CM Storm Quick Fire Rapid-I Gaming Keyboard Review

With such a small area to work with, you can forgive the absence of dedicated media keys or USB hubs, however CM Storm has included playback and volume control keys which can be activated using the function key (replacing Page Up etc) and F5-F8 twilight as repeat rate adjustments, You're also able to lock the Windows key.


Of course, the main feature the Quick Fire Rapid-I offers is customisable backlighting. This only comes in white but each key is individually lit with the vast majority being individually programmable too. There are five brightness settings and five lighting modes - all on, slow pulse, light on touch, light on touch with slow fade and gaming cluster, which illuminates the WASD and direction keys only.



The illumination levels are fairly broad; there's a huge difference between low and mid brightness, although this should mean that if you prefer to use a very low setting all the time, even in daylight, you're fairly well covered. At maximum brightness, the keys are supremely visible, even in direct sunlight, but are pretty blinding in a dark room.


You can define your own always-on illuminated keys too and there are four profile slots to fill. A function key located to the right of the spacebar allows you to switch modes and also to start the programming phase by pressing any one of M1-M4 (F9-F12), recording all the keys you want illuminated, then pressing your chosen M-key again. By pressing the function key and the M key, your profile is activated.


The backlights themselves are single LEDs located above the actual switch. this illuminates the characters perfectly although any sub-characters obviously suffer, but not too much. There's a semi-transparent base below the keys too, which helps to spread the light bleed around the keys so it's not too obvious or garish.

Conclusion

The excellent backlighting has clearly pushed the price of the Quick Fire Rapid-I higher than you might expect for a tenkeyless keyboard, even a mechanical one, although there are plenty out there that retail for a lot more too. However, the build quality does also factor in here. From what we've seen in other reviews, though, some people may not be too keen on the soft-touch coating. There's no options here for Cherry MX black fans either and no macro functions. It's also more expensive than Corsair's K65, but that keyboard does omit backlighting.

These are our only criticisms, though, as the Quick Fire Rapid-I is otherwise a very solid keyboard, with nearly everything you could want in terms of backlighting, so long as you like white of course. It's pricey but we feel it warrants it's price tag, if only to a select few.