Overview
The Arctic K381 keyboard is small in size, but has all of the features you could need. The keyboard is only 12mm high in the front and 20mm high in the back, but it makes typing comfortable for its short size. The keyboard has no border around the edges, making this keyboard a space saver. The full keyboard layout doesn’t feel cramped even for the keyboards small size.
Towards the right of the keyboard is the standard number pad configuration. Above the number pad are a volume down/up button, mute button, and a sleep button. To the left of that are your arrow keys and other miscellaneous buttons. The print screen, scroll lock, and pause/break buttons are right on top of the insert, home and page up buttons, which I don’t agree is the best design. I would have switched the LED panel in between the two sets of keys.
To the left side of the keyboard are your standard A-Z, 0-9, Function, and other keys. The function keys however have a second purpose whenever the Function key, located next to F12, is activated. Going from F1-F12 are Help, New, Open, Save, Replace, Spell check, Undo, Redo, Reply, Reply All, Forward, and Send. Something to note is that the Windows keys are also replaced with Arctic Cooling logos (AC)
They keys are very responsive, easy to press, and thin as well, despite the keyboards slim design.
The back of the keyboard has a piano black finish in addition to the four rubber pads to help keep the keyboard from slipping around. A small hump in the back of the keyboard helps raise it off the surface it’s placed on. Unfortunately there are no adjustable clips to either raise or lower the keyboard.
