The older, non-RGB CORSAIR K68 launched a little over six months ago at an MSRP of $99.99 and currently sells for $89.99. As a direct comparison, this K68 RGB costs $30 more. In addition, the even older STRAFE RGB costs $139.99-$149.99 for the version with Cherry MX Red RGB switches, and it is only the version with the MX Brown RGB switches that has been discounted to $109.99 throughout. CORSAIR has been clever in ensuring that the K68 RGB is still their least expensive RGB keyboard at the time of its release in direct switch comparisons, even though it is obviously orchestrated artificially to be so. Other competitors have no such issues, however, and in 2018, you can find a lot of mechanical keyboards with RGB switches and backlighting at a lower price.

What does come in favor of the K68 RGB is that very few of these use Cherry MX switches, and regardless of whether or not they merit the premium, they come with a reputation that customers are willing to pay for. Personally, I have seen other switches - once clones, now peers - improve tremendously in quality control, yield, and switch design to where I can no longer say any particular switch maker is clearly better than the others, and this includes Cherry. It does not help either that CORSAIR has cut down on some features taken for granted in this price range, including rubber pads on the keyboard feet, a keycap puller that would aid in cleaning this keyboard marketed with spill resistance, and the continued use of thin ABS keycaps with laser-etched legends that will show signs of wear and tear in months. However, the K68 RGB has a few more features that help tip things in its favor.

As with the older K68 non-RGB version, the two rubber molds help make the K68 RGB one of the few products in the entire keyboard market today to offer some form of dust and spill resistance. The potential customer for this keyboard - the Internet cafe owner in Asia where customers come in to game and spend the day with drinks and food around, the external user at a construction site, or those at industrial plants - will find it useful. But this remains a niche application as the K68 RGB is not a waterproof keyboard, so there are limits to what you can do with it. CORSAIR's CUE driver is seemingly limitless, however, in what you can think of and implement here for key assignment and lighting controls. It is the standard bearer still for peripheral drivers and has only gotten better with time. The availability of their own PBT replacement keycap set with seamless doubleshot injected legends also helps add to the longevity of the keyboard.

The story of the K68 RGB keyboard is in many ways similar to the PBT replacement keycaps. The latter costs $49.99, while the industry standard from iKBC (or Vortexgear) costs $10 less and adds compatibility to other keycap spacings used by keyboards. As such, this too is not the best value for the money spent and currently is a viable option only due to features it has that others mostly do not - the seamless legends without the use of solid bars on the underside that impact backlighting makes them an option worth checking out, and the same holds true for the K68 RGB: worth checking out, it is not a must have.