A great gaming gear set for a budget – The Cooler Master Masterkeys Lite L (RGB Keyboard and Mouse Combo)

2016 was a great year for games and many enthusiast grade hardware too,Two gaming beasts “GTX 1080” and “GTX 1070” were launched along with some other budget oriented gaming hardware by both NVIDIA and AMD,

2017 ain’t going to be any ordinary year either, with exclusive games being launched at Q1 and more to come, gamers might need to invest on some quality gear, for console gamers the controllers are enough, but for PC gamers like me who aren’t that comfortable with controllers and like play games the old way with keyboards and mouse.

Here is a good combo that might interest the gamers especially if they are on a budget. It is the Cooler Master Masterkeys Lite L RGB Keyboard and Mouse Combo.

Introduction

As the name says, you are gonna get a beautiful keyboard and a gaming grade mouse. And guess what, both of them are RGB backlight units. These comes at a price of around Rs.5500 which is pretty good for the items that you are getting in the box.

Before moving to the actual review, I would like to mention that at this price range, there are other formidable choices you could go for, some of the choices worth mentioning are the “Logitech’s g213”, “Razer Ornata Chroma”, “Corsair RGB K55” and “Cooler Master combo”.

So, why am I concentrating specifically at the “Cooler Master combo” is that, all the other keyboards don’t come with a mouse.

Let’s be specific with each one of them now. Out of the four, the Razer is actually the best one bothin terms of typing, actuation and lighting, but in India, its price is so steep that you can get a mechanical one with RGBs. The Logitech one comes at the second and it has a faster typing and actuation but lighting is limited but still it’s a great choice, I am mentioning you, if you are not that much into lights u can go for it and the price is actually 1k less.

Lastly, the corsair is not easily available and it’s just not worth the price (in India).

Now let’s get into the review.

Keyboard

The keyboard is lovely at this price. It has Mem-Chanical switches which are nothing but typical membrane switches with a bit more feedback and a faster rebounce. There is are clicky sounds like that of a mechanical keyboard but the fake effect which is created by the plunger and the housing is good, a bit plasticy tone though.

The keys are rated at 12M clicks and about 50g of click force, but these are membranes and would not actuate at just 50% travel, but like around 70-80% travel which is better than normal membranes but nowhere near to mechanicals. Nonetheless, typing experience is quite good though and the since the keyboard is kind of compact, the keys are packed quite close making the typing faster, believe me this happens.

The multimedia keys are accessible through the fn key. You have the ability to disable all the keys, or to disable the windows keys which is the game mode by the way. The response type of the keys can also be set with the f9 and f10 keys via fn key, this thing is very helpful.

There are two options here, one is 1x and other is 8x. how this works is that if u press 1x, then the keyboard will record only the number of inputs relative to the number of times u press a key, let suppose u press a key one time, the keyboard records it as one key press, but when u switch to 8x speed, if u press any key and hold it, it would record it as multiple times. This setting doesn’t change the  actuation speeds though.

The exteriors are very appealing with a matte black finish and the keycaps themselves are UV coated for durability and don’t catch a lot of dust or skin oil. The keyboard has a flat minimal profile which is amazing and it’s quite heavy due to an inbuilt metal plate. But the lack of a wrist rest is a bit of an issue cause the bezels are too thin and there is almost no room for the wrist to fit in.

Mouse

The mouse is responsive but its build is not that sturdy as the keyboard itself. The keys feel clicky but are a bit hard to press, that’s not a big issue though. It’s featuring the infrared avago 3050 gaming grade sensor sporting 500 to 3500 DPI shifts. It looks like some razer mice but is not so comfortable. I think it’s best for claw grippers but I use it all the time with my palm at the top. It has two extra buttons too for back and forward, sadly they can’t be assigned for anything else.

Lighting

As the name suggests the entire combo is RGB Backlight. I am not going to say much about the lights as I have some pics with which u can clarify your doubts and my very own review too mentioned in the link below. Yes, the lights can be controlled from the units themselves with the exclusion of any software. The lights for the keys can be turned on or off with esc and fn key. All the effects, colour, mode, direction controls are from f1 to f7 via the fn key.

The keyboard has 8 different modes and the mouse has two modes. Just mess with the manuals and the units to get the hang of the lighting it’s very simple. The lighting is bright enough to be visible in a mildly bright room of about 300lux (intensity of light in lumens).

The colours are not so vibrant when looked from certain angles due to the structure and placement of the lights. Again, all the different lighting effects are on the video below, so check that out.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_NqnSIPgVX0

Conclusion

So, after this whole review, you might be quite sure that you want to go with this keyboard for an overall experience of typing and lighting. Remember that the Logitech g213 is also a good contender and go for it if u are not so much into the vibrancy of lights. Just that RGBs are becoming the trend in hardware, otherwise you can also opt for a cheap mechanical board from red-dragon or any other brand. But, this combo is quite good and if you are upgrading from a normal membrane and want all the fancy lights along with some gaming performance and looks, U can go for it. So, this review’s done and it’s your wish what to get. This was my suggestion for this segment of gaming gear.