Besides the reformulated plastic, will there be any significant difference in the base set to a Charred Orange set? I just bought two of those and am considering either getting a full extra kit or just mods. I don't use backlighting, will there be any noticeable difference?



Thank you for the interest in SKIDATA+. I'd be happy to post a write up and explain the differences.There are significant differences between Charred Orange and SKIDATA+.Charred Orange's plastic issues are noticeable even without backlighting, and visible to the naked eye.I have discussed these issues with GMK, and as a result of the latest reformulation of their plastic, we will be seeing these issues addressed and vastly improved upon in GMK SKIDATA+.To reiterate, the issues with Charred Orange is that the plastic is translucent, which decreases saturation and contrast between the two plastics. It is especially obvious around the edges of the legends even under normal lighting, without backlighting.I'm borrowing Longzilla's Charred Orange photo to illustrate the issues, as it is very clear:1) Incorrect Tab Legend, this is a big pet peeve of mine that I cannot understand why it was chosen in the first place.2) The bottom half of "Control" is significantly different from the top half of the "Control". Also, the properties of the plastic is uneven, and the edges are "soft" and not crisp.3) "Alt", the "A" and "t" is significantly different than the "l", once again due to the same reasons listed above - translucent plastic, less contrast, not saturated.4) The "Windows 7" logo also does not have very clean and crisp edges - looks a bit "soft" due to the issues with the plastic.These issues are present throughout the entire keyset, and these are just a few examples to show you. I'm sure if you carefully looked through the two sets that you have on hand, you will come to the same conclusions.Now, compared to GMK's new reformulated plastic, you can see how it has 1) more saturated colours, 2) "crisper" edges for more contrast between the two colours. The legends themselves are just so much crisper than before.Here is the best example, using the same colours. You can see how the Orange and Charcoal Grey both have their defined, crisp, and clean edges. Overall, all of the issues I listed above have been improved upon, and obvious to the naked eye how much cleaner the end results are. It is an improvement that is not only visible just under backlighting, and is an overall improvement that will be very obvious once we have a chance to see and compare the sets in person.-----Here is another early production sample of GMK's newly reformulated plastic, using SKIDATA+ colours (Blue and Orange).SKIDATA+ One-off Blue on Orange "X" (Photo credits go to Zeal)You can click the photo to zoom in to fullsize, and inspect the borders/edges of the "X". You will see how the improvements to the plastic I've mentioned above is obvious even without backlighting.Last but not least, SKIDATA+ offers the most comprehensive keyboard layout support to date.We have windowed LED keys for Capslock, Scroll Lock, Numlock, as well as 75%, 1800, HHKB (Capslock "Ctrl" and 1.5u Delete), and a bunch of other layouts that allows SKIDATA+ to be used on almost any standardized keyboard layout out there.Feel free to refer to the mockups again to see what I mean, as there are many additional keys, and would take a very long time to point out each and every one of them.I hope this helps. Feel free to let me know if you have any other questions.