CONCLUSION

   I was quite intrigued when the Hailstorm arrived in our lab but after testing it for roughly 10 days I can’t say it left us with the best impressions. First of all Sandberg says that the wrist rest is rubber coated making it softer and more comfortable. Well our sample had nothing of the sort since the wrist rest was just two pieces of plastic. Now I don’t know if Sandberg changed the end product after sending the sample over to us so I will ask for a new one and will update this review if that’s the case. Right now however things are just how we described. Luckily build quality is quite good (although we’ve obviously seen higher quality ones), the Outemu Blue switches feel quite sturdy (although way too loud for my taste) and its brightness levels are very strong. Unfortunately although the Hailstorm is marketed as an RGB keyboard that’s only partially true since you can only choose a total of 7 different colors. I don’t know why Sandberg didn’t make a color palette available with their control software (perhaps it’s not supported by the LEDs used?) but it would be great had they done so. Another good feature would be to allow the end user to adjust the color of the surrounding LEDs either individually or tied with the color of the keys. Again we have no idea as to why Sandberg chose to skip on that.

   One of the things that have elevated Sandberg products over the years is their very aggressive pricing policy something which I’m afraid doesn’t apply for the Hailstorm (at least not in the same degree). To be more specific as I type these lines the Hailstorm Mechanical Gaming Keyboard retails for USD87 inside the USA (Amazon.com) and for 80Euros inside the EU (Amazon.co.uk) a price tag that lands it right in the middle of a large number of similar models. True you will not find a large number of RGB mechanical keyboards at around the same price point but you will find quite a bit some of which offer more compared to the Hailstorm both in terms of features and quality (some even use Cherry MX switches). That being said overall the Hailstorm is a good gaming keyboard but it doesn’t really bring anything new to the table and although we do recommend taking a look it will probably not be hard for you to get more for around the same price.

PROS

- Overall Build Quality
- Outemu Blue RGB Switches (50 Million Actuations)
- Intergrated Wrist Rest
- 7 Color Key Illumination With 10 Effects
- Individual Key Illumination (Manual Effect)
- Hardware & Software Controlled
- Braided Cable With Gold Plated USB Plug

CONS

- Price (Compared To Its Competition)
- Only 7 Available Colors
- Wrist Rest Not Rubber Coated (Our Sample?)
- Bad Packaging (Our Sample?)
- No Dedicated Macro Keys