On Our Desk - 14

Keysonic Intuition-XL Keyboard (ACK-5600 ALU+)

Manufacturer: Keysonic
Price (as reviewed): £44.99, available January

Keyboards, we all need one in some form to complement the mouse on our desks, and Keysonic's new Intuition-XL keyboard, or ACK-5600 ALU+, is a full size brushed aluminium keyboard with low profile laptop keys.

Very swish.

It comes in both anodised black and plain silver, but to be honest the black is better looking and goes better with the "leather" palm rest.

The aluminium looks great - much better than the usual moulded plastic we normally see - but naturally it's cold for the wrists when you get into work or wake-up on those winter mornings. The sticky leather patch cures this, and although it does spoil the nice neat look stuck to the top it's a welcome addition but it is a one time only application.

The Intuition-XL is a keyboard for those who prefer typing on a laptop. The low profile keys and short strokes better suit faster typists and require less effort to strike, however for those who have used to the RSI reducing "natural" style there's still no option available for these keys outside of the standard rectangular shape unfortunately.


We found the build quality to be very good - the space bar allows an even depression even at the extreme ends and the keys are well placed, although the slim enter key may take a little getting used to.

Additional features include fancy blue LEDs for the num, caps and scroll lock keys, not that it'll be that new to us and something funkier like (bit-tech) purple would have been cool. They could have been more diffused for our liking though because, when typing in the dark, they seem to call planes to land which is not great when you work on the Heathrow flight path like we do.

On the back there is a two port USB hub and 3.5mm microphone/headphone jacks that are all powered from the USB connection to the PC. This is slightly unusual in that it offers a 5V power socket to provide a powered hub, however Keysonic doesn't go as far as to include the power adapter for it as well. That's a little dangerous when you consider that USB devices are limited to a certain milliampere range and using any old 5V power brick just won't do.


Finally there is also a sleep button, along with volume up and down and mute buttons. Depending on how much you use the extra buttons on any keyboard is a personal thing - we find Macro-assignable ones on the Logitech G15 useful, but we're split down the middle in the office whether "media keys" on keyboards are actually useful - Harry says he's bought keyboards because of them, Tim says he forgets they are there and never uses them.

Providing you want a normal rectangular keyboard typing on it is a genuinely very nice experience and gamers may like the short stroke slash fast response keys (Tim loves typing on laptop keyboards, but hates gaming on them). However the extended aluminium wrist rest will be a bit of a love/hate thing considering how big your hands are and where they usually sit. Personally, I found it just a bit too short.

Verdict: A really nice looking, high quality keyboard with fast keys, but it's very expensive for what it does and doesn't offer a huge amount of extras. Essentially you're paying for the brushed aluminium and blue LEDs over the usual plastic/green LED combo.