Razer BlackWidow V4 Pro Wired Mechanical Gaming Keyboard Orange Switches Tactile Quiet - Doubleshot ABS Keycaps - Command

I played with this keyboard a lot. Pretty much everyday since I had it. This was a beautiful keyboard. ✨☺️💖 I loved the way the lights wrapped all of the way around the wrist rest pad. It was comfortable, it was even easy to customize with fun different key caps! I spent 2 years and 4 months with it before I started having issues. 💔 I'm not sure what the average lifespan of a keyboard usually is, but I guess I wore out the D after using it too much. Unfortunately, the D is now somewhat unresponsive when I touch it. Perhaps it was all of the repetitive strafing from side to side that went on in the competitive games I had been playing. The A and D keys were definitely put to work with many long hours of play sessions. It was not each time I pressed the key where it didn't respond, but the inconsistentcy was enough to cause me to retire this keyboard. Time to move on to my next, new keyboard. ⌨️🌷RIP🌷 this beautiful keyboard. We had some good times together! Maybe I'll get the same type, or maybe I'll try something different. Who knows! I'm not sure yet! Read more

Over all I will say that I typically really enjoy razer products and my wife gifted me this keyboard and I absolutely love it. the aluminum metal makes it feel very durable and just a overall great feeling so the build quality is really felt once you hold it in your hands. Easy plug and play and works well with the razer program. The extra keys are easy to program if you need it. This is a heavier keyboard so its not something I would recommend for like traveling. The color options are good just like most rgb keyboards. I personally like the clicky'ness of blue switches so I can tell you that the green switches sound great IF you like that sound. It is loud if you get the green switches so if your going to be using this near someone or just don't want keys that are a bit loud defiantly get red switches. The keyboard just feels so nice when typing and pretty much anyone I let try it or use it falls in love with it to. It definatelly has a more premium price but you can feel it in the quality of the keyboard. If you want something that will last you and feel great I would recommend this keyboard. Highly recommend. Read more

