It seems lately the market has become flooded with mechanical keyboards and that can be a good thing or a bad thing as there’s just a lot of choices and like any product not all are created equal.  There was a time when you had to search high and low for a mechanical keyboard but they’ve become extremely popular. Up for review today I have an excellent product, one that I’ve come to love honestly, it’s the Crimson Pro mechanical gaming keyboard from a company called Sentey and it features Cherry MX Black switches. The Crimson Pro has plenty of features that gamers and non gamers can appreciate I’m sure. This keyboard features red LED backlighting behind all of the keys and you can even re-program the keys to do most anything you want and even disable them or program macros to them. The Crimson Pro comes with a carrying case and a bit of gamer swag and it even has built-in USB ports and audio jacks. Read on to learn more…

 

 

Unboxing

 

Let’s start out with a video unboxing, then continue on for the pictures.

 

 

The box is rather subdued for a gaming product, usually they’re all flashy and exciting. The Crimson Pro box just has pictures of the keyboard and a little bit of info about it. The one thing you will notice first though about the box is that it’s very heavy, much heavier than you would expect for a keyboard for sure.

 

 

When you open the box you’ll be greeted with a black box and then inside that is a black case. The case is very plain except for the Sentey logo but it’s well made, it feels sturdy and durable.

 

The case has dual zipper on it and rubberized and rather rugged handles.

 

 

When you unzip the case you’ll find two sections, a top net section with accessories in it and a bottom padded section that holds the keyboard.

 

 

Up in the net section was the wrist rest, door hanger, poster, folder with documentation and a small black nylon drawstring bag.

 

The wrist rest has the Sentey logo on it and it’s basically a piece of plastic. On the bottom you’ll see rubber feet to help keep the keyboard from sliding and on the edge are pieces of plastic that stick out and go into the matching part of the keyboard to attach the wrist rest to it.

 

 

In the small nylon drawstring bag you’ll find a small zipper bag with a black key puller and orange keys. The idea is to replace the WASD keys for gaming but you can use them for anything.

 

 

Inside the small black folder is a driver disc, user guide, Sentey VIP card, a sticker sheet, warranty booklet and a Sentey product catalog.

 

So here’s the Crimson Pro, it is a nice looking keyboard. The UBS cable comes wrapped up in plastic for protection.

 

The USB cable is gold plated and it’s for connecting to your computer but it’s also for the USB ports that the keyboard has built-in. The keyboard cable also has connections for headphones and a microphone.

 

 

The Crimson Pro is black in color and it’s not shiny, which I like, it’s more of a flat black and overall it has a gamer looks and feel to it. I think it has an almost military look to it personally. I like non glossy or non shiny as the seemed to collect dust as quickly.  Yes glossy looks great, but after a day or so it’s got fingerprints and dust all over it and it doesn’t look so good anymore.

 

The Crimson Pro has a full numerical keypad, which is something that I like to have and use often. What’s important though is what’s above the keypad and that’s three indicators, two of which you’re familiar with I’m sure, and they are Numlock and Caps Lock, but the third is G for Gamer mode which is specific for the Crimson Pro. Above the indicators you’ll see labels for microphone, headset and two USB ports. The labels correspond to the front edge of the keyboard where you’ll find the ports to go along with the labels.

 

 

On the top of the keyboard are the function keys and they perform double duty in conjunction with the FN key. You’ll find multimedia functions like play and pause but there’s also five keys labeled PF1 through PF5 which are used to switch profiles.  There’s also the F12 key that’s labeled G/PC which is used to switch between gaming and regular modes.

  

 

Here’s a couple more views for you, the spacebar has the Sentey logo on it and there’s a key labeled Fn on the right side where the Windows key might be for the secondary functions.

 

 

The Crimson Pro features Cherry MX Black key switches which are considered to be medium stiff and they’re not as loud as other mechanical switches are. Cherry MX Black switches aren’t clicky like what most people expect mechanical keyboard to be but they’re not silent either. The key switches themselves don’t click but a full press on the key does make the familiar mechanical keyboard clack sound. Cherry MX Black keys require just 2mm of downward movement to register  the key press and then another 2mm to bottom out. They are moderately heavy in terms of resistance so there’s less likely a chance of mistakenly hitting a key. Some people don’t like Cherry MX Black for typing, but I don’t mind them at all myself, I very much like them.

 

Here’s the side profile of the Crimson Pro, it’s only about one inch thick making it nice and thin.

 

On the bottom you’ll find the identification label along with rubber feet and two legs that can be flipped out to lift the keyboard up at an angle if you wish.