Tesoro Tizona G2N Elite Mechanical Keyboard Review

[section_title title=”Conclusion”]

Conclusion

So whatever you want to call it, the Burning Blade, El Cids sword or even “Tizona”, I have had my fill of Tesoro’s offering and it’s time to give my final thoughts on a product which has spent around a week or so under heavy use.  With mechanical keyboards being one of those “must haves” due to their superb quality, does the Tesoro Tizona G2N Elite live up to such a commandeering name?  Let’s go…

Starting with the performance, the Tizona was quite a mixed bag of highs and lows to say the least.  At first look without pulling any keycaps or not too familiar with the feel of the switches, you probably wouldn’t differentiate the Kailh switches from Cherry MX; not entirely a bad thing.  Although the Kailh switches aren’t on review here, there isn’t too much difference between them other than the quality (Cherry MX feel a little bit better) and of course the price.  The Kailh switches have been adopted by quite a few brands and although it’s nice to see cheaper keyboards, the Cherry MX are a case of you get what you pay for; should make for some interesting competition now the patent has lifted.  Anyway, the Tizona has full NKRO which is a huge plus and I had no issues with keys sticking; although Tesoro really need to update the cheap plastic keycaps, they felt terrible.  Other than that though, the Tizona did a great job so aside from a simple fix like keycaps, the Burning Blade shines brightly!

Design wise, this is where it gets interesting.  The overall design of the G2N Elite & G2N-P is relatively good and I love the ability to be able to have the numpad either side of the keyboard but the question remains; how many people want a purple accented keyboard?  Now I’m not really knocking the design and perhaps a poll would be a good idea but I haven’t really seen many purple themed PC systems around so I’m unsure this type of colour scheme would appeal to those who rigorously match peripherals to their computer systems.  With that being said, the overall design is good and it definitely stands out which is what you need in an already over populated market; something different from the rest.

The keyboard itself and the numpad do have separate selling prices; £65 and £23 respectively which makes this keyboard combination very good value for money.  The 80% G2N Elite tenkeyless is a decent option for £65 especially those who have limited desk space or even better yet, want to transport their keyboard around to LANs etc.  The numpad itself is also completely optional allowing users to save on the full cost which gives an added level of flexibility; something I haven’t seen in the mechanical keyboard world until today.

Overall the Tesoro Tizona G2N Elite & G2N-P have a lot going for them in terms of value for money and unique appeal.  The Kailh switches compliment this budget option from Tesoro very well and although there is a lot of stiff competition at this price point, Tesoro have something different which should surely be appealing to the masses of gamers wanting to put the Burning Blade in their arsenal.

Huge thanks to Tesoro for sending in the Tizona in for review and I look forward to seeing more in the future.