[Hardware]HyperX Alloy Origins Mechanical Gaming Keyboard Review: Slick Simplicity (Updated)

[Revo]

 

HyperX Alloy Origins mechanical gaming keyboard (Image credit: Tom's Hardware)
Update 10/5/2020: After its initial launch with HyperX Red switches and follow-up update with HyperX Aqua tactile switches, HyperX today announced a version of this keyboard debuting its HyperX Blue clicky switches. We’ve updated the switch section below with our experience and thoughts about the keyboard with this switch, which is most similar to Cherry MX Blues. The Blue version of the Allow Origins is now available via HyperX's website. 

What do you want from your best gaming keyboard, a truckload of features that you’ll want to futz around with for hours, or a sleek, solid, compact and colorful package that feels great while letting you get down to gaming? If the latter sounds like you, HyperX’s $110 Alloy Origins is well worth considering. Its metal shell is compact, sleek and solid. HyperX’s in-house linear switches feel familiar, in a good way. And the RGB backlighting looks about as vivid as any I’ve seen on a mechanical clacker.

Design

Measuring 1.4 x 17.4 x 5.2 inches (36.4 x 442.5 x 132.5mm) and weighing 2.4 pounds (1,075g), the Alloy Origins is pretty compact for a full-size mechanical keyboard. And a removable braided USB-C cable (that’s nearly 6 feet long) helps make the keyboard more travel-friendly. The slim, aluminum shell looks attractive and feels solid, while giving the exposed switches and keys a nice surface to reflect off of, resulting in bright, attractive lighting effects.

In short, this is one of the nicest-looking mechanical keyboards I’ve used in recent memory. It’s certainly prettier (and feels more premium) than the pricier, switch-swapping Logitech G Pro X. The only features I miss when using the Alloy Origins are dedicated media controls and (ideally) some sort of volume wheel. But there isn’t enough physical space on the keyboard’s frame for more than one or two extra buttons anyway, and HyperX at least integrated media controls (as well as basic lighting controls and a Game Mode switch) into the Function row. A strip above the numpad on the right looks like a tiny monochrome screen (similar to the SteelSeries Apex Pro), but it’s only used as an indicator for Num Lock, Caps Lock and Game Mode.

There’s a couple things worth pointing out on the underside of the keyboard as well. First, the bottom shell is one curved-edge, cool-feeling piece of aluminum, just like the top, which helps lend the keyboard a very premium and solid feel. Second, the feet at the back of the Alloy Origins can be flipped up to two different heights, letting you adjust the angle to three different positions (the third with the feet flipped down) to whatever feels right for you -- I liked typing and gaming with the feet at their maximum height.