Corsair K63 Wireless Mechanical Keyboard Review

Keyboards are a staple to any computing setup. Mechanical keyboards are typically preferred by the majority of PC gamers. What if you play your PC games in front of a large screen TV? You are then attached to your PC by a wire, but what if you could remove that wire and sit on your super comfy couch and game from there instead? Would you? Perhaps you are more of a minimalist and like to keep your desk area neat and tidy but also cable free? Previously, there had not been much on the market in terms of mechanical gaming keyboards that were wireless. In fact, there was one but now there is another: the Corsair K63 Wireless Mechanical Keyboard.

The Corsair K63 Wireless Mechanical Keyboard is just that, a mechanical keyboard that can be used without being physically plugged into your computer. The K63 Wireless is also a TLK or tenkeyless model; that means there is no number pad, resulting in a smaller footprint. Corsair has ensured that this is a true mechanical keyboard by including Cherry MX Red switches. Not only does this mean you will have get tactile feedback, but you know the keys will last a long time.

How does a wireless mechanical keyboard like this perform though? Let’s jump in and take a look!

What’s in the Box?

The Corsair K63 typically does not come with very much in the box, but because of its wireless nature, you do get a bit more. Inside the box is the Corsair K63 Wireless Gaming keyboard itself along with a USB cable for charging or allowing to stay wired, a wrist rest, a USB cable adapter, the 2.4GHz dongle, manual, and quickstart guides. If your computer has Bluetooth, you can forgo the included 2.4GHz dongle, but make sure you take the 2.4Ghz dongle of the package before recycling the box as it could easily be missed.

First Impressions

The one thing some people might notice, if they did not look at the box, was that the Corsair K63 Wireless keyboard has no numpad. This not only makes the keyboard more portable but if you are not going to use the number pad, why include one? I can’t remember a single game where I’ve ever used a numpad actually. I will miss the numpad for general use though, especially when typing in an IP address or doing something on the calculator, but that can easily be overcome.

Once you have taken the keyboard out of the box, you may or may not want to attach the wrist rest that is included. I personally like using the wrist rest, but your mileage may very. It snaps in really easily and if you decide not to use it, you can easily remove it and put it away. You will also note the colour of the Corsair K63 keyboard: black with a blue highlight. This blue area behind the keys help accentuate the blue LEDs that each key has; this gives it a nicer glowing feel to it but we will look at this in more detail later.

What is the first thing you do when you get a new keyboard? You pretend to type like a maniac to check out how the keys feel. Well, I was no different.

Before even plugging the keyboard in, I started typing like a 4 year old that just drank 2 cans of Jolt cola. I wanted to feel the keys, hear the keys and decide if I liked them or not. It has been a really long time since I used a proper mechanical keyboard, and the K63 not only comes with Cherry MX switches, but Cherry MX Red switches. Red switches are usually quieter so that is definitely a bonus for me.

The last mechanical keyboard I played with was a cheap one that had blue switches; those switches would keep the kids up when I tried to do anything with it. We will see how these Cherry MX Red switches will not only handle my typing, but if they will not wake up the kids. Each Cherry MX switch has a dedicated blue LED. Sorry, no RGB this time.

Looking at the Corsair K63 from the side shows you the height of the keycaps and the overall profile of the keyboard. It does have keyboard stands, but the weird thing I found was the stands did not have rubber at the ends like the bottom of the keyboard does.  When you extend the stands, the rubber feet near the wrist rest helped the keyboard stay put though, so that is not too bad.

Zoom in close to the top right side of the Corsair K63 Wireless keyboard and you will see the volume keys and status LEDs for power, wireless, caps lock and scroll lock.

Move over a bit to the left and you are presented with the Corsair logo, the key lighting button and encryption button. More on these buttons later.

The playback media keys are on the far left of the keyboard: stop, reverse, start/pause, forward. These are perfect for those who listen to music while enjoying their favourite games. I personally like the inclusion of the media keys. To make some keyboards smaller, some manufactures have left out media keys altogether, but it is nice to see that Corsair has kept some for this wireless variant. Typically, Corsair media keys are on the right side of the keyboard above the numpad (if present) and includes their volume control knob, a feature some Corsair fans really enjoy.

At the top of the Corsair K63 Wireless Mechanical Gaming keyboard is the on/off switch and the USB port. You can use the keyboard in two ways: wired and wireless.

On a side note, I love the on/off switch that this Corsair has because it allows me to disable the keyboard and leave the computer on. This stops little hands from smashing they keys and getting Windows into some crazy state that forces me to reboot. No, the kids do not enable “Sticky Keys.” It is some other weird mode. I can also easily remove the keyboard by unplugging it and placing it away from curious little hands too if I want them to stop smashing on the keyboard in general.

