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My First Mechanical Keyboard
I’ve been hearing the hype around mechanical keyboards for a while, but I’ve always stayed away because of the noise associated with typing on them. I know they offer a tactile and fulfilling typing experience, but working late at night clacking away while others are sleeping wasn’t in the cards for me. So when I saw that Logitech released the new MX Mechanical keyboard with the option of choosing a tactile quiet version, I had to try it out. Here are my thoughts!
Please be advised that the link above is a referral link, which means that I earn a small commission for each qualifying sale. There is no additional cost to you.
Technical Specs
✅ Weight: 828 Grams / 1.8 Lbs
✅ Dimensions: 26mm H x 433mm W x 131mm D (Approx: 1″ H x 17″ W x 5.1″ D)
✅ Battery: Rechargeable Li-Po 1500 mAh battery
✅ Battery Life: Up to 15 Days with lighting effects (10 months without lighting effects)
✅ Switch Types: Tactile Quiet, Linear, Clicky
✅ Connection Types: Bluetooth Low Energy & Logi Bolt USB Receiver
✅ Materials: Low carbon aluminum top case and a recycled plastic bottom
✅ Wireless Range: 10 meters / 32 feet
✅ 1 Year Limited Warranty
Price & Value
The Logitech MX Mechanical full-sized keyboard is around $170 USD, and the MX Mechanical Mini keyboard is around $150 USD at the time of writing. They are not cheap keyboards, but the premium build quality and typing experience help to justify the cost.
The keyboard is only available in the two-tone gray color option. In terms of switches, it comes with Tactile Quiet, Linear or Clicky options. I bought the Tactile Quiet version.
In The Box
The box comes with the keyboard, USB Type C to A charging cable, Logi Bolt USB receiver, and some manuals.
Design & Build Quality
The build quality on this keyboard feels premium, primarily due to it coming in at 1.8 lbs, thanks to the aluminum top case. The color is a two-tone combination of dark gray and light gray keys. I’m not the biggest fan of this look since I prefer a consistent-looking design, but it will have no issues fitting in at home or in a professional environment.
The font used for the keys is a nice clean font. Since the keyboard is compatible with Windows and Mac, the Alt key is also printed with the Command icon for MAC users.
The back of the keyboard has a power switch and USB Type C charging port.
The bottom of the keyboard has two adjustment hinges that add 8 degrees of angulation to add some more height to the keyboard.
The bottom also contains a wide rubber to help prevent shifting when typing. The right and left sides of the keyboard do not contain any elements. The keyboard feels quite planted and stable when typing lightly or heavily.
Lighting Effects
The lighting effects are tastefully done on the MX Mechanical. The only backlight color available is white. RGB lighting is not available. The lighting modes can be cycled through in Logitech’s software or by a combo keypress of the Fn key and the Bulb key. There are six different lighting modes to select from:
- Breathing – slow pulsing lighting
- Contrast – only the modifier keys are backlit
- Wave – lighting cascades from left to right on the keyboard
- Random – the keys are lit up randomly
- Reaction – keys that are pressed have a slight afterglow (my favorite lighting effect)
- Static – all keys remain solidly lit
It’s difficult to showcase the lighting effects through images, so here is a time-stamped video showing a demo of all six lighting modes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LX377-cIGtY&t=248s
The keyboard also has a proximity sensor, which senses your hand and automatically lights up the keys, then automatically cuts the backlight when your hand is not near the keyboard to help prolong battery life.
Keyboard Features
To make the most out of the keyboard, Logitech has added some quick shortcuts above the Numpad area to launch the calculator, show/hide the desktop, activate the search function and lock the computer. Of course, these keys can be remapped in Logitech’s software.
The F keys are also mapped to custom options such as launching dictation, launching emojis, and quick muting the microphone, which comes in handy for video calls. These can be remapped as well. To gain access to the regular F key functionality, pressing the Fn key and Esc gets you there.
There are also three keys located above the insert, home and page up keys, which allow you to switch the keyboard for use on other devices quickly or to take advantage of Logitech Flow, which allows for convenient copy and pasting between different computers.
Multi-Device Connectivity
Like with most other Logitech products, the MX Mechanical can be paired with up to 3 devices. Pairing is quite easy by Bluetooth or the Logi Bolt USB receiver. Devices can be paired via Bluetooth or with the supplied Logi Bolt USB receiver.
There are three dedicated keys instead of one key to switch between devices, which requires multiple presses to select the target device, which is convenient. However, if one key was assigned to this task, a Print Screen key or a key to switch lighting modes could have been accommodated instead.
My Typing Experience
Right out the gate, I want to address the noise level when typing on the Tactile Quiet of this keyboard. I expected it to be quieter than it is, but it is not overly loud compared to other regular keyboards. If I’m typing in an office environment, I don’t think it is loud enough to stand out amongst the ambient noise in the room. Here’s a demo of me typing so you can get an idea of the noise: https://youtu.be/LX377-cIGtY?t=450
Before using this keyboard, I was using the keyboard on my aging Alienware R4 laptop. The experience on this keyboard is unsurprisingly much better, of course. However, I mentioned my old keyboard because I didn’t need much time to adapt to this keyboard and the button layout. I also had a pretty big area of laptop wrist real estate, but I have been using the MX Mechanical without any wrist pad, and it’s been going better than I thought it would.
The typing experience is great due to the tactile feedback and a great level of keypress travel distance. My fingers also do not feel fatigued or tired from long hours of typing because there doesn’t seem to be a noticeable amount of effort required to depress the keys when compared to my previous keyboard.
I also love how cool the reaction lighting effect looks when typing at night. Overall I’m impressed with the typing experience, but I would have liked it just slightly quieter to match the soft clicks on my Logitech Lift Vertical mouse.
Battery Life
Logitech claims up to 15 days of battery life when the lighting effects are used and up to 10 months if all lighting effects are turned off. Fifteen days using the backlight is pretty abysmal, in my opinion. Being a full-size keyboard with this type of weight, I would have liked to see a larger battery accommodated to give at least 30 days of battery life with backlighting turned on.
Settings & Customization
You have to install the Logi Options+ software to remap the keys and check the battery life percentage. You can see below that there a ton of options to choose from. Not pictured are the rest of the remapping options if you scroll down the list.
Lighting modes can also be set in Logi Options+ but can also be cycled through on the keyboard with a combo button press.
Can I Recommend It?
If you’ve been thinking about getting a mechanical keyboard but were hesitant due to the noise it will create when typing near others, then the Tactile Quiet version of the MX Mechanical keyboard is a good starting point. The typing experience is wonderful, with good tactile feedback and a good level of key travel distance.
One area to consider is the battery life because if you plan on using this keyboard with the backlight on, only having 15 days of battery life before needing to plug it in is pretty inconvenient. If you’re a fan of using a typing wrist pad, I did not see any option that attaches to this keyboard on the Logitech website.
If you choose to buy the MX Mechanical, let me know your thoughts on it!
If there is anything that I missed in the review, or if you have any questions that I did not cover, please leave a comment below.
Please be advised that the link above is a referral link, which means that I earn a small commission for each qualifying sale. There is no additional cost to you.
