Review on ASUS ROG II Mechanical Passthrough by Ha Joon Bong ᠌

Name: ASUS ROG II Mechanical Passthrough
Item: ASUS ROG II Mechanical Passthrough
Rating: 5

October 21, 2022

Feel free to buy, for such a price, the quality is simply amazing.

Before that, I used Corsair K70 with Cherry MX Brown for about 8 years. I had no complaints about this keyboard, it is still alive, and even looks good, but I needed a wireless keyboard in order to play in front of the TV. I did not want to take a budget device as an additional one, I wanted it to be "all in one". Well, they arrived: from the normal devices available with us - Logitech G915, Razer BlackWidow V3 and Asus. As a result, the choice fell on this miracle of Taiwanese technology.
Never regretted the purchase. Again, the keyboard is a pleasure to use. It's beautifully built and feels like a monolith, it has very nice keys and comprehensive functionality, it finally looks great without all those pseudo-gaming whistles and grunts. I must say, for my taste, the Logitech G915 looks even more attractive: its design is simply gorgeous. But she has enough of her shortcomings, according to reviews and reviews.
By the way, the Asus keyboard does NOT have a Bluetooth connection, only its own wireless channel or wire. It doesn't bother me at all, but it may seem critical to someone.
For a couple of months of active use, I found only a few shortcomings, half of which can not be encountered at all with more or less careful handling, and one more is a toad that should have been crushed a long time ago. Actually, if you need an uncompromising WIRELESS gaming keyboard, and there is an opportunity to spend 200+ evergreen money on it, then this one is definitely worth a closer look.

Pros

+ This is, so to speak, the flagship wireless keyboard of a very well-known brand. So, excellent build quality, (subjectively) excellent appearance, a lot of nice "chips". + The most noticeable of the "chips" is modularity. The digital block can be removed altogether, it can be rearranged to the left side. + Innovative super duper mega switches. Asus in promotional materials strongly emphasizes their response speed, durability and other advantages, but for me personally their incredible innovativeness is not quite obvious. But it is obvious that the switches are very quiet (I have a version with red switches) and there is practically no play on them (yes, even on space and shifts). The user experience is extremely pleasant, even after the high-quality mechanical keyboard that I previously had. + The backlight is very even, very bright at maximum and can be adjusted to your heart's content. If there are other components of the system unit with Asus Aura support, then the backlight can be synchronized with all these components, because the software is common. There is no need to install several software packages, everything is collected in one. + Every single key is programmable. Macros can be recorded on the fly. + Battery life is about a week with backlight, and this is in a fairly active mode (5-6 hours of games per day) + typing. More than 2 weeks went without illumination. For me this is more than enough. By the way, the Asus battery, without further ado, was taken from the line of their smartphones (the battery marking is CA456080G). + Rest for wrists and plugs of lateral contacts on magnets. They stick with a nice click. + Wired USB Type C connection, and yes, that's a plus. In 2022, it would be time already (hello Logitek). Now one wire is enough on the table, to which you can plug, for example, a telephone. The keyboard comes with 2 adapters that allow you to connect the keyboard to a regular USB. + Judging by the reviews, very low latency in both wired and wireless modes.

Cons

Cons, as often happens, are a direct continuation of the pros: - This is the flagship keyboard of a very famous brand. And that means it costs . How to put it mildly . Well, much more than we would like. Although it cost me an analogue of 210 American money (with a recommended cost of 270), for a keyboard it's still, as for me, a lot. - Very innovative switches use their own, strictly proprietary keycaps. Having a certain degree of curvature, it is possible, as is customary with us, to break one, lose one, and after that think for a long time on the topics "Who is to blame" and "What to do." Here you don’t have Cherry MX, for which you can get keycaps on a well-known trading platform for a couple of bucks per bag. Also, they can rub off over time. - Magnetic plugs for side contacts are not attached to the keyboard in any way. This means that they can also be lost, having all the same, not very great, degree of curvature. Given all this, as well as the cost of the device, it has to be extremely careful handling. - Attached digital block dangles a little. This is something very unexpected. True, this only manifests itself if it is specially chatted (pulled up from the table surface). In work and games, this does not manifest itself in any way.