City of Heroes: Live Forum Archive

Best wireless gaming keyboard?

Postagulous

By Postagulous,
Posted on: 2010-06-25 07:14 in Player Questions

 

Posted

Hey all, I'm frustrated beyond all belief. The thing is, there used to be some decent wireless keyboards on the market that were decent for gaming. Nowadays, though, keyboard manufacturers seem to have decided that they all have to go mucking around with a good thing. I'm currently in the market for a decent wireless keyboard that can be used for gaming, and I just haven't been able to find one.

Here are my criteria of what makes a good wireless keyboard:

  • The Insert, Delete, Home, End, Page Up, and Page Down keys must be in their correct traditional positions. Insert, Home, Page Up on the top row, Delete, End, and Page Down on the bottom row. This is a game breaker to me, no pun intended.
  • The function keys have to be full-sized keys. No stupid tiny little plastic tabs that are hard to find or hit. Ditto the escape key and the Print Screen, Scroll Lock (yes, I do use it) and Pause/Break keys.
  • It has to have a numeric keypad, and all of the keys have to be in their correct traditional positions.
  • It has to be able to handle chording at least decently well. For those unfamiliar with the term, many non-gaming keyboards shortcut the manufacturing process by putting keys that are not usually pressed together on the same circuits. For example, they think that no one would ever hold down the W key, Alt key, and 4 key at the same time, so if you're running forward in the game and you want to fire off some power on your secondary tray, you're screwed.
  • I'd like to have at least a volume control button and a mute button. Other media control buttons are okay, but not required.
  • I'd prefer Bluetooth, but RF is livable.
  • I'd like an LCD on it, but it's not required.
  • Special "macro" or function keys are okay, but really, unnecessary.

I'm really frustrated at how like 90% of all wireless keyboards manufactured today violate the first requirement above. Each manufacturer has their own layout now, and some manufacturers even use several different layouts among their different product lines. For example, Logitech, which I used to buy all the time, has no less than five different layouts for their keyboards!

Anyway, anyone have suggestions?

We've been saving Paragon City for eight and a half years. It's time to do it one more time.
(If you love this game as much as I do, please read that post.)

 

Posted

Even as a non-hardcore gamer [or maybe I am] I would never use a wireless while gaming. If you've never been on a team where someone declares their mouse is dead and goes afk for four minutes, count yourself lucky.

All the best gaming stuff is wired. I recommend the G11 keyboard if you're wanting some serious programability, though I have never done crap with the 18 extra keys. And with three shifts, that's 54 extra "G-keys."

I don't recommend wireless. Others may disagree.

I think you're biggest problem will be chording. As for inflexibility with different keyboards, I once used Microsoft Natural at work and home [on two different computers there]. Both Naturals on my own computers had different key layouts at that time. I found I needed to have at least one that was traditional due to my inability to use them after a while. Being adaptable is good.