Review: The Meka G-Unit's silly name belies a really gorgeous and surprisingly good product.
We are used to weird names at Atomic, but we don’t exactly know why Thermaltake has decided on G-Unit as the designation for its new mechanical keyboard. But we also don’t really care, because the Meka G-Unit is one of the nicest gaming keyboards we’ve used.
While competing mechanical keyboards push for modern stylings, the G-Unit is almost a throwback to the good old days of injection molded input devices. Its matte black casing looks and feels remarkably sturdy, and the individually sprung keys are a true joy to use. They’re also a lot quieter than those found on Razer’s competing Blackwidow keyboard, still not silent but not as brutally mechanical in nature.
The main differentiator between the G-Unit and other Meka keyboards is the partial backlighting. Rather than illuminate every key the G-unit is quite selective, with WASD, ctrl, shift, space and the arrow keys all sporting white LED backlights. There are also small white LEDs on the caps lock, numlock and scroll lock keys that denote whether they are on or off.
Besides this lighting the G-Unit packs twelve dedicated macro buttons, three profiles, the ability to disable the windows key and the usual array of media and volume control buttons. It comes with a detachable, cloth covered USB cord and sports two USB ports alongside headset jacks on the back of the keyboard. It also comes with a detachable palm rest.
We’d have preferred red backlighting to keep our vision sharp in our darkened gaming room, but the white LEDs are subtle enough to not distract. Keeping them to only a handful of keys is handy for quick positioning, but ultimately we prefer a solution like the red underkey lighting seen on Microsoft’s Sidewinder X6. Its matt black surface, however, is a godsend after the shiny, smudgy plastic of the Razer Blackwidow.
Ultimately the decision to go with a mechanical keyboard over the common rubber membrane based design is a personal one – but if you like mechanical this delivers in spades. It is one of the more expensive models out there, which is its only real downside, but well worth your consideration.
Issue: 137 | June, 2012