The Razer Lycosa is an evolved and sleeker Razer Tarantula with stripped off functionality. The original Tarantula was a great keyboard but what concerned us was the ?stripped off functionality? amounting to how Razer cut corners to reduce the price and spawn a totally new product. There are two versions available?a mirror edition and the standard edition with the rubber coating, which is what we are reviewing below. The only difference in the two is the glossy keys and mirrored surface on the aptly named mirror edition.
While the Lycosa is fairly big, it is incredibly light with the flat keys akin to laptops furthering the sleekness Razer was trying to achieve. This can either be a good or a bad thing depending upon personal preference of desktop or laptop keyboards. Instead of going for media buttons, Razer decided upon a touch panel with dedicated music keys.
On the back are three ports, one for a USB device, the second and third for a headphone and microphone with the Lycosa cable splitting into four parts for each of the devices. The Lycosa only requires its own USB port to be used so it is not necessary to plug in all four ports. The extra USB cable helps by making the Lycosa support a high powered USB 2.0 device to function which wouldn?t be possible if it was shared with the keyboard.
The non-slip rubber finish is quite helpful for those long and strenuous gaming sessions as it helps by stopping the sweat from sticking to the keyboard and making it all gunky. Also, be rest assured about cleanliness as Razer included a cloth with the bundle so that the Lycosa can be cleaned thoroughly after a long gaming session. The palm rest is big and stable since it has been screwed into place although for the more adventurous there is the option to detach it by removing the screws from behind. This might seem tedious but is invariably better than the detachable palm rest present on the Logitech G110,another gaming keyboard which is quite wobbly in comparison.
The rubber gripping present under the keyboard prevent it from moving around on a slippery surface. Overall, the keyboard is quite comfortable and considerable. Thought must has gone into making the slim design lessen chances of cramps or finger stress. The one problem with the view?ability of the keys was that it was hard to make out the characters on the keys so it goes without saying that the back lighting is a must in any kind of environment and will have to be permanently kept on.
The touch panel toggle for lighting the entire keyboard or the WASD keys exclusively has an interesting reason. The ?anti-ghosting? feature for the WASD gaming cluster essentially means that the four keys can be depressed and they all will be registered as individual keystrokes versus the three keys registering in normal keyboards. While this could have been a great feature, who would really want to move in all four directions at the same time in any game and as such the feature is wasted. Something infinitely better would have been ?anti-ghosting? implementation over the entire keyboard, something present in the Razer Tarantula. The bundled Razer software helps with programming of the keys and configuring the entire functionality appealing to gamers wanting complete control of their keyboard.
The keys are quite loud and can be heard distinctly in a quiet environment . But for hardcore gamers this shouldn?t really be a problem and might only irk a demographic wanting to use the keyboard for a lot of typing.
The Lycosa is a keyboard with a lot of promise held back by a few glaring flaws and should be purchased if the compromises can be lived with, otherwise there are many things to like and suitable for gamers and LAN party players searching for a portable gaming keyboard.
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