Performance

I took a look at the Corsair K63 as both a wired and wireless keyboard. Now, I’m not saying you should always keep it plugged in like I have been, but you seem to be able to. I would hope there is circuitry inside the K63 that would allow you to keep it always plugged in, but then why would you buy a wireless keyboard if you are never going to use it wirelessly?

Setting up the Corsair K63 Wireless Mechanical Gaming Keyboard via the 2.4GHz wireless dongle is easy, especially for Windows 10. The moment you plug in the dongle, Windows recognizes it right away.

Corsair Utility Engine, or CUE, mentioned that there was a firmware upgrade for the K63, but I could not get it to trigger the firmware upgrade with the simple instructions provided. CUE, like other software packages for peripherals, allows you to customize certain aspects such as colour (if there was more than one colour), key lighting schemes, macros, and more.

Instead of going into the various settings CUE lets you configure, I decided to jump into a few rounds of Fortnite instead.

Gaming with the K63

I am, by far, not the greatest Battle Royale player out there. In fact, I would say I’m fairly lousy at that genre of games. I do like playing them and it was neat to see how well the Corsair K63 Wireless Mechanical Gaming Keyboard would handle the fast-ish pace of the game.

I personally did not notice any lag with the 2.4GHz portion of the keyboard. Each key registered when I wanted it to. I even rolled my chair back 30 feet to see if I could get anything to introduce any input lag. If I had the Corsair Lapboard it might have been more comfortable to use the keyboard, away from the desk, but the wireless connection performed beautifully.

I even have a very noisy wireless environment in terms of devices chatting on the 2.4GHz wireless bands. It’s great to see the keyboard being able to keep up! The Corsair K63 with the lapboard could make it more comfortable for playing in front of a TV, mind you.

Another genre of game I play a fair amount is the survival world builders such as 7 Days to Die. The FPS aspect makes using a keyboard and mouse fairly important and sometimes you cannot hesitate or have input lag, or else you’re feeding your brains to the nearby zombies. I experienced no lag in input no matter how far away I took the Corsair K63 keyboard from the desk and moving around in the environment with the WASD keys was effortless.

Battery Life

An important aspect of any wireless device is the battery life and the Corsair K63 is no different. Corsair states that the battery life range can be defined as follows:

• 15 hours normal LED brightness
• 25 hours at low LED brightness
• 75 hours with LEDs turned off

What is normal LED brightness? Well, the K63 has a defaulted maximum brightness of about 75%. You have to go into the CUE software to specifically allow 100% brightness, but you will compromise battery life at 100%.

There has been the odd person who says they have experienced really short battery lives with the K63, but with this particular one, I’ve been running for hours longer than they have been reporting and my battery status was still showing a value of “High”.

If you are going to step away for a long period of time or you have turned off your computer, I would recommend turning off the K63 as well. Even as advanced as some power saving functionality can be, I do not always trust them, especially if I plan on not making use of a wireless device for more then 10-12 hours.

After about 3 days of my regular use, the power LED on the keyboard began to flash red, informing me that the battery was getting low. 3 days of use for me is pretty good for a wireless product and I could have extended that if I kept the LEDs off too.

It is possible to pop open the keyboard and check out the battery itself, though I have not done it with this particular keyboard. It’s reported that the K63 has a 2950mAh, 11.15Wh lithium battery and if you wanted to really calculate its power consumption, you probably could (but most people will not). The Corsair K63 Wireless keyboard could easily last hours of gameplay without having to be charged which is great and ultimately what people are going to be looking at.

Final Thoughts

The Corsair K63 Wireless Mechanical Gaming Keyboard is great at what it does in both wired and wireless modes. If you are looking for a good wireless mechanical keyboard to either help reduce the amount of cables on your desk or play games while sitting on the couch, then the Corsair K63 is a great keyboard for you.

If wireless is not really your thing, then Corsair does have other great mechanical keyboards with Cherry MX switches; even the previous wired K63 keyboard would be great. Some people may find that the lack of other switch color options a let down, but the Cherry MX Reds do a nice job, especially for gaming. People who do more than just game may (or may not) like a different switch option such as Blues. Perhaps down the road, Corsair may offer other switch colours.

The battery life is good, even when leaving the LEDs on. In my experience with the Corsair K63, I only had to charge the keyboard after day 3 of my regular usage, which is pretty good for a wireless device. I would turn off the keyboard when I was not in front of it or when I shut the computer down at night. If you really did need to extend the battery life, you can easily configure the LEDs to be less bright or even turn them off all together. The blue LEDs light up nicely and you do have your choice of a few patterns if that is your thing.

If you are looking for a wireless and yet true mechanical keyboard, I do recommend picking up the Corsair K63 Wireless Mechanical Gaming Keyboard. It’s available now for about $100 US.