Turtle Beach Impact 700 Mechanical Keyboard Review

Performance

The IMPACT 700 is a really nice keyboard, not only does it look fantastic when you take it out of the box, it looks even better when you power it up! The LED backlighting is really nice and as you can see in the pictures below, it stands out well (at max brightness) in both a light and darker environment. I’ve installed the replacement WASD keys and while you can light the whole keyboard, there’s also a few options to light up the gaming zones; you can also opt for a breathing effect, or have the lights off completely, it’s up to you.

Gaming on this keyboard is a lot of fun, the MX Brown keys aren’t my personal favourite, as I like the linear switches such as MX Black and MX Red, but the brown are quite close in feel to a tough membrane keyboard, giving you the benefits of a mechanical switch, with a more familiar feel. The switches are quick and responsive, while not being anywhere near as noisy as the MX Blue switches, making them a great choice for gaming, but also for day-to-day work.

The typing action is quite light and while the keyboard looks quite bulky, it feels perfectly balanced when typing, with good key spacing and a nice typing angle. The lighting is a nice touch, especially with just the dedicated gaming key illuminated, making it easy to find your place when gaming in a darker room.

There’s not really a lot to say beyond that, this is a premium mechanical keyboard and as such, it’s comparable with most anything else in its class. It certainly doesn’t disappoint in any respect and regardless of how many games I played, or how many reviews I typed on this thing, I never ran into any issues. If you want it just to play StarCraft II or DOTA2, you’ll love it. If you just want a high-quality keyboard for the office, you’re still going to love it; a solid all-round performance from Turtle Beach.

One nice bonus is the Fn-Shift multimedia keys, I prefer dedicated keys, but they’re better than nothing and perfect for skipping through your music while gaming.