Closer Examination

As we saw, the keyboard itself comes in bubble wrap, and removing it gives us our first look at the product. The Bloody B840 has an aggressive design, and I will mention here that this is among the "cleaner" designs their keyboards have. This is a full-sized 104 (+3 extra) key keyboard, and here, I have the ANSI layout in English. The keyboard does not have a lot of bezel in one direction, but extends in the other two due to its corners jutting out. Note also that the B840 has an aluminum alloy top cover with a golden finish that is held in place with screws, thus allowing for some modding capability and replaceable top covers if Bloody ever decides to go that route.


A non-removable 1.8 m long, braided (red and black) cable is attached to the keyboard's top middle. It terminates in a standard USB Type-A connector, and a single USB 2.0 port will suffice, although Bloody recommends using a USB 3.1 Gen 1 (USB 3.0) port for best performance. There are also four rubber pads and two rubber feet on the back for some surface grip regardless of whether you have the feet raised or not.


To provide some context on these stock keycaps, I put one between a Corsair Strafe RGB keycap on the left and a Cooler Master Storm Trigger Z keycap on the right. All three employ a Cherry OEM profile, and it must be noted that the Bloody keycaps are ABS doubleshot, which makes for a longer-lasting product, and the wall's thickness is slightly higher than average, measuring in at 0.97 mm. The provided replacement keycaps work fine as well and are slightly taller than the default stock ones. Overall, I like the inclusion of the extra keycaps at no additional cost, although their color does clash a lot. Another potential con is the font used on the legends, which, again, is more aggressive than I personally like, but I appreciate that different people have different preferences. It must be noted here that the secondary legends are in the same horizontal line as the primary legends, which will help when they are illuminated, although this was not the case with the UP and DOWN keys that can also be utilized to control the backlighting's brightness.



Removing some of the keycaps, we get our first look at the new LK2 Blue switch. Bloody has incorporated what they call their LK Sound Creator Tech here, which is how they provide clicky and tactile feedback on optical switches that are inherently linear in operation. As with other LK switches, these have an actuation distance of 1.5 mm, a total travel distance of 3 mm, and an actuation force of 50 cN, putting them on par with the Cherry MX Blue switch in terms of necessary force, but with a faster actuation and rebound time.

Another thing of note here are the walls around the switch and the keyboard's body. Bloody claims the B840 to be spill and dust resistant, and that, coupled with the keycaps flowing over these walls, works to allow for any fluids or dust to settle on the ridges instead of getting into the switch's mechanism. I have tested it by spilling some water on the keyboard while it was connected and can confirm it to work provided you understand it is limited to the height of these walls (~6 mm). Despite this, the keycaps have a floating-style implementation and are, as such, easier to remove for cleaning, though at the expense of less potential for light bleed from backlighting.


The larger keys are also stabilized differently from what I have seen before - no Cherry or Costar style stabilizers here. Instead, the intermediate size keys (Shift, Enter, etc.) have secondary clips on either side of the switch which the keycaps plug into, and the space bar is actually stabilized not just by these clips but two additional springs in the middle which are held in place by two small screws at the bottom of the keyboard. This provided for the best-feeling space bar I have used so far, and I have thus far used over twenty different keyboards. I would definitely like to see this implemented more. This does come with a con, though, as screwing the space bar back in is extremely hard since the two screws have to be aligned perfectly in a small opening that is sunk into the bottom panel. It can be used without the screws, but won't have the same feel to it.

In terms of keycap layout, a Cherry OEM profile with standard row spacing would generally indicate compatibility with a lot of third-party keycap sets. However, owing to the walls on the body and around the switches, I have not had any luck with some of my third-party keycaps. Your mileage may vary, however, and I would love to hear you describe your experiences in the comments section. Good thing overall is that the keycaps provided will not wear out easily, although they will still suffer from the same limitations as any other ABS keycap.

Before we go ahead and take a look inside the keyboard, let's talk about the wrist rest, or rather, the lack thereof. Some Bloody keyboards come with an integrated full wrist rest, others with a detachable full or single hand wrist rest. This one comes with none, and I can see two reasons for it: cost and justification of no wrist rest for a better typing protocol to alleviate any pains. But for those who need a wrist rest in extenuating circumstances, consider getting an add-on separately if the rest of the keyboard meets your needs.