Gadgetory

this video is brought to you by NCI XCOM great technology selection and service hey everyone Aiden here with Harlequin ox and today we're taking a look at Cougars new 450 series the 450k hybrid mechanical keyboard and the 450 and gaming mouse priced at $59.99 USD respectively we'll start by looking at the 450k keyboard and then later take a look at the 450 m starting off with the physical overview the 450 K has a solo plastic build coming in at 1 kilogram or 2.2 pounds it's not particularly heavy for its size but it feels extremely well built there's no flex anywhere in the build and the entire keyboard feels quite tough it features a smooth plastic on the top and bottom of the keyboard with a brushed plastic finish in the center I personally love this design choice brushed plastic allows for a more premium finish without the fingerprint attraction that plays brushed aluminium also here are the hybrid mechanical switches with three color backlighting with an iso keyboard layout on the bottom of the keyboard you have a red finish with five rubber grips as well as true flip-out feet finishing the physical overview is the 1.8 meter cable which is not braided despite Krueger's released specs one of the features cougar is pushing in terms of durability of this keyboard is the splash resistant design which they claim is due to the hybrid mechanical switches that are completely sealed this means no liquids can reach the internals which I would consider a fantastic feature I poured a large amount of water on the keyboard when it was powered on to test this and it held up perfectly which is a testament to the focus on durability which has been placed on this board overall the design of the 450k seems very well-thought-out with a premium build which is not characteristic of this price range the pricing seems very competitive as most affordable Cherry MX boards like the quick-fire TK start at the 70 to 80 dollar range this brings us to the switches on the board it features cougars hybrid mechanical switches cougars concept of these switches is to provide a mechanical feel without the mechanical design Krueger does this by having a fixed mechanism underneath each key cap which actuates the membrane as opposed to the conventional rubber dome method of having the key cap actuate the membrane to actly and as such this allows for longer travel distances these don't feel like Cherry MX switches to me but simultaneously they aren't like membrane switches either while Krueger doesn't state the actuation force I feel these are in the middle of Cherry MX blacks and MX Reds they feel heavy while still being relatively easy to press down while they don't keep the clicky feeling of the blues which I so love I have found myself really enjoying them they are satisfying and consistent unlike many membrane keyboards Logan from Texas indicate compare these two turbo switches and while I haven't tried torpor switches personally the comparison makes sense as a switch design of this board reminds me of the Nova touch these switches are also fairly loud unlike membrane switches so here's a sound sample one of the disadvantages of this non-standard switch is the lack of third-party key cap customization the caps on this board are quite good but the option for the customization that's available MX boards is sorely lacking from this the contains switch does allow for that water resistance though and it also allows for the backlighting to be embedded in the switch which supposedly allows for more even backlighting this brings us into the features and the board packs some simple useful ones the backlighting has three colors red green and blue with three levels of brightness as well as a breathing mode which transitions smoothly however that's where the backlight customization ends with no custom modes or other effects present the backlight brightness is also lackluster with even the brightest level being fairly dim in good light this means that the backlighting can seem uneven as it's quite dim leaving certain areas not adequately lit jumping into the software we have a fair bit of customization for the keyboard you have the ability to rebind every key on the keyboard except for the function button and you can also assign macros to keys this is awesome and it's see this level of customization on a keyboard I wish that you could reassign the function key however as I personally like to have the windows key in that location and would love if you could swap the right windows key to function however that just doesn't seem to be possible the board also has support for three onboard profiles which changed the macros and also can have individual lining profiles so that you can tell which profile is activated these profiles can be changed with the three dedicated keys on the keyboard and there's also media controls as well as a polling rate control up to a thousand Hertz accessible on the board so that about wraps up the 450k it has a great design enjoyable typing and good customization at an attractive price point moving on to its sibling the 450m I found it didn't impressed me quite as much as the 450k did to recap the 450m is priced at $49.99 which puts it in line with mice like the Logitech G for a tune and the razer deathadder so the competition is fierce in this price bracket the 450 M touts an ambidextrous design with two buttons on each side of the mouse and it weighs in at 105 grams which is fairly light for large amounts like this it also features RGB lighting on LAN switches a 5000 dpi optical sensor a thousand Hertz polling and a 32-bit ARM processor with onboard memory in terms of raw specs the mouse delivers with no obvious features missing I personally prefer more buttons like on my g6 are true however for a gaming oriented Mouse this decision is understandable sensor performance has been very good so far it uses a pixel art 331 0d each sensor with no acceleration issues and no polling issues I jumped into csgo and found no abnormal behavior with the sensor it seems to be very accurate and overall the experience was pretty enjoyable my issue with this mouse is not the sensor but with the mouse design the killer for me is the material they chose for this mouse with the top material being a black glossy plastic I honestly can't see any reason for this choice as not only does it look tacky in my opinion but it also picks up fingerprints it's more slippery and is generally just a terrible surface for a mouse I'll give them props for the execution of the surface however as when I saw that it was glossy plastic I did expect much worse but it's been more resistant to finger prints and more grippy than I expected but no matter how well this was executed I don't think this material choice is a good one the sides have a textured rubber finish which works well even if it isn't my favorite feeling texture the true side buttons are very small and Irbid too thin for my preference generally the mouse is fairly good for their palm grip I use with ambidextrous mice but it isn't one of the most comfortable myself used the mouse has a large dpi switcher which is individually lit and while it's a tiny bit far back for my preference it has a very satisfying click and it's easy to press the scrollwheel has very defined steps but I do find the resistance is a little strong for my liking and pressing the scroll wheel takes more force and ensured customization is something the Krueger 450m does well in the software we can switch from our keyboard to the mouse and we see not only three modes like in our keyboard we also have individual profiles you can adjust a range of settings with individual access dpi control which is awesome there's also scroll speed lift height polling rate acceleration and snapping in here which is all great stuff you can have profiles activated by game as well if that's your thing moving to key assignment you can bind macros or keys to every button which is great to see under lighting we have the full RGB lighting suite which was lacking on the keyboard the controls are great with the RGB codes available for input as well as the slider the colors on the mouse match very closely does it software so that's refreshing to see you also have the option between breathing and fully lit I would have liked to see brightness levels but the breathing mode is very good like on the 450k while the lighting effects are simple they're very well executed and work well however they're let down by the ridiculous choice of having green on the mouse the main point of having RGB lighting is color matching with other peripherals so having such a vibrant green on a product with RGB lighting makes little to no sense to me as most lighting themes will clash with it this really is a strange choice to me and it renders most of the colors on the mouse useless whereas they would have looked great with the otherwise plain black mouse so in the end the 450m isn't terrible it just has a lot of questionable design choices if it was competing in the $30 price range it would have had a chance but at this price there are just too many poor design choices for this mouse to compete with the other mice in this price range the lightweight design and average build quality are starkly different to the 450k and they don't seem like they're from the same product line at all ranging from the accent color on the red underbelly of the 450k to the green on the 450 m and this seemingly just different design philosophy of the products in conclusion the 450k hybrid mechanical keyboard offers great value with an enjoyable typing experience excellent build quality and design solid features and a solid price point and as such we're giving it a damn good value award however the 450m contrasts as it seems uncompetitive in the current market while it brings some good customization and hardware the design lets it down resulting in an ultimately lackluster final product thanks for watching everyone feel free to let us know what you think about this lineup at the comments and also let me know what you think of this review and give me any feedback down below I'm Aiden with Hardware Canucks if you enjoyed the review hit that like button don't forget to subscribe for more similar content and we'll see you in the next one