We have reviewed a lot of keyboards here at Keyboardslab, however, the Chilkey ND75 might just be the best “budget” keyboard we have seen. The Chilkey ND75 starts at $89, however, its shipping will begin in July. This is the same company that came out with the Rainy 75, an amazing budget keyboard that was once on the top of our list of budget keyboards.
Review
You can get this keyboard in four colors, Pure White, Elegant Purple, Jet Black, and Mountain Blue. It is a 75% keyboard, and it has a shiny aesthetic to it that we liked. The board is made entirely of Aluminum, so it is a little heavy and feels quite premium, and it also has a small screen. This keyboard already comes with switches and stabilizers, which is very good for a keyboard that costs only 90 dollars.
The board is gasket mounted but the gasket performance is dull and it feels very stiff. The typing performance is overall very good and the switches feel good as well. The keycaps are double-shot PBT and feel like any other $20 set of keycaps. They are more on the louder side and will make some noise when you’re typing.
The Chilkey ND75 comes with Dopamine Blue linear Gateron EF switches, and these are the switches that you can get with this keyboard as of now. They are hot-swappable, so you can remove and replace them without any soldering. The switches are pre-lubed and are relatively lightweight, they feel and sound good, and the only complaint here is that we don’t have a lot of choice in choosing a switch for this keyboard as this is the only one available.
The RGB is very dim, sometimes you don’t even feel that you have RGB with this keyboard until you look very closely or turn the lights off. The board has a screwless quick assembly system that works using magnets, there are no screws attached and you can just remove the frame by pulling on it a little from the side, you can also take the PCB board off because it is also attached via magnets, and you only have to connect a little ribbon in place to assemble the keyboard again. This makes it great for customization as you can easily take the keyboard apart in just under 30 seconds.
The foam that comes pre-installed was stuck to the board with a very strong adhesive, which makes replacing the foam a very tiresome job, also, the keyboard surprisingly sounds better without the foam. There is also a plastic sheet between the board and the foam that further helps with sound dampening.
The on/off switch is below the right shift keycap, and you do have to take the keycap off every time you want to turn on the keyboard or switch it off. This was a complaint people had with the Rainy 75 as well but the company did not take that into account when building this keyboard, the keyboard can also connect via Bluetooth.
The screen is what separates this keyboard from other budget keyboards, it looks really good but the software is really bad and difficult to use. A more interactive UI would have been better and would have made the screen more usable.
What’s in the box
- Chilkey ND75
- USB-C cable
- 2.5GHz USB Dongle
- Screws
- Silica Gel
- Extra Screen Cable
Verdict
The Chilkey ND75 sounds good and performs well. The only downside is the placement of the on/off switch and the foam. Customizing is very easy and we would like to see more keyboards released that are without any screws and take only a few seconds to take apart. Overall, this is a very solid keyboard with very few cons.
