Cooler Master CK352 Keyboard Review

1. Introduction2. Unboxing and First Look3. Testing4. Closing Thoughts5. View All Pages

We've reviewed plenty of keyboards over the last twelve months, with each new model trying to ‘one up' its rivals by adding more and more advanced features, with ever-increasing price tags. But what if you don't want a keyboard with all the bells and whistles – instead, you want something that just works? That's where the Cooler Master CK352 comes in. Designed to offer a core gaming experience but without any gimmicks to drive up the cost, the CK352 hits the market at £69.95. Let's find out if it is any good.

Despite Cooler Master describing the CK352 as a ‘straightforward gaming keyboard', it still looks decent on paper. LC mechanical switches are used, there's a sandblasted aluminium top-plate instead of an all-plastic build, and we find per-key RGB illumination alongside four LED strips in each corner of the keyboard.

Of course, considering the price-point the CK352 isn't going to be as feature-rich as something that costs twice as much, and on first impressions I immediately noticed the lack of dedicated media keys, wrist rest and even software support. That doesn't mean the CK352 isn't worth buying however, so let's take a closer look.

Specification:

• PRODUCT NUMBER: CK-352-GKMR1/L1/M1-**
• KEYBOARD SWITCH TYPE: Mechanical Switch (Red/Blue/Brown)
• KEYBOARD KEYCAPS: Part of Asia/US layout: ABS Double-injection & Laser-engraved, Other layouts: ABS Painting & Laser-engraved + UV coating
• KEYBOARD MATERIAL: Sandblasted Aluminum, Plastic
• KEYBOARD COLOR: Space Gray
• KEYBOARD LED COLOR: RGB
• KEYBOARD POLLING RATE: 1000Hz
• KEYBOARD RESPONSE TIME: 1ms
• ON-THE-FLY SYSTEM: Yes
• KEYBOARD MULTIMEDIA KEY: Through Function Key (FN)
• COMPATIBLE OS: Windows XP & 7+
• SOFTWARE SUPPORT: N/A
• KEYBOARD CABLE: PVC, 1.8m, USB 2.0
• KEYBOARD DIMENSIONS (L X W X H): 454.6 x 142.6 x 35.96 mm / 17.9 x 5.6 x 1.4 inch
• KEYBOARD WEIGHT: 904g (2 lbs) (without cable)
• KEYBOARD WARRANTY: 2 years

Shipping in a dark box, a large image of the Cooler Master CK352 is immediately visible on the front, with Cooler Master also keen to point out this board is indeed using mechanical switches.

On the back, we find multi-lingual text highlighting various key features and specifications of the board.

Opening up the box reveals the keyboard itself, sitting in a thin plastic covering. The only included accessories consist of a quick start guide and a keycap puller.

As for the board itself then, I have to say it looks very good from a purely visual perspective. Usually we'd expect a cheaper keyboard to have a clunky or basic appearance, and while at £70 the CK352 isn't a bargain-basement offering, I'd say it is still up there with the more premium-looking keyboards we have reviewed.

A large part of that comes from the sandblasted aluminium top-plate, which not only adds more rigidity to the build, but also looks a lot better than an all-plastic construction. On that note, I would also say that the colour of the metal plate itself is a fair bit lighter than what is shown in Cooler Master's stock photos of the board. In those images, it looks like a very dark grey, but in good light (as we can see here), it is more of a light/mid grey.

One other good-looking part of the design is the use of dual-tone keycaps. This is pretty common in the world of custom mechanical keyboards, but most off-the-shelf boards from big gaming companies stick with single-colour keycaps. Cooler Master has bucked that trend and gone with grey caps on the letters and numbers, but black caps on the modifier keys. That colour scheme, coupled with the grey aluminium top-plate, gives an overall appearance that is not dissimilar to the Drop CTRL.

Obviously this is a full-size board too, but right now Cooler Master does not offer a TKL (tenkeyless, or 80%) option. The only area with any branding on the keyboard itself is a clean white Cooler Master hexagonal logo in the top right corner.

We've already mentioned how the CK352 does not offer any software control, but that's not to say you can't adjust things like the RGB lighting or control media playback – these are all just secondary functions dotted about the board. We take a closer look at the controls themselves on the next page, but you will notice a load of secondary legends printed on the F-keys, on the arrows keys, the INS/HOME/PGUP keys and so on.

The keycaps themselves are ABS material, but interestingly the exact process varies depending which layout you buy – for those in some Asian regions and the US, Cooler Master uses double-shot caps with laser engraved legends, but for our UK sample, the ABS plastic is painted and then laser engraved, but with a UV coating.

