New KB/Mouse

So, I splurged a bit, I had a bit of money saved up for a new GPU and monitor. Since the GPU doesn't seem like it's a possibility for a while, I took some of that and got a new KB/Mouse.

Previously, I had a Corsair K68 mechanical keyboard with Silver MX switches (the fast actuating). I also had a Corsair M65 mouse.

Both still work great. The keyboard, if I pulled all the keys and cleared out all the dog/cat hair, and ran the keycaps through the wash - would look brand new. The mouse had a bit of wear on the outer coating and the cloth cable sleeve, and some gunk built up in the scroll wheel I could never quite get cleaned out all the way, but still functioned well.

The mouse is just dirty. It's old, still works fine, but I can't seem to ever get it clean, especially all the crevices. Nothing utterly disgusting about it, just from use and age. The keyboard, while it works great, I have found that the Silver switches are very, very sensitive. I can't even rest my fingers on the keycaps without actuation. I lived with it for ... 3 or 4 years now? But my typing really suffered for it, and I just prefer a Red or Brown switch.

So I decided to back away from Corsair. It was kinda neat having RGB stuff that I could coordinate, but I had just turned it off mostly and I'm over the fad. I do like media keys on the keyboard - I really liked the volume scroll wheel. And I use the number pad frequently, so that was a must. For mouse - I do not like extra buttons. I use the scroll wheel, left and right. That's it. Apart from that I want it to feel weighty and fit my palm well.

I went with a Ducky One 2 with Red switches, after having read good things about the brand. And for the mouse I went back to Logitech - a M502.

The keyboard is excellent. The only things I could ding it for is that the capslock light isn't on the capslock key, and those indicator lights (numlock, capslock, scroll lock) are blindingly bright blue LEDs. It's like a laser beam if you look at those lights head on. Apart from that, it types well and is solidly constructed with no frills. I did sacrifice a volume control scroll wheel for volume up/down buttons, but they work well enough and serve their purpose.

For the mouse. The 502 is similar in shape and feel to the M65, but it's a bit longer, and I can tell on the way my fingers rest on the buttons and have to click a bit harder because they ride higher on the buttons. The scroll wheel is "chunkier" when it's set to have friction, and doesn't scroll as smoothly as the Corsair does when it's not set to free scrolling. The mouse feels weighty enough (I used all the supplied weights), and apart from the scroll wheel not being as smooth as I'd like, I have no other complaints yet. I like that the DPI adjust buttons are out of the way (on the Corsair, they were right behind the scroll wheel and I would hit them accidently on occasion) - I like that Logitech got away from that rubberized coating that turned to snot after a few months. The only other thing I would ding it on would be that the mouse is a bit taller than the M65 - when it's in my keyboard drawer under my desk, the height of the mouse + mouse pad makes the desk hit the scroll free wheel button when I slide it in -- not really Logitech's fault there though, so I can't really blame them that it doesn't fit in my desk.

I am staying away from the driver software. I had used iQue on the M65/K68 to set static lighting, but that was all I had done with it. I installed the logitech software to check for firmware updates (there were none from what the mouse shipped with), and then left the mouse at default - it seems to work well there for me without needing any tweaking. So I can't really comment on iQue vs Logitech software, and I prefer not having to run a big bulky driver with splash screens when I don't absolutely need to.

I've saved the old KB/M for a secondary build, or ready spares. Nothing was wrong with them, other than they were a bit dingy from age. They still worked fine. I do feel somewhat bad replacing hardware that otherwise worked fine, but at the same time, I do enjoy the new KB/M, and I really like being able to type again without feeling like I'm typing on eggshells. As far as longevity goes though - both are more than 3 years old, maybe 4? For a mouse especially to last that long is unusual for me, so in that regard, I'd certainly recommend Corsair to anyone. I just decided to try something else for a bit.