What is the opinion of Reddit about the
RK ROYAL KLUDGE RK61 Wired 60% Mechanical Gaming Keyboard RGB Backlit Ultra-Compact Hot-Swappable Brown Switch Black?

There’s the Redragon K552, which is a basic mechanical keyboard with clicky blue switched. If you’ve ever been to an eSports cafe, this is likely the keyboard you used.

There’s the Redragon K582 Surara, a full size board with linear Red switches and full RGB backlighting.

At around the $50 range you might want to consider the Royal Kludge RK61, which has much better build quality, a compact 60% form factor, and RGB backlighting.

PCPartPicker Part List

Black airflow build, minus the GPU. Try to find whatever you can for a midrange budget like $300-600.

I don’t think it’s worth it for the i5-11400 because it’s $250 right now; $75 more for moderately higher single-core performance isn’t worth it, but here’s the option in case you want it. One downside to the i5-10400F is that it doesn’t have integrated graphics, so you won’t be able to use the computer without a discrete GPU, however the 11400 does have integrated graphics. This means you can buy and build everything now, and you can still use the computer while you’re looking for a GPU. Compared to the $210 i5-10400 (with integrated graphics), I think it’s worth it to bump up to an i5-11400.

Third party cooler for silence and low temps.

Best all-around motherboard right now; my usual picks (ASRock B560M Pro4, MSI B560M Pro-VDH) aren’t available. 4 DIMM slots for future RAM additions, decent connectivity, and really has all you need.

16 GB of standard 3200 MHz CL16 RAM. Not much to say here, except holy shit RAM prices have gone up recently…

I don’t mind your SSD pick; normally I’d look at a WD Blue SN550 or Kingston A2000 (an NVMe SSD) since they’re usually around the same price or cheaper, but for $15 premium I don’t know if the increased speeds are worth it. This is primarily because you’ll only see a difference on boot; games aren’t affected by seq. read/write speeds. One plus-side to this is that I’m leaving the M.2 slot open so you can always add a faster SSD later.

Like I said earlier, I recommend trying to find any GPU in that $300-600 price range. That should be great for 1080p 100+ FPS. Don’t forget about the used market, like eBay, FB Marketplace, or r/CanadianHardwareSwap.

The case is one of my favourites – the Cooler Master NR400. It’s a compact mATX case with excellent airflow and good cable management space. Great value overall with a minimal aesthetic and two included fans.

The PSU is a popular mid-range unit in the CXM550. Good protections, semi-modular design to reduce cable clutter, and overall good value.

I like the monitor pick; I can’t stress how important it is to have a monitor with adjustable height. You don’t want to be straining your neck every time you use your computer, especially for long gaming sessions. The monitor itself has a good VA panel and high brightness for a gaming panel at 350 nits.

I would highly recommend a mechanical keyboard here; the Tecware Phantom is a solid entry-level keyboard with RGB backlighting and a TKL layout which removes the numpad. This leaves more room for the mouse and a cleaner look overall. If you can stretch a bit, I’d recommend the Royal Kludge RK61, an entry-level enthusiast keyboard with much better build quality and typing experience.

Finally, the mouse is the Corsair Katar Pro XT. It copies the popular Logitech G305 shape, and has good build quality. It’s a light/medium weight mouse at 74g and has an ambidextrous shape.

Let me know what you think 🙂

A little update, i just got told that the 60% keyboard on YMDK does not support VIA/QMK, because the architecture is different. So the consensus seems to be that if you want a 60% keyboard and use VIA/QMK it needs to be built for that. So looks like i can kiss my wish of having a potent software with a 60% keyboard goodbye, unless i look into very custom solutions. Like i would have to start from the pcb, and what it supports, and then go from there.

On testing the software i realised that there is no youtube video for the Smart Duck XS61, but there are obviously videos for the Royal Kludge products. One of them is this one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SKVkNLI9Dns and its quite recent. Is that what you see as well ?

The Royal Kludge products seem to use inhouse Brown switches of which i dont have a clue about their quality, but lets roll with it. The keybaord is said to support 3/5 pins so i can switch them out for MX/Gateron Browns along the way.

I dont think there is onboard memory, right ?

If you would kindly check whether or not my statements are correct, then you can finally tell me why i should prefer the RK68 model over the RK61 model since the saved space is very important to me, then we would finally almost have a closed deal.

Thats what i am thinking about:
https://www.amazon.com/-/de/gp/product/B089GMKFTP/ref=ask\_ql\_qh\_dp\_hza?th=1

ASRock B550M Steel Legend if you don’t need WiFi/BT.

MSI B550M Pro-VDH WiFi if you do.

As for the peripherals:

PCPartPicker Part List

Here are some options for the mouse and headset. There’s a range of budget/high-end and wired/wireless options for both.

For the keyboard, once again here are a variety of choices at different prices and connectivity options:

• Royal Kludge RK61
• Keychron K6
• Epomaker AK61
• Epomaker K870T
• HyperX Alloy Origins Core

For the mousepad/deskmat, I’d suggest looking at full-size deskmats (900x400mm) on DeskHero. The designs are much more interesting than a plain black mousepad and can provide a lot of personality to your setup. It also sounds nicer to type on your keyboard with a deskmat under it, but that’s just me.