PBT is my preferred material, but is is understandable that Cooler Master wants to keep cost down – the ABS caps will just become shiny over time. Cooler Master uses an OEM keycap profile.

Underneath those caps, we get a look at the mechanical switches. These are LC-branded switched, in the Red variety – meaning linear and non-clicky, as you would expect. I'd never heard of LC before and a little bit of digging online suggests they are a fairly budget switch choice, though Cooler Master still claims a 50m click lifespan. We talk more about the feel and performance on the next page.

It is worth noting, however, that in the UK it is only possible to get the CK352 with these Red switches. Cooler Master lists Brown and Blues as options for the CK352, but those are region-specific and will not be available in the UK.

Elsewhere, each corner of the keyboard is home to a small LED strip that bends from the bottom edge, round to the side of the frame. This is in addition to the per-key RGB lighting found on the key switches themselves. We take a look at the RGB lighting itself on the next page

The underside of the board is almost entirely plain. It's made of black plastic, with a sticker in the middle. Two flip-out feet are also visible in the top corner, while five small rubber anti-slip pads are also positioned around the edges.

Lastly, the cable measures 1.8m, is made of rubber and is non-detachable. It terminates with a standard USB Type-A connector.

We break down testing into three main sections: lighting, build quality, and performance.

Lighting

Kicking off our testing with a look at the RGB lighting, the CK352 does a good job here. As mentioned, there's no software used to control this so all adjustments are done from the keyboard itself, but it's very easy to cycle through various modes (including breathing, rainbow wave, rainbow spiral and so on). If you prefer a static colour, you can select one of nine solid colour options or you can manually adjust the red, green and blue levels to get a final output colour that isn't included as one of the nine presets.

The LEDs themselves get nice and bright, coverage is even across the keycaps and you even get a bit of colour spilling out onto the aluminium top-plate. My one main criticism for the lighting comes down to the LED strips themselves – the lighting is just quite dim and also fairly uneven as it comes out of the diffuser strips themselves. It appears this is because these strips only give off incidental light from the key switches – it doesn't look like there are any dedicated LEDs specifically for these light bars. It's hardly the end of the world, but it does look somewhat sub-par compared to the per-key RGB lighting on the rest of the board.

Build quality

As for the build quality of the CK352, for a £70 keyboard it is ticking a lot of the boxes. Primarily, the use of an aluminium top-plate adds a lot to the overall rigidity, to the point where there is only minimal flex exhibited if I try and twist the board with both hands. Laid flat on a desk and typing as normal, I did not notice any flex to the board at all, so that's a very good start.

A slight negative area for me though came from a bit of keycap wobble, primarily on the larger keys like enter and space bar. The stabilisers used on these keys don't appear to be of the highest quality as there's quite a lot of lateral movement from the keycaps when resting your fingers on these keys. It's not dreadful and I didn't notice it much when typing, but it is something present on the larger keys. The letter keys didn't exhibit any more wobble than I would expect.

The other point to mention here – something we also touched on on the previous page – is the use of ABS keycaps. I'd always rather see PBT keycaps – and double-shot ones at that – as you know the legends won't fade or wear-off, but PBT generally commands a higher price premium than ABS, so it is understandable why Cooler Master went with ABS here. In fairness to them as well, these specific ABS caps are of good quality – they don't feel brittle or too thin, which is common amongst particularly cheap ABS sets – so overall I can't really complain, the fact these are ABS and not PBT is just something I wanted to mention.

Performance

Moving onto the day to day experience when using this keyboard then, we'll start with the LC Red switches, as these will shape the core user experience of the CK352. As mentioned on the previous page, I'd not heard of LC mechanical switches before and there doesn't appear to much information on the switch's specifications online. However, as we would expect from a Red switch, they are linear and non-clicky.

After contacting Cooler Master about these switches, we were sent a datasheet which reveals the following specifications:

Image credit: DONGGUAN LEICHUANG ELECTRONIC TECHNOLOGY CO，LTD.

What we can see then, is essentially identical specs to a Cherry MX Red. Give or take some variation, each switch is designed with a 45gf operating force, 2mm of pre-travel and 4mm of post-travel.

In use, they feel smooth and overall fairly satisfying to type on. I tried to compare typing with the LC Reds directly with my Corsair K65 which has Cherry MX Reds, and the overall feel of the switch is very close, particularly in terms of actuation force. I would say the Cherry Reds perhaps feel a bit more consistent between keystrokes, but overall we're talking very minor differences. I did notice the keycaps can bottom-out on the CK352's top-plate if you press hard enough, which doesn't happen on my K65, so that could explain the slight difference in feel from time to time, but like I say, there's not a lot in it at all.

