Thermaltake ARGENT K6 Keyboard & DAMYSUS Wireless Mouse Review

Thermaltake is back with its latest effort in the peripheral market. I've been saying in the office, that there have been so few new keyboards and mice this year, it's strange, but it's great to see the tide finally turning and new hardware landing here at eTeknix HQ. Today, I have the new Thermaltake Argent K6 RGB Low Profile Mechanical Gaming Keyboard with Cherry MX Speed Silver switches. If that wasn't enough for you, I'm pairing it with the Thermaltake Damysus Wireless RGB Ergonomic Gaming Mouse! First up, we have the Argent K6, a premium mechanical keyboard with an aluminium top plate, a plethora of RGB lighting options, a smart control for audio, RGB and website tabbing, and it even comes with a wrist support! While the DAMYSUS features a large body ergonomic design but still comes in at a very impressive 84 grams, despite packing a high-performance sensor, wireless 2.4G, Bluetooth, and USB-C technology, and a built-in ARM 32-bit controller. ARGENT K6 Cherry MX Low Profile RGB Speed Silver - The Cherry Low Profile RGB Speed Silver has the fastest buttons in the Cherry family and is characterised by direct and extremely fast triggering. In addition, thanks to its particularly low height, it offers a shorter bounce time and a longer click life. CURVED DESIGN WITH ALUMINUM TOP PLATE - With its gorgeous asymmetrical curved design, coupled with the aluminium top plate, floating keycap design, and custom key lighting, the ARGENT K6 RGB allows enthusiasts not only to challenge the game but also play in style. Car audio style multifunction button - with the rotating volume control made of aluminium, you can adjust the volume and change the website easily and quickly. In addition, you can customize the function of the controller via our iTAKE software. Light up your battles - Light up your battles with 16.8 million RGB colours and multiple lighting effects that give you the brightest view and eye-catching style for your gaming session. MAGNETIC WRIST SUPPORT - With a magnetic wrist rest made of faux leather that provides both comfort and ergonomics. DAMYSUS Wireless Faster Than Ever - DAMYSUS WIRELESS RGB Ergonomic Gaming Mouse features an 84g lightweight design for effortlessly fast gameplay (Excluding cable). Track Every Movement - Features a high-performance PIXART PMW-3370 optical sensor with up to 19,000 DPI that delivers superior tracking and response, be in total control! Connect it Your Way. Type C USB - Wireless range of 10m. Fast 1ms polling rate and battery lasting up to 24 hours with lighting or 120 hours with lighting off. Not Only Comfortable but Superior - Equipped with enhanced 60 million clicks omron-engineered switches for improved comfort and durability. It also comes with an ARM-based 32-bit microcontroller with 512Kb flash memory for superior performance to meet the needs of hardcore gamers. Injection-Moulded Rubber Side Grips - The left and right sides of the mouse are fully covered with rubber grips which are moulded as part of the shell, allowing players to swipe the mouse more smoothly. Light Up Your Battles - 16.8M true RGB colour illumination across 2 zones, with customizable dynamic lighting effects for the most personalized of plays. iTAKE Engine Software - Customize macros and game profiles; adjust brightness, speed and direction of the RGB lighting effects; and SyncALL RGB colours of all your Thermaltake Gaming Peripherals via the TT SYNC function, creating one complete ecosystem. Packaging The packaging looks great, with both the keyboard and mouse coming with the modern grey and black-themed packaging we now see throughout the Thermaltake range. There's a clear photo of each product on the front of the box too, as well as key features, such as the Cherry switches and the RGB lighting clearly mentioned. Around the back, there are more in-depth mentions of key features, as well as further images showing each product from multiple angles, which is always good to see. DAMYSUS Wireless Mouse The Damysus comes bundled with a paracord-sleeved USB Type-A to Type-C cable, which can be used to operate the mouse in wired mode and to charge it. However, the mouse is also 2.4G wireless with the included dongle, as well as Bluetooth compatible. It's a nice looking mouse too, pretty understated in terms of flair, but it looks clean, has great lines, and the matte finish feels good to the touch. There's a pretty high body on this mouse, with a huge curve over the top, giving it a full-palm grip and ergonomic feel. Interesting, Andy didn't like how this one felt in his hand, just didn't seem to suit his more nimble FPS style of gameplay. However, I have larger and wider hands than him and tend to play with a full hand palm rest grip, and honestly, this mouse fits me like a glove, very comfortable! The left side is recessed, so you can really get your thumb in there for a good grip on that hard textured surface, plus the side buttons are large, making them easy to trigger with a flick of your thumb. The right side is undercut too, so again, you can really get a good grip on this mouse quite easily. With it only weighing 84 grams without a cable, it's easy to lift too. The mouse buttons are huge, and the big mouse wheel is quite exposed due to how low the front of the mouse sits, but it all feels very comfortable to me and easy to control. Finally, we get to the underside, which features three slipmats, with the larger one at the wider back section of the mouse. There are three modes on this mouse, wired, Bluetooth which doesn't require the included dongle, so you can pair it to your laptop, phone, console, or whatever, and then 2.4G wireless, and the little dongle for that is tucked away in the belly of the mouse. The mouse moves great, feels good, and the click response is decent too. However, I found that it wasn't always the most accurate to track. If I connected it to the dongle and drew circles, I got the occasional fraction of a second hold up while using the 2.4G wireless, and that's just not good enough for gaming. However, I had no such issue in Bluetooth of wired mode, but couldn't rule out some external cause for the interruptions. Overall though, it's a good mouse, and I love the RGB, but I'm not sold on its overall wireless performance. ARGENT K6 Keyboard The ARGENT K6 comes pretty well equipped right out of the box, with a robust USB cable, which is hard-wired unfortunately, but largely because it deals with two USB headers and an audio cable in one. You can connect one USB for the keyboard/RGB function, while the other is optional to use the USB pass-through port on the rear of the keyboard. There's also a headphone/microphone pass-through, so