 The accepted wisdom for a long time has been that if you want a truly enthusiast class typing or gaming experience, you need a mechanical keyboard. And with features like superior build quality, satisfying tactile feedback, and quicker response times, perhaps there was only one thing that could actually have made them even better, and that would be freaking laser beams! EK Water Blocks' all aluminum fluid gaming lineup offers great custom grade water cooling performance for an affordable price. Learn more at the link in the video description. Optical keyswitches like the ones that we're looking at today promise extremely quick response times and shorter actuation distances than popular mechanical keyswitches from manufacturers like Cherry. But for some reason, they remain a niche item. The fact that the big boys of current keyboard manufacturing like Corsair and Logitech haven't picked them up yet probably isn't helping. So we turned to Bloody, Tesoro, and Wu-Tang, the only three companies we could find that are currently incorporating them into their keyboards to see if this technology has a bright future. Let's start with a quick look at how they work. Currently there are two main types of optical switches. One uses a plunger that blocks a beam of light, and when the key is pressed a gap in the plunger moves down and allows the light beam to hit a sensor that registers a key press. Two of our keyboards, the Bloody B720 and the Tesoro Excalibur SE Spectrum, use this process, with the Bloody switches branded as Lightstrike, abbreviated as LK for some reason, while the Tesoro uses swappable switches from Gateron? Gateron? Gateron? Either way, both keyboards incorporate waterproofing as well, a nice value for you Mountain Dew fanatics. The second main type, FlareTech, instead uses an upwards firing beam to determine how far downward the key has been pressed, meaning instead of simply registering a key as pressed or not, the keyboard can instead register a partial key press, similar to how an analog trigger on a game controller can be pushed only part way down to accelerate a little bit more slowly than a full press in a driving game. So our third keyboard, the Wu Ting One, is available with these FlareTech switches in two flavors, red linear switches or blue clicky ones, which are user swappable. And we'll start with a closer look at this one. Wu Ting actually markets this granular level of input sensitivity control as analog, which is not technically correct, because the keyboard is really just registering one of 256 distinct states of pushed downness. But for the sake of helping users understand the tech, we see why they did this. And in practice, the action is very smooth. I doubt that most users would actually even be able to notice the difference. Let's demonstrate how this works with Forza 3. Here you can see how pushing down the keys that are mapped to the steering wheel only part way results in a much more gradual turn. While a gentler throttle press also allows finer control over acceleration. Neat, huh? You'll also find a surprising amount of customizability in Wu Ting One's software package, which is called, and no, do not adjust your headphones, you heard me right, WuTility. Not only can you remap keys to functionality like triggers on a gamepad, but you can set up multiple analog profiles with different sensitivity curves, since you might want the keys to react differently depending on whether you're piloting a tank in Battlefield or controlling a soccer player slash footballer in FIFA. Something to note is that this analog functionality doesn't actually kick in until after the 2mm actuation distance, which is similar to most Cherry MX switches. So while Wu Ting is looking into the ability to build a hair trigger capable version in the future, for now the WuTility can only be used to make the actuation distance longer, if you prefer less sensitivity in something like a turn based game or if you're just typing. And of course, all this additional functionality doesn't mean the Wu Ting One is automatically the best option in every scenario. Let's move on to the Bloody B720. Its LK switches lack the fancy analog functionality, but it boasts a very short actuation distance of 1.5mm, the shortest of any of the keyboards in our roundup. To see if there's a tangible benefit, we had our resident CSGO wizard Edzel test out each of the keyboards, and while he didn't feel that the Wu Ting or Tesoro were appreciably different from common Cherry MX Reds, he really liked the quick response of the Bloody, saying that while the difference wasn't huge, it definitely was noticeable, kind of like going from a 144Hz to a 240Hz monitor in his words. And we didn't even tell him the actuation point specs before he tried it out. So give Bloody some credit here, their claim to have the world's fastest key response might just be true, at least when comparing to other optical solutions. The MX speeds claim a slightly shorter actuation distance at 1.2mm. And although Edzel didn't think this made a difference in game responsiveness, he did think the LK switches were a bit heavier. So keep that in mind if you use a light touch on your keyboard. And this leads us into our impressions of overall build quality and usability. In our opinion, the Wu Ting 1 walked away the clear winner in this department. Its deck is quite rigid, which often indicates a well-made keyboard, and its understated brushed finish and subtle logo at the bottom give it a higher-end appearance. Not to mention, I really liked how this thing felt under my fingers. It was soft, but in a good way, kind of like typing on boobs for whatever it's worth. And then when you use the clicky switches, it was sharp and satisfying. The Bloody, with its giant blood-soaked logo on the other hand, practically screams, we tried to make this look as gamer as possible, at any cost. And the keys felt a bit mushy for my liking, though Ed didn't seem to mind, so that's something to note. And the build quality overall seemed solid, if unexceptional. Unfortunately, I can't say the same about the Tesoro. I was able to twist the keyboard way too much, even with a minimal amount of torque. Maybe that's what they meant by break the rules. At $92, it isn't a bad piece of hardware, it just simply doesn't do anything better than the other two. The Bloody, however, presents an interesting alternative to MX Speed switches, thanks to its very competitive price of $75 US. The Wu Ting 1 is by far the most interesting one we checked out today, possessing a unique feature set with solid build quality and customizability. But I would probably only shell out the 160 euros it'll cost you, if the games you play specifically benefit from their pseudo-analog functionality, or if you want a typing experience that matches your tacky mouse mat. If you were to go get TunnelBear right now, you could actually have it turned on and working, by the time I finish telling you why it's awesome. It is that simple to use. You basically press one button, and boom! Your connection is secured, and your online activity is kept private, from your internet provider, advertisers, and the websites that you use. And of course, there's the added benefit of being able to select any country you want, so you can use websites and online services, like streaming video players, as though you are from a different country. TunnelBear has a top-rated privacy policy, and does not log your activity, and you can even try it for free, to experience what a more open internet might be like, with 500 megabytes of data, with no credit card required. And then, once you choose to get a year of unlimited data, you can save 10% on that, by going to tunnelbear.com slash LTT. Thanks for watching, guys! If this video sucked, you know what to do. If it was awesome, get subscribed, hit the like button, hit the bell, if you want to incessantly see every single video we ever release, to your phone and your desktop and everything. It's a good way to keep track of everything we're doing. If you want to see stuff to buy, check out the link in the video description. There's an Amazon link down there, and there's also a merch store link, for some cool shirts that aren't this one. Anyway, yeah, check out this video, which is, uh... which is, uh... seeing the first video I ever made, which was on my own, and it never got uploaded anywhere, and it was on a ducky keyboard from, like, way back. My mom filmed it on a flip HD camera in our kitchen, at the time. See you later.