The Keyboard

The Tarrantula takes up a large area of the desk and is only slightly smaller than a Logitech G15. Part of this size is due to the large top section which we will cover later and the hand rest at the bottom. These two areas alone add over three inches to the width of the product. The hand rest does feature a pulsing blue Razer logo which adds to the style but this is no doubt responsible for the hand rest not being removable. Ideally a small redesign to move the logo to the top of the unit and provide a removable rest would go a long way to making the Tarantula more suited to everyone’s needs. The layout of the main keypad is a standard design but some changes have been made. The main changes involve the Insert, Home, Delete, End and Page Up/Down keys. These use a two column by three row design with large Delete button. As a result the insert key is moved and can be found above Num Lock. Another minor but very important change is also made in this area, for some reason Razer have switched around the order of Print Screen, Scroll Lock and Pause Break.

Down the right and left edges of the keyboard are two columns of buttons. On the left edge are sleep, home, rotate, zoom and 100% buttons. The first two are pretty self explanatory but the other three are not usually found on keyboards. These keys are used for image manipulation which saves some mouse work for basic functions. On the right side of the keyboard are small buttons which are all aimed at media use such as play, stop, volume and mute. There is also the less used shuffle button and each of these keys works well with Windows Media Player and Media Centre. Alongside each of these outer columns are two sets of five keys. These keys can be programmed with macros or functions as we will show later. They are also the keys which can be replaced for the bundled extras.

The Tarantula is not just a keyboard and as with many high end units it also acts as a USB hub and Audio connector. Using the cables attached to the unit we have access to two USB 2.0 ports and mic/audio out ports which are located on the top edge of the board. There is also a small removable cover just above the F8 and F9 keys. This dock is used by Razer’s accessories such as a keyboard light, all are purchased separately.

Software/Drivers/Firmware

For anyone familiar with Razer mice it will come as no surprise that their keyboards feature a similar configuration utility. This utility allows the user to set various features on the board such as which media player is launched by the media button and configure up to six profiles. There is also an option to upgrade the firmware within the keyboard and Razer are now on version 2.02 which resolves a minor key programmability issue as well as changing the delay insertion increment for macro’s.

Speaking of macro’s the above two screenshots show the two main macro functions. These are assigned to the L1 to L10 keys. The keys can be assigned various combinations as shown in the left hand screenshot or set to launch an application as shown in the right hand screenshot. Finally, something which is not immediately noticeable from the driver control panel is probably one of the Tarantulas best features, the ability to reassign keys. Using the software profiles you can reconfigure the keys so that, as an example, the arrow keys actually act as A S D and W, the main movement commands for first person shooters. The options are endless really but it does make the product highly customisable.