Gadgetory

okay guys I promise you this isn't another gaming keyboard and I'm sure most of you would have realized that with the intro so without any further ado I'd like to introduce you guys to the craft keyboard by Logitech this is a complete package for creative professionals who are looking to take their interactive experience with their respective work to the next level but it comes at a cost for $200 this is an expensive investment and you should seriously think twice before taking the plunge unless if you're a confident that this would optimize your workflow and I'm hoping by the end of this video you will come to a thorough understanding as to how the craft keyboard works specifically you know with certain programs and it will perhaps make you know your purchasing decision so let's dive into this but first a quick message from our sponsor you can only rely on the pro to do the job with every keystroke satisfying like the millions before it quality feel with every key regardless of your space Coolermaster master keys bro they could with you make it yours let's get some basic stuff out of the way since I'm sure most of you are excited to see how the creative dial input performs first order of business the design and I love it personally it's a welcoming change from a traditional gaming keyboard and I've always had a soft spot for minimalist design boards and the craft delivers exactly that it's a full-size keyboard that comes with this matte grey coating otherwise known as graphite throughout the chassis the edges are rounded which gives it a unique appearance when it's on a desk and for those of you wondering it dis complements the MX master 2's Mouse really well as you can see the uniformity with the color scheme is top-notch so if you're planning to build a simple setup here you go the build quality gets a solid 8 out of 10 and the reason I say that is I've seen keyboards that are less expensive featuring metal housings the main body of the craft is primarily made out of hard plastic materials but it has some series have to it resulting in a structure that's barely flexible so that's awesome this partly also has to do with the metal housing on the top portion of the keyboard that carries all the electronics inside including the touch sensor for the dial the keys are well spaced out throughout the body but most importantly each individual keys a feature these rounded concave shape design that's supposed to complement your typing experience it took me a few days to get used to but boy does it align really well with my finger tips you won't notice the texture difference once you get accustomed to these new keys so if I were you I wouldn't worry about discomfort in the long run the craft is a cross-platform compatible meaning it should work with both Windows and Mac OS and they have carefully labeled the start and command keys right beside the spacebar key although I did find it a little bit confusing at times where I would accidentally hit one or the other but I would have preferred some neutral signs on both these keys because seriously it's it's really confusing I mean it's probably just me but I don't know let me know what you guys think about it in the comments down below logitech users scissor type mechanism to actuate the keystrokes this eliminates an unnecessary wobbling around the corner of each key therefore resulting in consistent actuations the slim profile of the keys along with their shorter travel times made typing faster from my usage I can't scientifically test how faster or slower these switches are when compared to a full-size mechanical keyboard or a mechanical switch but here's my verdict on these low-profile scissor titles which is they are of great quality and they don't require too much force to actuate and they're pretty fast the keys are individually backlit and they are very bright during low-light conditions there is a proximity sensor located at the top right hand side of the keyboard that detects your hands when it approaches the unit and it lights up the keyboard automatically it's a great feature to have especially when you're working those night hours but I wished it only worked during those hours and not during daytime as well this could have extended the battery life significantly speaking of battery life the craft is a wireless keyboard and a connects to your computer via the unifying USB receiver or bluetooth it comes with the easy shift technology that switches between three different devices and there are dedicated buttons for that task it works really well and I have it paired with my desktop laptop and even my smart phone the media playback buttons along with other controls like volume adjust brightness adjust task view and Action Center are implemented within the function keys and they are assigned as primary buttons out of the box but the user can always switch back to the standard mode through the software I should also mention that you can program these function keys through their software and Logitech has included a handful of commands that users can take advantage of this also applies to those dedicated keys that are located at the top row section of the numpad although I would leave them as is since they are important shortcuts anyway except for a few that you can customize ultimately it's your call and I'm glad that Logitech has opened their options to the end user clicking on angle adjustments there are none on the craft keyboard although by design the metal casing at the top angles the keyboard by just a bit and that's all you get now does that affect economics not really at least for me but it's something to be aware of before making the purchase all right I think it's about time to talk about the creative input dial on the craft keyboard other known as the count and you know what this is what makes this keyboard stand out from the competition and I think some creative professionals might find this an attractive feature so what exactly does it do well it instantly acts as a specific functions for certain programs and allows the user to adjust values it's also touch sensitive meaning programs that require multiple functions within a contextual tool can take advantage of the dial although you have to be really careful when operating it as it's a little too sensitive let me show you a quick demo as to how it works so what you're looking at right now is a screen capture of the desktop and I have an overlay shot of me playing around with the dial in real time let's kick things off with the option software so as you can see how the MX master 2's Mouse and the Kraft keyboard paired up let's quickly switch over to the Crown segment and we can see that we can customize three functions so there's turn pressed and press and turn so in my case I have the turn feature set to adjust a volume then as you can see it does exactly that when I press the dial it plays or pause a certain music track but in this case I don't have a music player open so that's okay when I press and turn this switches between applications so that is a pretty cool feature like I said you can also customize these options with certain you know controls so in this case we have the option to do a desktop switch if we want to or you could just leave it as none if you really don't want to play around with default settings now when you install the options software Logitech automatically scans the programs that you have installed in a computer and it checkmarks that was those applications and you know requests you install the profiles for those applications so like as you see here I have Photoshop Premiere Pro Chrome edge and Excel PowerPoint