There is a slightly different overall sound profile however, with the LC Reds definitely proving louder than the Cherry MX Reds. The spacebar is particularly loud and, along with the enter key, has a much ‘thockier' sound to it than my K65. Whether that's good or bad really depends on your personal taste, but I would say the CK352 isn't going to be as quiet as MX Reds, and certainly not compared to any of Cherry's Silent switch varieties.

To demonstrate, here's a soundtest comparing the Cooler Master CK352 with LC Red switches, to the Corsair K65 with Cherry MX Red switches:

The only other thing to mention is going to be general gaming performance, but only to say that I had no issues when gaming with this keyboard. The switches are plenty fast for me, it supports full n-key rollover (verified with this test) and of course, Windows-key lock is supported. The polling rate is set at 1000Hz too, so no complaints there.

Image credit: Cooler Master

What some may take issue with however, is the lack of macro support – and this brings us onto the next section of the review, where we look at the on-board controls. Cooler Master has not supplied software with the CK352 – even though we have seen Master Plus many times in the past, we were told the fact CK352 does not support any software is simply down to cost.

Instead, there is a ton of functionality baked in as secondary functions on the F-keys, arrow keys, and INS/HOME/PGUP keys. Handily, Cooler Master details all of the controls in the quick start guide (as seen above), and it's fairly simple to get your head around these, especially with the secondary functions printed on each keycap.

That said, the control is broadly limited to tweaking the RGB or adjusting media play back. As mentioned, there's no way to record macros (as we've seen on the Cooler Master MK730) nor is there the ability to save different profiles. Profiles I can live without, but no macros – especially on a full size keyboard – could be a dealbreaker for some.

With the peripheral market becoming increasingly saturated, it can be easy to get lost among a variety of keyboards, all with various key selling points and unique features… and price-tags to match.

The USP of the Cooler Master CK352 is almost the fact it doesn't have a USP, and instead is designed as a ‘no-frills' gaming keyboard. At its core, it offers mechanical switches, per-key RGB lighting and solid build quality thanks to the use of an aluminium top-plate, so Cooler Master is clearly trying to make something that does the basics without costing a small fortune.

And I have to say, it is pretty successful in meeting its aim. The LC Red mechanical switches feel good under the fingers and do not disappoint while gaming. The per-key RGB does indeed work very well, and I do like that no software is required to quickly change colour to configure a new LED effect.

Credit also has to go to Cooler Master's design team, as the sleek grey aluminium and dual-tone keycaps look fantastic in my opinion, reminiscent of the Drop CTRL – and that is certainly a good thing.

That said, there are undoubtedly some limitations. The lack of software is both a blessing and a curse, as there's no way to record or use macros via the on-board controls, which I do find disappointing for a full-size keyboard. The lack of switch variety could be a problem for some too, with only Red switches available in the UK – Browns and Blues are an option for the CK352, but only in other regions.

I do have to admit to having a question mark around these LC switches. LC are a brand I have never heard of before, and while Cooler Master still claims a 50m click lifespan, I do wonder why they didn't opt for a different alternative. Cherry as we know charges a price premium, so I don't insist on Cherry switches personally – but Gateron, Kailh, Outemu and even TTC are known brands in this space. LC is just a bit of an unknown, and while that certainly doesn't mean things will go wrong or the switches aren't as good, we just don't really know how they will hold up, when the aforementioned brands all have track records stretching back years.

Still, the Cooler Master CK352 is ticking a lot of the right boxes for a mechanical keyboard that won't cost the earth. You may want to look at the Corsair K60 RGB Pro that's currently retailing at the same £69.99 asking price – but with Corsair software support and Cherry Viola switches – so arguably Cooler Master could knock another tenner off just to make the CK352 even more competitive, but it's still a solid offering in this market segment.

We found the CK352 listed for £69.95 from Overclockers UK HERE.

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Pros

• Solid build quality.
• Looks great with aluminium top-plate and dual-tone keycaps.
• Per-key RGB lighting works well.
• Mechanical switches.
• On-board functionality.

Cons

• LC switches are a bit of an unknown.
• On-board controls don't include macros or saving different profiles.
• Corsair's K60 RGB Pro is the same price but offers Cherry switches and iCUE software.

KitGuru says: The CK352 offers the core functionality we'd expect from a modern mechanical keyboard without costing the earth.

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