Melgeek impressed us over the last two years. Its Mojo68 was one of the earliest contenders for a prebuilt keyboard that rivaled more expensive customs, and the following year’s Mojo84 came right alongside it as an excellent option. Melgeek just released its latest, and most affordable keyboard yet with the Modern97, a compact full-size keyboard retailing for only $139, completely built, and supporting 2.4GHz wireless and Bluetooth with up to eight devices.
The mechanical keyboard market has never been so competitive, with affordable but excellent kits quickly becoming the standard rather than the exception. Even with such heated competition, Melgeek has managed to land another win here with a keyboard that comes completely built, sounds as good if not better than some of those custom keyboards you have to build yourself, and requires absolutely no modding out of the box. It also features high-speed wireless connectivity, making it a great choice for pure gaming too.
Specifications
Current Price: $139 (Melgeek)
Melgeek Modern97 - A Custom Keyboard You Don’t Have to Build Yourself
The Melgeek Modern97 is a stylish and compact full-size keyboard designed to elevate your typing experience without forcing you to spend an arm and a leg or build it yourself. It is, in a real way, a custom keyboard that just happens to come pre-assembled.
If you’re not already deep into the world of mechanical keyboards, the idea of a “custom keyboard” probably seems pretty foreign to you. So allow me to illustrate with an example.
Imagine you were shopping for a car. You have the choice between two vehicles. Both are equally safe and will get you to your destination in the same amount of time. The first car is run-of-the-mill. There are 30 of them on the lot that all look and drive exactly the same. When the dealer takes you to the second car, he pulls out a checklist of options. Do you want a more powerful engine, heated seats, and an upgraded sound system? It also has upgraded suspension for a smoother ride and a fine-tuned engine that quietly purrs — or car roar — down the highway. Your choice. By the time you get through your checklist, the second car is completely customized to your preferences. Which do you think would give you the better typing experience?
That’s what a custom keyboard offers, but, just like that car, almost always at a higher price and with the demand that you bring some parts of your own to complete the job (switches, stabilizers, and keycaps). It can seem daunting and like a lot more work — it is. And for a lot of people, you don’t want to have to build it yourself. You want it to work at peak performance, right out of the box, at a reasonable price.
The Modern97 is a version of that second car. Rather than provide you with a checklist, it’s like the upgraded model. The manufacturer has paid attention to the options people choose the most, what they seem to value, and how they tweak the final product to their taste and has applied all of the most popular options. And because they’re selling at scale, they’re able to do it at a much lower cost than if you were to build it yourself. That’s what this offers in the keyboard world: all of the upgrades and design considerations you’d usually need to factor in and mod to perfect, already done for you. It is, without exaggeration, one of the best out of box typing experiences I’ve ever had at its price. Go higher and there’s more competition. Here at $139? It’s leading the pack from the hundreds of keyboards I’ve tested over the years.
Melgeek Modern97 - Build to an Enthusiast Standard (Enhanced Typing and Gaming)
The first thing to know about it is that it’s most of the way to being full-size but isn’t quite there. It uses a 96% layout that squeezes all of the keys together and removes most of the empty space. The navigation and editing cluster above the keys has been shifted to a four-key array above the numpad. The right shift and the “0” key have been shortened. The “missing” keys, like Home and End, are available as Fn commands accessible with a quick key combination (but can also be added back as physical keys using the replacement keycaps in the box and the Melgeek Hive software).
It’s a very functional layout. It’s about as wide as a TKL but with more dedicated buttons. I find it to be a great middle ground between work and gaming if you need to have a number pad on your keyboard. The shortened “0” can take a little getting used to, though, if your muscle memory has you tapping too far to the left where you’ll hit an arrow key on this keyboard.
The keyboard is rich with enthusiast features that enhance the typing experience. It uses doubleshot ABS keycaps, so the legends will never fade. Beneath them are hot-swappable switches allowing you to replace or repair switches at any time, and to completely change the sound and feel of your keyboard just by putting in a new set — something you’d usually have to replace the entire keyboard for.
Beneath that, you’ll find layers of sound-dampening and sound-enhancing foam and silicone. There’s a layer of foam between the plate and PCB to isolate reverberations and draw out the sound of the switches. Another layer of thin foam rests underneath the switches themselves to act as a sound filter, adding pop to its sound signature. Beneath the circuit board is even more foam and silicone to remove any sense of hollowness from the case, add weight, and to deliver a quieter, lighter typing sound.