TLDR: slipshod programming, excellent marketeers. [NOTE: apologies for the typos - I had no time to proof my notes. But it takes ages to even list all the issues/flaws, much less document them--I'm far from the only person who has tried... and threw up their hands in defeat.] //skip to Part 2 for better grammar :) PART 1 ----- THE HARDWARE ----- Literally every major feature listed (on the amazon page for naga pro and blackwidow v4 pro) has a major issues 1. Media keys 1. Sunken down too far to be visible, aka too short to see and use easily 2. Hard to see. Symbols are faint. No through-key illumination, only peripheral backlight. Very difficult to see even in good light and without glare of the backlight. 2. Indicators above the arrow keys 1. No backlight, cannot see the text, not that you use these often. 3. Command dial - modes + comments 1. Keyboard brightness ® Redundant. Dedicated fn keys already exist on this very KB 2. Windows zoom. ® Programmed with wrong output (e.g. deprecated in newer windows os) 3. Track jogging. ® Limited utility. Works only when player is in focus, which defeats the main purpose ® Doesn't work will all apps ® Windows media: dial ONLY WORKS WHEN FOCUS IS ALREADY ON TRACK SLIDER. Absolutley useless. ® Under the hood, it's just "shift + left arrow" and "shift + right arrow" 4. Vertical scrolling. ® Good use case: gaming. For button mashing quick-events; perform scroll wheel up/dn if you've already mapped your physical scroll wheel's up/dn to something else ® Useless? For me anyway 5. Horizontal scrolling. ® Actually works. Nice to have when synapse crashes, disabling horizontal scrolling on razer's naga pro mouse. (though I haven't tested this extensively). ® UPDATE. Nvm. Does not work w/o synapse. 6. Switch apps ® Alt + Tab… but much worse. you already have alt-tab. But this is worse. Once you stop turning, it selects that app, but gives you little time to glance through them, so you have to key turning the dial. But if you overshoot and reverse dial turn direction… ◊ It Scrolls in wrong direction // If you reverse scroll direction too quickly, it won't recognize the change in direction, aka the wheel doessn't work well 7. Track selector ® Basic next track, prev track 8. Switch browser tabs ® Why would you need this? 9. Custom modes - user created ® Can be useful, but YMMV ® Gaming: map to scroll wheel 4. Dedicated macro keys 1. M1, M2, M3, M4, M5 - useful 2. Side keys - too easy to bump by accident Overall hardware quality - fine for <$100, but not remotely worth >$200 PART 2 ----- THE SOFTWARE ----- No review of Razer peripherals is complete without mentioning their software, Synapse. Razer Synapse - so, so many issues 1. Required for most features to work, integral to the product listed. 2. Frequently crashes (especially during games). Result: i. Your profile stops working: macros and keys return to default (or to some random ghost profile that you can't delete) ii. Your macros stop working iii. Your lighting stops working 3. Profiles 1. corrupted 2. Hybrid storage doesn’t work (white profile on Naga Pro): unable to retain settings when synapse disconnected 3. Profiles and macros don’t work when signed IN to Synapse, but work OK on a guest account. 4. Unable to sync profiles 5. unable to factory reset / erase profiles (!) 4. Macros don’t work in a dozen ways 1. issues with combined modifiers (like win + ctrl) 2. keys stuck in down-press or un-press 3. keys do not respond 4. corrupted in so many ways... 1. random keystrokes removed from macros 2. unwanted duplicates 3. failure to run 4. failure to duplicate correctly 5. corrupted on import 6. up/down keystroke pairs no longer “linked” 7. no name “No macro” 8. unable to edit 9. unable to wipe from account 5. Not synced 6. Disappeared from account 7. Nonfunctional 1. When signed into Synapse 2. When signed into specific user account 3. At all 8. NOTE: yes, I am sure many (if not all) the issues stem from Razer/Synapse, not the user. eg i checked the macro files themselves and discovered, for example, some were missing ID tags, had the wrong ID, sequenced my inputs differently from what was displayed in Synapse, were missing key-up lines (making your keys/buttons stuck "pressed down"), etc. 9. Keys are incorrectly mapped Example: the inputs {up, down, left, right} are mapped to arrow keys ® But with turbo, they are are mapped to numpad 2,4,6,8… ® But Synapse doesn't automatically deactivate num lock. ® So when you think you're rapidly commanding {up, down, left, right}, Synapse is actually putting out {8, 2, 4, 6} on the numpad. ® Even when using "keyboard recording" i.e. they don't actually record faithfuly your key presses, they estimate. ® This bug is hidden. Zero indication is visible to the user. I had to parse the macro files directly to finally figure out what on earth was going on. 5. resource intensive 1. Consumes 1 GB of RAM 2. Consumes 100 MB to 200 MB of GPU VRAM(!) while machine is idle just after rebooting. 3. Generated >10 GB per user in AppData. (Razer, what on earth are you doing that requires multiple gigabytes?!) 6. Seriously, it's easdier to list what they did right than what they did wrong. This is literally the worst piece of software that I (or most people buying Razer products) will EVER use. PART 3 ----- SUPPORT IS TERRIBLE ----- 1. Razer Support actively dissuades users from contacting support: i. they require A LOT of personal info to even start talking to you. ii. they require VERY invasive logs to even start helping you 1) even if their intent is completely benign, would you really trust Razer Security™ with your personal info? If you think Synapse code is bad, do you think their internal code is any better? 2. they can’t help you anyway (so what was the point of collecting all your personal info?) i. their main advice: 1) uninstall/reinstall everything. 2) don’t get fancy: a) don’t make complicated (useful) macros, b) don’t use USB hubs, including their own accompanying peripheral, c) don’t ‘run too many things at once’ 3. Support forums are littered with tons of “yes-men” who just repeat official lines from Razer i. … even if the advice is irrelevant ii. … even if the advice does not work (see a comment above), eg their driver removal tool doesn’t work on recent firmware patches 4. And yes I’ve tried EVERYTHING while troubleshooting over the years: 1. clean Windows installs 2. new machines. 3. laptops/desktops. 4. different OS. 5. different synapse ver. 6. different combinations of razer products 7. different Razer accounts 8. Multiple of same product 9. safe mode 10. lesson: RAZER PRODUCTS WORK BETTER THE LESS YOU USE THEM. 1. don’t use synapse 2. don’t use macros 3. don’t use chroma / lighting 4. don’t reassign keys 5. don’t mix/match razer products 6. Don't use on multiple profiles on the same computer 7. Don't use on multiple computers 8. etc. ad nauseum 9. … which defeats the point! I could go on for hours… this is just the tip of the iceberg… and these are just the issues i’ve experienced this year alone. Razer has written terrible software and fielded terrible support for years and years. Do you expect them to improve any time soon? From the start and for years on, I was a big fan of Razer products because they offered features not found anywhere else on the market. But their value soured. Their broken software is a deal-breaker. If they invested half as much on software as they did on marketing, they would not need marketing. But I can no longer recommend their products any longer. Even if Razer started discounting their products AND Razer’s competitors all went on vacation (no longer true in 2024, if ever), I could not recommend buying Razer products: they just DON’T work. They are tremendously tiresome, hassle-some, fragile, inconsistent, perpetually broken, and time-consuming. They have wasted thousands of dollars of my time. At minimum. I bought Razer products because they not only accelerated my work, but also enabled me to do things I could not otherwise. So I tolerated their terrible software for a long time... until now. This is the last straw. One can’t help but wonder whether their software issues are intentional. It would make more sense than this calamitous never-ending train-wreck. (Seriously, it's as if they slapped together every feature solely to satisfy a checkbox but performed zero user-testing and or zero quality control, especially in their software. ) TERRIBLE PRODUCT. Just buy a Wooting keyboard instead. Or even a Wooting knockoff. Read more

The only reason I bought this was because my original Black Widow Chroma V2 got drenched in tea. So I go on the hunt and find out they no longer make that keyboard. I purchased two other Razer keyboards and even though they were great, nothing to me beats the Black Widow keyboards. The comfort of the wrist rest is great and it doesn't matter if I'm working, cruising the net or gaming, it's a comfortable go. I do love the color picking ability and I keep it on one color for everything and it looks awesome! You will have to be careful of the buttons on the left side of the keyboard but other than that the smoothness of typing is great. I am a very particular person when it comes to what my keyboard feels and sounds like. Yes, this is a "clicker" keyboard and I absolutely love that. The speed of typing is awesome, the response time keeps you moving, so no complaint there. The biggest complaint I have is the software. I never had a problem with it keeping my settings, starting back up after a reboot, opening up in general. I have all the buttons clicked for it to start up at boot, log in and everything, but 9 times out of 10 I have to open it back up, log in to Synapse and then it starts doing what I want. Also, I truly miss the Chroma extras of the headphone jack and usb port on the right side. This does have a usb port on the back, but you tend to forget about it because of the location. So, everything is great about this keyboard, some things take a little getting used to, like the roller wheel volume control, but like all new things it will grow on you. Is it worth the money, that all depends on your own personal preference. I broke down and spent the money because I knew I would be happy with keyboard and will last for years, as long as I don't spill tea on it. Read more