(NEW) 8Bitdo M Edition Retro Mechanical Keyboard
$59.99
$99.99
40% off
Reference Price
Condition: New
Top positive review
13 people found this helpful
Great first attempt at a mechanical keyboard by 8bitdo
By Sweet Tea Bags on Reviewed in the United States on December 18, 2023
8bitdo is known for their wireless controllers and it seems like they've decided to expand into mechanical keyboards. This is a great first attempt by them! I have a couple mechanical keyboards so I'm not an expert by any means, but I'll try to make it make sense for newbies.I have a Redragon K556 Pro that I used to type on before I got this and 8bitdo's has blown that out of the water.Battery life:The battery life is fantastic. I can't get my redragon to last more than a couple days even with turning off the keyboard at the end of the day. I haven't had to charge the battery yet for 8bitdo's and I started using it around early November 2023. Can't remember if it was bluetooth or 2.4 so I'll update when I check next time I'm in the office.The switches:I swapped out the switches in my Redragon for speed silvers which I do love, but I also love the switches on the 8bitdo keyboard. If you're a newbie to mechanical keyboards, the switches they use on 8bitdo's are the Kailh White switches which aren't super noisy, but aren't linear either. They're tactile. They're louder than speed silvers but still type nicely and aren't as loud as cherry blue switches. The clickiness volume sounds like a normal keyboard so your coworkers won't be super unhappy with you unless you're an angry typer like I am, lol. They sold me on the Kailh switches so if I ever decide to switch, that's what I'm using.The keycaps:I swapped out my keycaps on my Redragon which have a KCA profile. I wasn't super happy with them because I kept mistyping. I'm more of a Cherry girl. If I had to guess which keycap profile these were, these look a lot like DSA or XDA which are probably more my speed. They remind me of the XVX XDA profile keycaps actually (also sold on amazon), which are about same height as a normal keyboard's keycaps. That was smart because that makes this as close to a normal keyboard with the benefits of a mechanical keyboard. It's great for those who are thinking about swapping to a mechanical keyboard but also don't want to sink $$$ into one or wasting money trying to find the right keycap profiles for their typing style.The big red buttons:These are just so fun to use! It took me a second to figure out how to program them, but the instructions included were very helpful so I figured it out. They also weren't on fragile paper and I have it hiding under the buttons. It came with stickers too. I programmed my two to be Ctrl+C & Ctrl+V because they are my most used buttons and they work great when I remember to use them. My coworkers love to come over and mess with me by clicking them. These are wired, but the wire is long enough and unobtrusive.Was this worth it?:Absolutely 100% worth it. Mechanical keyboards get so costly. The fact that they made this keyboard $99.99 is extremely accessible when you consider that mechanical keyboards can cost hundreds. I hope to see a full sized version someday. No lie, I also wish they sold the keycaps because I absolutely love the retro aesthetic of this keyboard. It feels good and looks good so I would recommend this.
Top critical review
1 people found this helpful
Good with some asterisks
By simon on Reviewed in the United States on September 2, 2024
For me, this is a 7/10 keyboard, but I can't give it 3.5 stars here...Reviewing this is a bit challenging because value is generally an important metric to scoring. However, mechanical keyboard pricing is all over the place, this is far from the most expensive keyboard, but also far from the cheapest.I think that if someone is dropping $100 dollars for a themed keyboard, it's fair to expect some level of polish in the execution. Which brings me to my pettiest negative as well as the one that bothers me the most.--- The petty stuffIf you check the first picture, you might notice there's something off about the LED labels, particularly SCRLK. If you can't see it, the print in the key cap might give it away - it appears that the LED label wasn't fully printed, missing a few rows of ink, perhaps.I'd also say the "design" for this labels need some help as well, it's basically impossible to read them at a normal distance due to the combination of tiny font and the low contras. In practice this isn't much of an issue as you can just memorize which is which, but I find it slightly annoying nonetheless.--- The importantI would say the most important aspect of a keyboard is how it feels, and I'd say that, for the most part*, this feels great, but when it comes to feeling's cousin - sound - I'm not so positive. I don't consider myself to be particularly sensitive to sound, and I've never gone out of my way to buy a silent variant of any product, but in this case I'd say the keyboard is a bit too loud, I definitely don't recommend it if you plant to use it close to someone else, unless I want to piss them off.* The exception for this being the big red buttons that come as an accessory. I'm no expert, but I think the switches used for them just aren't strong enough to handle the button's weight properly and pressing them isn't satisfying, unlike the main keyboard.--- ConnectivityWhile I couldn't really test the battery life as I almost always use it wired. That doesn't mean I haven't used bluetooth.BT was one of the reasons I got this keyboard as I sometimes "need" it for the deck, as not having to worry about disconnecting and reconnecting cables seemed like a nice quality of life for me, and for that purpose it works perfectly fine. I move the switch and 1-2 seconds later I'm typing on the deck without incident.-- AnnoyancesFirst one is on me for not noticing that this keyboard lacks a context menu button, I don't think I had ever seen one before this one, but in here it is replaced for one of those "macro" A/B buttons.The other one I don't know if it's the keyboard or my computer as I recently started fresh, but even when scrlk is turned on, it doesn't work in programs it used to like spreadsheet and notepad++. The fact that it is non-functional in both windows and linux makes me think it is a keyboard issue, but I can't be sure of it until I get another keyboard to double-check.
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