Performance

I prefer keys with tactile feedback, and these worked great for me, although their additional clicky sound means you may want to think about who else is around your workspace before using this keyboard. It took less than three days for me to get used to this, treating it as I would any other keyboard with Cherry MX Blue switches, for instance. Bloody offers a discrete gaming mode and two profiles to use wherein you can have saved macros or super combos activated, and also have the Windows key de-activated if you so wish. The rest is mostly based on you assigning or re-assigning functions to the various keys on this full-sized keyboard.


It promises N-key rollover (over USB), and Aqua's test confirmed it. I also used Switch Hitter to test for any key chatter, and as you can see, there was none to be found.

There is one more claim Bloody makes, and that is of the ultra-fast 0.2 ms response time as a result of using optical switches, as is the reduced travel time to actuation and rebounce. The 0.2 ms they are referring to is for the keystroke to be registered by the MCU, and not necessarily the total time before which you see the keystroke's function displayed on your monitor. There are several steps involved here, and perhaps having one step take place faster than on other keyboards may not be as big of an advantage in the grand scheme of things. Quantifying this would normally be out of most people's reach as well, and this is precisely why Bloody developed a test suite for it. So confident are they in their technology that this program, aptly named Key Response PK, can be downloaded here for anyone to use.


It comes with two tests: Target PK and Knock PK. Both require two keyboards (or mice) to be connected to the same computer. Target PK asks the user to hit two different keys (one per keyboard) when the countdown hits zero, and it will then measures which is faster. Human error has been built in, so I did not like it a lot. Knock PK, on the other hand, is based on using a solid bar to connect two different keys (one per keyboard) to then press them continuously. Both tests tell which key's input was faster, and by how much relative to the other.

Here are the results of the Knock PK test for the Bloody B720, relative to a Corsair K70 RAPIDFIRE RGB with the new Cherry MX Speed (Silver) mechanical switches:


I also put a Bloody B720 with linear optical switches up against a Cherry MX 6.0 featuring an analog RealKey Technology that also promises to cut down overall response times. Unfortunately, I no longer have the Cherry keyboard, so this result below is more of an indication of how things would be with the B840:

I also tested this by pressing two small keys so as to lower any potential issues of stabilizers coming into play here. Note that the Cherry MX 6.0, while having said RealKey Technology, also has standard MX Red switches which actuate at a travel distance of 2 mm vs. the 1.2 mm and 1.5 mm on the other keys tested, which will have had an effect as well. We see that the Bloody optical switches are consistently faster than the Cherry MX mechanical switches, even with similar actuation and travel distances and similar bottoming-out forces, whereas things are a lot closer with Cherry's analog controller solution. However, the actual numbers themselves are inconsistent, which does bother me enough to leave a question mark over these results. Will you notice these differences in real life? I personally did not, but perhaps the more sensitive gamers will. In this day where marketing talk rules over purchasing decisions, it is good to see someone walking the walk as well. Finally, I did test this with non-Bloody keyboards and mice, and performed a blind test using someone else before concluding that there was nothing fishy about the software itself - it is unbiased.

The sound and feel of a keyboard is quite subjective, but here's a recording to help provide some context to what the Bloody B840 sounds like with my typing (and bottoming out) at ~105 WPM and with a sound gain of +10 dB applied:


For some context, here's the Cooler Master Storm Trigger Z with Cherry MX Blue switches getting the same treatment. The B840 definitely sounds deeper and louder, and part of the reason for this is the aluminum alloy cover which the keycaps hit, as opposed to the plastic ones for the CM keyboard. But even with the aluminum cover removed, I could easily tell the two apart, and I personally prefer the B840 since it has a better-defined tactile feel and a deeper, louder sound, which for such a switch is fine with me. Let's face it, we are not taking this keyboard to a crowded office anytime soon.

Before we wrap up, I also wanted to mention that I did not subjectively feel any key-to-key variations in terms of actuation force or distance. I did do a US nickel test which a fellow enthusiast (Ripster) can be credited for, but it is not reliable and precise enough for me, and we are working on having a more quantitative approach built in for keyboard reviews.