Software

There is software support for the Royal Kludge RK84, but you would not know from the product box or manual. Thankfully, this is where reviews such as ours enter the picture to tell you to check the product pagecarefully, where you see see a tab titled Software about halfway down the page. This downloadable, compressed archive contains a folder within which are two other folders and a text file that tells you to use a specific folder and installer based on the serial number of your RK84. So there has clearly been a change in hardware, and I have the newer configuration with its respective installer. The installation is simple and gives you English or Mandarin options, but throws in a desktop shortcut without asking. It is extremely lightweight on system resources and only takes up ~7 MB of storage space.


I have version 1.0.1.3 of the RK RGB Keyboard software program here, which the copyright information at the bottom shows not to have been updated since 2020. It does appear to be a universal driver and has a home page with enough space to show other connected, compatible devices. Clicking on it takes you to the device-specific settings, and I will mention that things are well laid out and in good English too. Display scaling needs to be improved, however; it will still show up as a tiny window on a high DPI display with OS scaling on.

Using the software is fairly easy, and again betters the average small keyboard company offering since it isn't just another re-skin of an MCU firmware and control tool. The default page allows key assignment, where you click on the key of choice and choose from the list of options below. There is a macro recorder with detailed options, and two separate pages of lighting options with the main difference being that the second set is adopted in real time on the virtual keyboard. The first set is what you get onboard as well, but with the software, you have far more granularity in not only the 16.8 M colors (256 brightness steps each for R/G/B channels), but per-key lighting as well. It's not going to win any customization awards, and there remain some UI issues to resolve first, but it is still more than I expected going in.