Corsair Vanguard Air 99 Wireless review: a premium keyboard with great keys and a high price
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Corsair Vanguard Air 99 Wireless: One-minute review
The Corsair Vanguard Air 99 Wireless is an optical-mechanical hybrid board that takes aim at the premium end of the market.
It’s a smart and understated affair, although the bright RGB lighting certainly adds some vibrancy, as does the white colorway. The floating keycaps are also a nice touch.
It’s built as well as the best gaming keyboard options, too, thanks to its aluminum body that provides plenty of stability while keeping the weight down. It’s also very compact, despite having a full-size layout; you even get six extra customizable keys on the left, known as S keys.
These S keys can be customized via Corsair’s web app, which offers quite a few rebinding options for every key on the board. You also get additional functions such as SOCD, although it has to be said some rivals do allow for more tweaks, especially analog models. Being a web app, you’ll encounter long loading times when clicking on many elements, which can quickly become frustrating.
The S keys can also be customized using Elgato’s Stream Deck software, to assign various Stream Deck functions. The Vanguard Air works well with this app, although I did find that bindings I configured in the Web App failed to re-establish themselves immediately when switching back to it after closing Stream Deck.
Thankfully, I had no qualms with the gaming performance of the Vanguard Air. I loved the feel of the switches, as they gave plenty of feedback and responded with satisfying clickiness. However, they’re a little heavier than I expected, which I noticed most of all when holding them down for sustained periods.
I typically prefer low profile keycaps over tall ones, so I instantly gelled with those in the Vanguard Air. They’re comfortable to use when gaming, especially the space bar, since it was low enough to avoid hitting its back edge with my thumb. They’re also easy to glide over, which makes for quick typing.
The Vanguard Air connected wirelessly to my PCs quickly and easily. Switching between devices connected via Bluetooth and the 2.4GHz dongle on the fly was just as straightforward. However, it’s a shame that the board takes a while to wake from its sleep, which can be frustrating when you want to dive straight back into the action after a break. At least you can turn off sleep mode completely, should you wish.
Battery life isn’t particularly great, lasting little more than a couple of days with both wireless connectivity modes used. Also, the battery indicator on the display didn’t seem very precise, turning from nearly full to nearly empty without much warning.
The Vanguard Air is certainly an expensive board, which is partly justified given its premium design, brilliant clicky feel and versatile connectivity options. However, its minor frustrations and lack of features relative to more advanced models take away from its value.
Corsair Vanguard Air 99 Wireless review: Price & availability
- $259.99 / £239.99 (about AU$360)
- Available now in two colorways
- Top end of the market
The Corsair Vanguard Air 99 Wireless costs $259.99 / £239.99 (about AU$360) and is available now. It comes in two colorways: black or white.
This price point puts it at the high end of the market. You could get a premium analog gaming keyboard for a similar cost, such as the SteelSeries Apex Pro. These boards are more customizable, letting you tweak actuation points and giving you access to advanced functions such as Rapid Trigger and dual actuation. In my view, the Apex Pro is one of the best examples of its class.
If you want to spend considerably less on a gaming keyboard that still performs, then the Keychron V1 Ultra 8K is a great alternative. It too has an 8K polling rate, but features mechanical switches which felt and sounded great to us. However, the tall keycaps might hamper your typing, depending on your preferences.
Corsair Vanguard Air 99 Wireless review: Specs
|
Layout |
99% |
|
Switch |
Corsair OPX Low-Profile |
|
Programmable Keys |
Yes (Corsair Web App / Elgato Stream Deck) |
|
Dimensions |
425 x 135 x 17mm |
|
RGB or backlighting |
Yes (customizable) |
Corsair Vanguard Air 99 Wireless review: Design and Features
- Compact and light
- Solid aluminium construction
- Some frustrations in customization software
The Vanguard Air lacks the gaudy aesthetic of many others in the gaming keyboard world. On the contrary, it’s very understated, with the colorful customizable RGB backlighting being about the only indication of its intended market.
Far from being boring, though, I found its minimalist form quite appealing. It’s very thin and compact, and I always like to see floating key caps, for aesthetic and practical reasons (they’re easy to remove and make cleaning in between their crevices easier).
Despite this minimal form, the Vanguard Air is supremely solid, thanks to the aluminum chassis. This material also helps to keep the weight down, meaning it’s an easy keyboard to move around when needed. It would also make a good choice for those who like to travel around with their board, yet also feels more premium than the plastic-laden alternatives.
There’s no wrist rest included with the Vanguard Air, which is a small shame for a keyboard this expensive. However, the unit is so low to the ground that I didn’t need one to get comfortable. The folding feet also provide a relatively shallow angle, so my wrists didn’t have to bend upwards that far. They provide plenty of stability, too, although moving the board back and forth too vigorously will cause them to fold back in.
It’s impressive the Vanguard Air has a full size layout, considering just how compact it is. There are plenty of useful shortcuts dotted around the keys. There are even six customizable keys on the left, known as S keys.
These can be customized using Corsair’s Web App, along with all the other keys. There’s a sufficient selection of assignments available, including media controls and system functions, although these aren’t as extensive as those in rival software. There’s also the obligatory macro recorder.
There’s a SOCD feature, too, which Corsair calls FlashTap. This features a useful visualizer to show how each of its three settings works. When two keys of your choice are held simultaneously, you can select the first one pressed to have priority and therefore override the input of the second, or vice versa. There’s also a neutral option, which disables both keys from registering when held together.