you can control and connect your hardware directly to the keyboard. There's also this lovely-looking wristrest, which can be magnetically snapped up against the keyboard. However, I'm not sure I like the design here. The rest is the width of the black section that sits under the keys, but not the width of the keyboard, and it looks like it's a little short to me as the lines don't always aesthetically line up on this keyboard, with it being wider at the top, and the black panel breaking up the aesthetic of the much nicer looking brushed aluminium. Here's the wristrest aligned with the left edge of the keyboard. And here it is lined up with the black section/keys. The keys have a matte UV coating on them, so they do feel silky smooth, and with the Cherry MX Low Profile RGB Speed Silver switches, they're pretty light and fast to actuate making it great for gaming and typing. However, Cherry no longer feels like the top dog in the switch market, with custom brands like Mountain, JamesDonkey, Ducky and a few others having what I think are even smoother actions than this. Still, it is light and fast, so no issues really. I'm really not sold on that black background though, I think if TT dropped that and kept the whole thing in brushed aluminium it would be more premium-looking. That being said, style is subjective, so don't let me tell you otherwise if you like the look of it. Unfortunately, I ran into another issue, the right shift key. I touch type and my little finger tends to go for the leftmost side of this switch and it pretty much just jammed up, I couldn't press it! If you strike the switch in the middle, not a problem, but given the width of the shift key, it should smoothly actuate over its whole length, but it doesn't. I do like that the keyboard has so many built-in features though, so TT gets top marks for that. There's a plethora of RGB lighting functions and features just an Fn-Shift away. Allowing you to cycle through profiles for key configuration and RGB effects with just a few keystrokes. Plus, you get this great control hub in the corner, allowing you to control your music while you work and play. There's also a large wheel allowing you to deal with the volume, and a function mode to change the wheel function to RGB, tab through windows and whatnot, so that's pretty neat. But there's another quirk, if you push it in from the right, you can mute your audio, but if you don't have a hand on the keyboard, the keyboard pushes to the left a few millimetres, so muting and unmuting causes the keyboard to move, basically... so the rubber grips and weight aren't particularly in the balance here. At the rear, you can hook up a USB device and a 4-pole headphone jack, so you can pair your mouse and headset into one device, which is great for cable management in your gaming setup. The RGB is stunning though, and while I may not like that black background, it does provide a good accent for the lighting, which looks great! But at the same time, so does the aluminium which can be seen lighting up on the top row of F-keys. It's full per-key lighting too, so you can customise it however you like, and there's the usual array of lighting effects to play around with. Perhaps the best trick here is that you can use keyboard shortcuts to customise it on the fly. That includes setting any value and combination of R/G/B to any switch, allowing you to create some pretty unique layouts, or just set your favourite shade of blue to all of it. Overall, a great-looking keyboard and mouse, but they both fall a little short for my taste. The mouse isn't as smooth as it should be when wireless, and the sticky shift key of the keyboard makes it a little clumsy for me to type on. And finally, while I hate to kick this keyboard again, the wrist rest is too short. My wrists never actually sat on it when using my natural typing position, and it should be at least 2cm more to really work as intended. However, when moving to a WASD gaming position and curling my fingers, it worked ok. How Much Does it Cost? The Argent K6 RGB KB6 Cherry Low Profile Silver we reviewed was actually not in a UK layout, so as such, the only stock of this model is coming from the EU, and the German layout mechanical keyboard doesn't come cheap, with a list price of £226 + import fees on Amazon, it totals out at £272.42... ouch. However, the UK stock is showing at just £203.84 but with a 4-6 weeks dispatch. Thermaltake doesn't appear to have stock of any of their previous models in the UK now either, as the stock has dried up, so there's not really an alternative right now for those wanting an all-TT configuration. As for the Thermaltake Damysus Wireless RGB gaming mouse, that's currently listed at Scan for £79.99, which is competitive, but honestly, I'd rather have the wired version for just £49.99. Overview The Thermaltake ARGENT K5 RGB has been on the market for three years now, and as I said, the stock has dried up that one. However, it seems not all of my concerns have been addressed since I reviewed that one. The old model was £215 back then, so the price hasn't really come down on this new model. Well, it has if you adjust for inflation, but still, that's a lot of money in today's market. I said on the K5 review that the wristrest wasn't big enough, and that's clearly still the case here, it does need to be bigger both in length and width as well... my wrists don't actually rest on it. And while the old model "rang like a bell" when you type on it, this new one has fixed that issue and does feel more robust, but it also just feels a bit stiff now and not as smooth to type on as more affordable rival products, plus the right shift key actually won't press down unless you're reaching for the middle of it. I do like that it has great RGB technology built-in, and pretty much everything is configurable and programmable directly from the keyboard itself. Plus, the addition of dedicated multimedia controls is always welcome, as I'm always listening to music while I work and game. Being able to plug in headphones and USB devices to the keyboard is great too, as it saves me crawling under my desk looking for the ports. As for the mouse, it's great, the sensor is fantastic, the ergonomics fit my hand really well, and I like the RGB on it. But it only seems to work really well as a Bluetooth mouse or a wired one, and the 2.4G wireless caused weird hangups at random. None of my other wireless mice do that, so I'm ruling out a Windows problem on this one. That being said, you can get the wired version for £30 less, so I'd say get that one instead. Overall then, a bit of a mixed bag, some good some bad, but at this price range, I was expecting a little bit more to be honest.