FNATIC miniStreak Overview
Taking the miniStreak out of the box the first thing I noticed was that it had some weight to it, which typically point to good quality. The keyboard weighs in at 702g and has official dimensions of 360×194.5x36mm with the palm rest attached. The aluminum top-plate is sort of a dark teal color, which is quite unique and looks good with the black key caps and black palm rest. Being that this is the miniStreak it has a tenkeyless, or TKL layout, which is quite popular with gamers.
Since you are limited on keys the top function row has alternate functions. You can actually fully enable the alternate function keys by pressing the smaller function key on the top row. F1-F4 are reserved for shortcuts or macros. F5-F6 are lighting controls, F7-F8 are volume up and down, F9 is desktop selection, and F10-F12 are multimedia controls. There are also smaller buttons on the top right corner for microphone mute, competition mode, and sound mute. You’ll also notice two small indication LEDs for caps lock and scroll lock. Overall I think the layout of the keys are good and adding the smaller keys keeps the size of the keyboard compact and small.
Under the black key caps you’ll find Cherry MX mechanical key switches. Our miniStreak came with Blue switches, but you can also get the miniStreak with Red, Silent Red, and Brown switches.
The miniStreak comes with a faux leather detachable palm rest, which is actually quite unique. The palm rest sits on top of a removable piece of aluminum and is held into place by magnets. The aluminum has grooves in it, which allow you to extend the palm rest to fit your hands perfectly. This is the first time I’ve seen a design like this and I love it! You could even just pull off the palm rest and use it with another keyboard if you wanted.
Flipping the keyboard over we can see that there are four large rubber feet on the keyboard itself and two on the palm rest. There are also two pop-out feet. FNATIC has designed a channel to easily route the included cable into the keyboard. The included cable is USB-C to USB-A, which makes plugging it into the keyboard much easier than even a microUSB connection.
Looking at the miniStreak from the side we can see that it is not all that thick. The keys are designed so the first three rows from the bottom are angled down, and the top three rows are angled up, this is pretty standard when it comes to gaming keyboards. The keyboard does sit at a slight angle by default, but you can use the pop-out feet to make that angle more extreme.
Last but not least there is a removable magnetic signature plate on the front of the keyboard. This is backlit and the default signature plate has the FNATIC logo on it. FNATIC says that in the future you will be able to customize this plate with your gamer tag or clan name.
