Razer Ornata
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This article requires photographic illustration |
| Branding | Razer |
|---|---|
| Features | Backlighting, detachable wrist rest |
| Keyswitches | Rubber dome over membrane with clicker. |
| Interface | USB |
| Rollover | 6KRO |
| Introduced | 2016 |
| Price |
$80 (Ornata) $100 (Ornata Chroma) |
| Website | www.razer.com/gaming-keyboards |
The Razer Ornata is a rubber dome keyboard with a clicker in each switch for extra noise on each key press.
Description
Razer markets it as being "mechanical membrane" referring to it being a hybrid between mechanical and [rubber dome] keyboards. However, the only mechanisms are the clickers and their only purpose is to provide noise.
The keyboard does however have a trace on the membrane for each key to a diode on a separate circuit board, allowing the controller to provide six-key rollover over USB. This feature is unusual on rubber-dome keyboards, being more common on mechanical.
The "Ornata" has green backlighting. The "Ornata Chroma" is a variant with full-colour backlighting. The keycaps are laser-ablated painted translucent ABS.
Points of contention
People in the keyboard community have mentioned the following points of contention about the keyboard and about Razer's official marketing about this keyboard:
- The "mecha-membrane" switches. Razer claims a "crisp tactile click", but feel (tactility) and sound (click) are separate and not linked with each other. The keys rely entirely on being rubber dome for tactility and actuation, and the clicker mechanism is a separate function of a key press.
- Razer claims that the keys were made lower in profile to actuate faster, whereas in reality the height of a keycap has no significance whatsoever on actuation distance. On the contrary rubber dome keys need to be pressed to the bottom to actuate.
- Razer claims that they combined the "best of both worlds" of mechanical and [rubber dome]. Many people have the opposite opinion on noise, actuation distance and feel on bottoming out. The keyboard does have 6-key rollover though, whereas most other membrane-based keyboards have only 2-key rollover (optimised matrix or not)
- Build quality for the price.
Razer may further muddle up the terms:
- The use of "membrane" as referring to rubber domes and not specifically to the membranes underneath them. See: Membrane vs rubber dome.
- Razer claims 10-key rollover, but the rollover has been measured to 6-key rollover over USB. It is suspected that Razer included the four types of modifier keys, which are normally not counted as those are typically reported separately in the USB protocol.
- "Anti-ghosting" incorrectly refers to a way of achieving higher rollover, whereas anti-ghosting actually means methods to avoid unintended key actuations in a matrix.
Trivia
For this keyboard and the marketing of it, Razer came third place for The *Ping* Award in 2016, beaten only by Apple's Touch bar and a user who ran group-buys and disappeared with the money.
