestions for improvements: Tt could improve this keyboard by offering it in Brown switches so that the slight technical improvement for RTS games would make this keyboard 100% undoubtable as one of the best gaming keyboards on the market.
i got mine from MSY a couple of weeks ago and that makes it look like i got a good deal! i really do love the keyboard.. it even feels nice when i am having to do work related typing :P
I saw a video on YouTube where a car runs over the Meka G1 and it still works!! for sure it's rage proof (ノ◕ヮ◕)ノ*:・゚✧ Also having different switches would appeal more to other people who likes Red/Brown/Blue switches can't imagine how popular Ttesport keyboards would be if that happened
Last edited by sRDreaM; Thu, 15th-Mar-2012 at 9:50 PM.
Great review. I think a lot of the Tt eSports keyboards look great, although I also believe other Cherry MX Key Switches should be incorporated other than Blacks to broaden the interest to other peoples preferences. Blacks for me at least are a deal-breaker because they require too much force to depress.
#KeyboardRacism
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"Don't let me get 80 drones."
I like Senjougahara~
Last edited by CyniX; Fri, 16th-Mar-2012 at 5:42 AM.
Reason: lawl
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