The Web App functions well for the most part, although I frequently encountered long loading times even when performing basic actions, such as merely clicking on an element. I suspect this is due to it being a Web App rather than a standalone piece of software, and even when I used it in offline mode, I still encountered the same issue.
You can customize those aforementioned S keys in Elgato’s Stream Deck app, too. You can assign them to perform various functions exclusive to the app. Again, this works well, but there’s another problem: whenever I closed Stream Deck and wanted to revert to the bindings I configured in Corsair’s Web App, they failed to activate. It took several minutes before the Vanguard Air finally realized and they worked again.
The Vanguard Air also features a screen in the top-right corner. This has a pleasingly high resolution for such a small screen, but frankly this is overkill for the basic and limited information it provides. It shows battery life, what connectivity mode is being used, and what key locks are active, but little else.
It can’t be interacted with, either. Other boards with such a screen incorporate their rotary dials to navigate menus to adjust certain settings. The rotary dial on the Vanguard Air, though, has no such function. It can only be used to control volume and other parameters, such as the RGB brightness, horizontal or vertical scrolling, and zoom. These functions can be selected via keyboard shortcuts or via the Web App. The dial is solidly notched but feels easy to use.
Corsair Vanguard Air 99 Wireless review: Performance
- Fantastically clicky keys
- Easy wireless hot-switching
- Slow to wake up
The optical-mechanical switches in the Vanguard Air are a joy to use. They’re quite light and clicky, and make a very satisfying sound without being too loud. There’s just enough dampening to cushion impacts nicely, and enough travel to make inputs forgiving.
They’re also snappy and responsive, making quick movements in games like Counter-Strike 2 easy to achieve. However, they’re a little heavier than you might expect, which can cause fatigue when holding them down for long periods.
Despite the compact layout, I was comfortable in the WASD position, and the low profile keycaps meant I could hit keys flush, even the space bar — a key I often hit the back edge of on boards. This low profile also makes them great for typing, as they’re easy to glide over.
I had no problem connecting to various PCs via Bluetooth or the 2.4GHz dongle. Hotswitching between these connection methods is also quick and easy, merely requiring the flick of a switch on the rear of the unit. There are also Fn shortcuts for hotswitching between three Bluetooth connections.
However, the Vanguard Air is frustratingly slow to wake up from its sleep, requiring multiple key presses. Thankfully, you can alter the time it takes before the board enters sleep mode, and even prevent it from sleeping altogether, but a short setting will likely cause annoyance. I haven’t experienced a keyboard with a slower wake time than this.
The battery life of the Vanguard Air isn’t all that impressive, either. After about two or three days of use, switching between 2.4.GHz and Bluetooth modes, it gave up the ghost. What’s more, it did so seemingly out of the blue. The battery indicator on the screen was green and close to full for most of that aforementioned time, but suddenly dipped into the red and threw up a warning, before dying pretty quickly after that. What’s more, it died while I was typing and the last key I pressed continued to register, as if it were being held down, which can obviously be quite disruptive.
Should I buy the Corsair Vanguard Air 99 Wireless?
Scorecard
|
Attribute |
Notes |
Score |
|---|---|---|
|
Value |
The Vanguard Air is incredibly expensive, which only highlights the issues that undermine its value. |
2.5 |
|
Design and features |
Superbly made, but the software is a little temperamental, and it lacks top-line features rivals have. |
4 |
|
Performance |
The clicky keys are sumptuous, and the low profile keys are great for gaming and typing. A slow wake up time and middling battery life are drawbacks, though. |
4 |
|
Overall rating |
The Vanguard Air is brilliantly designed and feels great in action, but some of its drawbacks are hard to swallow at this price. |
3.5 |
Buy it if…
Don’t buy it if…
Corsair Vanguard Air 99 Wireless review: Also consider
| Row 0 – Cell 0 |
Corsair Vanguard Air 99 Wireless |
SteelSeries Apex Pro TKL Wireless Gen 3 |
Keychron V1 Ultra 8K |
|
Layout |
99% |
TKL |
75% |
|
Switch |
Corsair OPX Low-Profile |
Analog (Hall-effect magnetic) |
Keychron Silk POM (Red/Brown/Banana) |
|
Programmable Keys |
Yes (Corsair Web App / Elgato Stream Deck) |
Yes |
Yes (Keychron Launcher / ZMK) |
|
Dimensions |
425 x 135 x 17mm |
355 x 129 x 42mm |
329 x 149 x 29mm |
|
RGB or backlighting |
Yes (customizable) |
Yes (customizable) |
Yes (Customizable) |
How I tested the Corsair Vanguard Air 99 Wireless
- Tested for several days
- Used for gaming and other tasks
- Plenty of gaming keyboard experience
I lived with the Vanguard Air for several days, during which time I used it gaming, working, and general browsing. I used both Bluetooth and 2.4GHz for connecting to my devices.
I played AAA games and made as many tweaks and customizations as possible via Corsair’s Web App, as well as via Stream Deck, given the board’s integration with the software.
I’ve been PC gaming for over a decade and have experienced many gaming keyboards. I’ve reviewed a large number of them, ranging from budget offerings to premium models from big name brands, such as Razer and SteelSeries.
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