and word installed I don't have illustrator because I haven't I don't have that program installed on it but for now let's just work with a few applications here let's kick things off with edge the function is pretty straightforward all you need to do is just turn and it will switch between tabs so that's a cool way if you have multiple tabs open this is a great way to just skim over those tabs and look at you know just browse through what you're looking at which is great let's switch over to word here for a second here what you could do is change the theme style of the text so all I have to do is just scroll the dial and it'll just change the theme just like that now if you want to change the theme color or the theme font there are three more options if you pay close attention to the bottom section of the screen there are three options that are grayed out so if you need to access them only need to do is just tap and you can adjust the theme color just like that now if you want to change the theme font you can just have one more time and that would just adjust the theme font so it works really well it's a little touch sensitive to be honest because you know you can accidentally just click or you know tap on the theme style instead of adjusting the font so it really does take a little while to get used to now another thing I could do is just select the text and adjust the font if I want to and it does a really good job doing that it can also change the paragraph style or I can also align the text so let's just leave it centralized because Boston is awesome when we order to excel there are a few options that you could access within the dial so as you can see I have a benchmarks a file where I can pair different pcs and what you're looking at right now is GP temperatures everything's laid out really well so if I twist the dial what I can do is adjust the sheet navigation so I can scroll through different sheets that I have within that file now if I tap one more time on the dial I can scroll and shift between horizontal cells so now it doesn't have a vertical solution but this is great if you're just you know scrolling through cells there's also one more option to zoom if you want to get a better view of the chart so that's that's a really cool option and there are other ways that you can also take advantage of the doubt so for instance if I click on the chart I can adjust between different charts that I'd like to access so in this case I can go 3d if I want to do that although I prefer it as it was in the beginning I can also do a quick layout shift if I want to just shift between different layouts there's also the change if I want to change the color of a chart I could do that but in this case I have it set a default so it won't really you know shift that and I can also change the chart style if I want to just go with a different theme so that's that's pretty cool you know photoshop is where things get a little interesting so in this case I thumbnail opened up very straightforward analysis for the NAR box review so what I do is just adjust the dial I'm going to scroll the dolly because as you can see it adjusts the brightness of the photo so it takes a little while to catch up I mean it all depends on how fast your computer is because remember Photoshop is an intensive program and it requires a speedy computer but it does get the job done really well so I'm just gonna leave the brightness to zero because I like the way how it is I can also adjust a contrast if I want to so that's a great way to add a little blacks I can also adjust a saturation unfortunately there isn't an option to change the vibrancy but it is something that hopefully I'm hoping that Logitech would add in an update now what other cool feature that you could do with the dial is adjust the brush size so if I want to add a lens flare effect I can just click on you know the Brett brush the brush paint tool and start adding colors so I can adjust the brush size change the colors quickly and you know add a blend mode and call it a day you know these are some of the things that I've seen myself using a regular basis so I'm really glad that Logitech has added these implementations within creative programs except for Premiere Pro because there are only two ways to take advantage of the dial the first thing is to navigate to the timeline the other option is to use a jog wheel shape function that just scroll to the timeline by frames I don't see using that as a feature but the timeline navigation works really well and I'm glad that you know it works just as it should so at least you know we have something let's talk about battery life on the Kraft keyboard now Logitech advertises a full week of usage out of this guy and I was able to hit that timeline no problem in K in some cases I even went more than that more than a week of usage so that was awesome on the Kraft keyboard now this all depends on usage so in my case I spend the majority of my time filming in the studio so I don't spend you know 99% of the day on my desk editing videos I move around so like I said it definitely hits the mark as what Logitech advertises but I would have preferred a longer battery on this guy but most importantly if you recalled the back lighting feature that turns on automatically works during daytime so if this you know somehow found a way to disable that maybe through software that you know that could have significantly improved the battery life so to conclude I think it's safe to say that the Kraft keyboard from Logitech deserves its own space within the keyboard market from a design standpoint it's a great addition to a simple and elegant setup especially when you paired with the MX master 2's Mouse and the integrated creative input dial works amazing with programs like Photoshop excel and some other productive tasks personally I wasn't impressed with the profiles for Premiere Pro specifically because dial only helps you navigate through the timeline so I wish you know there are more options to adjust the brightness or the contrast exposure vibrancy and the intensity of an ND filter some you know some features within the Lumia tree panel would have been a great addition and I'm sure they could add these with a software update and have recalled a few updates that were pushed on with an option software while my testing period so it looks like Waja tech is listening to the community and I'm just waiting for that update but should you spend $200 on this keyboard I'm gonna let you guys decide on that because for one I know we do focus on a lot of mechanical keyboards especially you know gaming oriented keyboards and this one's completely you know how the equation as to what we review but as a creative professional has a content creator I do find that you know the dial is next transition to the craft keyboard obviously limitation of Premiere Pro as I mentioned earlier is a bummer but you know people who use a lot of photoshop or you know people who are working with a long numbers within Excel can definitely take advantage of the dials so I would say it would be a great investment if you end up doing a lot more work within those programs and so that's it for me I'd like to hear your thoughts on the craft keyboard from Logitech is it worth its price and would you consider picking one up are you you know excited about the dial and what are your thoughts on this dial specifically with its implementation and how it works with software let us know in the comments down below i'm eber with hurricane axe thank you so much for watching make sure to subscribe for more similar content and we'll see you in the next one you