When my old mechanical keyboard broke down, I decided to go magnetic and try Turtle Beach’s Vulcan 2 TKL Pro.
After four years of clacking, I was ready for a change.
I first made the jump from a membrane keyboard to a mechanical one in 2020 with an $80 Aukey keyboard. It was a hulking mess loaded with 104 keys, an enormous volume knob, and gaudy blue buttons specifically there for on-board RGB customization. Its flaws didn’t concern me, though; I was too busy obsessing over the sweet sound of clicking. It didn’t take much to turn me into a convert, as I could feel myself typing with better precision thanks to the tactile and audio feedback.
A lot has changed for me in those four years. A shedding cat and a new home co-working setup with my partner meant that my loud, hair-collecting PC setup had become a detriment to my needs. I needed a new solution, and Turtle Beach’s Vulcan 2 TKL Pro was the perfect experiment. The keyboard would once again push me out of my typing comfort zone by introducing me to the world of magnetic Hall Effect switches. Now that I’ve tried it, I’m not sure I’ll be going back anytime soon.Magnetic typing
I began running into problems with my Aukey setup about a year into owning it. While I was fond of its loud switches, they tended to collect cat hair and other debris much quicker than I thought. I was constantly wrenching keys off to clean it, pulling up spools of dust. It didn’t hold up to wear and tear very well either, as keys would consistently stick on me after a few years of constant use. The last straw came when my girlfriend and I moved in together and I suddenly became hyper-aware of just how loud the switches were. That, paired with a move to a smaller desk space, meant that I had a lot of problems to solve.
While my original plan was to move to a similar Alienware mechanical keyboard, I decided to give the Vulcan 2 TKL Pro a try when it came across my desk for testing.
