Cooler Master, a company known for their computer cases and cooling solutions, are trying to emerge into the gaming peripherals scene. They have a number of mice and headsets but I was more interested in their keyboards. For the price of just around 70$ their mechanical keyboards are nothing to laugh at.
In 2008 Cooler Master started their gaming peripherals division “CM Storm” in hopes of “Arming the gaming revolution.” The CM Storm Quickfire Rapid keyboard just the tool to start this revolution. The Quickfire comes in a plethora of different models for you to choose from to find the perfect size and feel that you want in a keyboard.
The quickfire Rapid is a Mechanical Keyboard (along with all of the other Quick Fire keyboards) and comes in Cherry MX Blue, Brown, Red and Black. Coming from a Steelseries 6Gv2, Black is what feels the best to me so that is what I got on the one I ordered from Cooler Master. The keys feel pretty solid but when compared to the Steelseries the key caps themselves feel light and a little cheap.
The Rapid is a “ten-keyless” keyboard meaning it doesn’t have a number pad which helps keep the size of the keyboard down. I constantly have too much on my desk since I got my touch screen and am running a second computer with another keyboard so having that extra room allows for more mouse movement and I even have room for a cup of tea. If you need a number pad, other versions of the Quick Fire have them but the rapid and stealth don’t.
The cable that is included is a Usb to Usb that plugs into a little hub on the bottom center of the board. CM Storm were pretty smart with including different trenches for the cable to either run out of the left, right, or back of the keyboard. I have not tried different cables with the keyboard but I’m almost 100 percent sure that you can substitute cables if anything happens to the one that Cooler Master has provided you with. The cables they give you is braided and plenty long to reach from your desk to my computer which is sitting on the floor. The connectors themselves are gold plated.
With the amount of different options from keyboard size, back lighting, and swtich type paired with the low cost make this a very strong competitor to Razer and Steelseries. My Beloved Steelseries 6Gv2 has taken a back seat to this board because of the smaller size and I don’t notice much of a different in how the board feels other than that. Its a very solid board and feels much more then what they have priced it at. Cooler Master is no longer just a brand that makes cases and cooling and I am excited to see where CM Storm goes from here.