Ideazon has been making gaming input devices for a while now, and have proven themselves to make some of the best devices out there. The Zboard is one of their main products. It's a hot-swappable USB gaming keyboard with loads
of special functions and dozens of game-oriented keysets.
The Zboard is compatible with a
fairly wide array of hot-swappable keysets. You can purchase
these keysets and swap them into your current Zboard base in a matter
of seconds. Ready for some Counter-Strike? Swap in
the CS keyset. Ready to write a paper? Swap in the
standard keyset (yes, I'm typing this review on the Zboard standard
keyset)!
Packaging
& Presentation
The
presentation of the Zboard product is quite impressive. I
opened the box and immediately noticed the careful layout of the
packaging. A nice folder loaded with Zboard pamphlets
detailing all of the various keysets you can buy was in the box, as
well as the driver CD and other documentation.
Ideazon
shipped the Zboard with two keysets: the Zboard keyset and the standard
keyset. The Zboard keyset is essentially a standard keyboard
with no number pad on the right side; instead it contains special
game-oriented controls on the left side of the keyboard. The
standard FPS and RPG movement keys are large red buttons; several other
default game controls are also present.
Ideazon
also sent us a special keyset for Counter-Strike: Source.
This keyset is set up exactly like a standard keyset, but there are CS
graphics and all of the keys are labeled according to the game's
default controls (a bit of a problem if you play with modified
controls, but that's a limited market anyway). The number pad
of the CS keyset contains several special buttons with functions to
help out with the in-game 'buy' system.
The
Zboard keyset is kind of tough to type on, but it feels great when
playing certain games. The only problem is when you want to
quickly type a message in an online FPS: you'll probably get fragged
while looking for the 'B' key.