The keyboard is structurally different too. It utilizes a gasket-based mounting structure. While many keyboards use a “tray mount” that screws the circuit board to the case for a very firm, unforgiving typing experience, the Modern97 uses soft gaskets around the edge of the plate. These are held, squeezed between the two halves of the case. Instead of your keystrokes slamming against hard points across the plate, these gaskets absorb that impact and give. The typing experience is softer and sounds better because of it.
Larger keys on a keyboard require plastic and wire supports called stabilizers. These keep the key from tipping one way or the other when you press them off-center. The plastic and wire construction can rattle, making these keys louder and sound rather grating. Usually, you would need to add a bit of grease yourself to solve this problem, though many manufacturers are now applying this at the factory. The trouble is that it’s often poorly done and inconsistent. One key may sound fine, while another is still rattly, making it stand out even more. Melgeek has done a tremendous job with its stabilizers with consistent lubing across the entire keyboard. The larger keys sound great and don’t require any extra tweaking to bring them up to potential.
The keyboard itself is also much more stylish than is common in the gaming and productivity world. It comes in two different versions, Ocean and Fountain. Both of these have a “cookies and cream” speckling of black on white (Ocean) or green (Fountain). The keycaps are also different with Ocean taking on a white, blue, and yellow color scheme and Fountain adopting black, white, and green. The underside of each is also frosted plastic with slick ridged trim and some inset symbols that speak to its gaming prowess.
To that end, the keyboard supports both wired and wireless play. Over Bluetooth, it shockingly supports eight different devices, which is double the highest I’ve ever seen on a wireless mechanical keyboard. It also sports a high-speed 2.4GHz wireless dongle for 1ms latency, essentially identical to playing with a wire. With RGB off, Melgeek rates the keyboard as lasting around 700 hours. It doesn’t provide an “RGB on” figure, but you can count on needing to recharge it every week or two.
The other element that makes it a gaming keyboard, as well as enthusiast, are its switches. It’s available with Melgeek’s custom Kailh Sonic53 switches, Box Plastic switches, or Kailh Tactiles, which have a bump you can feel in your fingers. These switches are all pre-lubed and are extremely smooth with no spring ping whatsoever, but the Sonic53’s I tested in this model have a higher 1.2mm actuation point. If your reflexes are up to the challenges, these switches can actuate and send commands faster than a traditional 2mm switch, but were also heavy enough at 45g of actuation force, to avoid many of the typos I am typically plagued with using other “speed switches.”
When it comes to RGB, the keyboard is exceptionally bright and vibrant. The keycaps are not backlit, so the legends don’t illuminate in the dark, but the lighting creates a beautiful “bed” that glows around the keys. It’s also customizable for color and brightness using onboard controls or slightly more using the Hive software.
That programmability is another strong suit. Hive allows you to remap keys across multiple layers with few limits. You can record and assign macros, apply Windows shortcuts, and then save them to the keyboard’s onboard storage to use when Hive isn’t active. Programming the lighting is much more limited, however, so if you’re looking for advanced custom lighting schemes or to do more than change hue, brightness, or speed, it’s probably best to look elsewhere.
Melgeek Modern97 - Worth Buying?
I’m sure it’s clear by now that the answer to this is a resounding “YES.” The Melgeek Modern97 is an exceptionally good keyboard, especially at its current price. Its thoughtful construction, unique style, and performance in both typing and gaming are genuinely hard to beat at this price.
It’s getting more challenging to decide what is the “best” when shopping for gaming keyboards. So many, even budget-priced keyboards, like the Womier G75 at $90, are factoring in many of these same qualities. Many of the boards we receive in for review these days have similar qualities to the Modern97 and are great values in their own right.
The Modern97 sets itself apart in a number of ways, however. Its 2.4GHz connectivity and support for oodles of Bluetooth devices. Its keycaps are great and the implementation of its layers of silicone and foam offer better, softer typing. It’s more programmable. The switches are outstanding and the stabilizers were perfect out of the box on my sample, which is rare and speaks to Melgeek’s attention to the fundamentals.
The result of all of these considerations is a keyboard that, while not cheap at $139, still feels like a great value. You don’t have to spend this much to get a great typing and gaming experience, but if you choose to, you’ll be getting a unique keyboard that accomplishes a lot of what keyboard builders and modders spend hours and hours doing for themselves, but you won’t have to. The improvements in sound and feel are immediate and big compared to gaming keyboards at this price (while wireless performance remains identical), while against others attempting this same thing, they’re more subtle. But if you’re looking to invest in a keyboard you know is great and don’t want to try the rest to test those subtleties yourself, this is a safe buy you won’t regret.
The product described in this article was provided by the manufacturer for evaluation purposes.
