Logitech, in my mind, always meant decent quality products with good reliability and no fuss. I'm using some of their basic mice for 10+ years without issues. I was gifted one of their mechanical keyboards a bit over two years ago. It's a G512 SE with blue switches. A very nice looking gaming keyboard, but I had no use for it at the time so I stored it away until recently.At first, the keyboard was great. The blue switches felt lovely to type on, the keycap material was nice to the touch and it was compact for a full-size keyboard. However, it didn't take long for issues to arise. First, one of the lesser used keycaps had a crack in the stem that meant it popped off the switch almost every time it was used. This was pretty annoying, so I contacted Logitech. I knew the keyboard was out of warranty, but it was slightly worrying that the keycaps were so fragile (I'm not a heavy typist and nothing had been dropped on it or otherwise damaged it while I had the board). I told them that I wanted to buy a replacement keycap. Not possible it seems, they don't stock replacement keycaps for warranty or even aftersales spares support. I found this pretty bizarre, given the cost of this keyboard (>£100) and the general trend most companies have of trying to reduce waste. Their only suggestion was to buy a 3rd-party aftermarket key, which of course would mean buying an entire set of keycaps so that they match. It's bizarre in these times that a £100+ keyboard isn't expected to be used for more than the warranty period. I can buy spare cables, pads and clips for my Sennheiser headphones, spare fittings, bezels and remotes for my AV receiver and so on, all much older than this keyboard. The complete lack of support from a supposedly high quality company is baffling.In the meantime, while I considered my options for the keycap, I continued using the keyboard. It wasn't long before the next issue cropped up. This time, a key started double-typing, it would type the character when the key was pressed, and again when the key was released. This resulted in that particular character appearing twice, causing occasional typos and code issues. Gradually this got more frequent until it happened about 50% of the times the key was used. A quick Google of the issue showed that many other people also had the same issue, and that some had solved it by dripping isopropanol into the affected switch to clean the contacts. I did this, and it did help, but for how long is anyone's guess. That wasn't the end of it though, as 3 more keys are now showing the same issue. In quality terms, that shows that the issue isn't a one-off, bad luck switch. It's a consistent issue across many switches, and possibly a design fault with these Logitech-made clones of Cherry switches.To have multiple switch failures after a couple of months of use on a £100+ keyboard can only be down to very poor quality control. Additionally, when the keycaps were removed (using a proper keycap puller) to access the switches to drop in some isopropanol, stress lines can clearly be seen running down the left and right sides of the stem on every key I checked - exactly where the first one cracked. So not only are the switches a poor design, but the keycaps are too - either by way of inappropriate tolerances or inappropriate material. And just this morning, a second keycap has cracked along those stress lines (not one I had removed either), hence my frustration at this completely useless, supposedly "premium" keyboard, at Logitech's blatant disregard for any kind of effective quality control, at their complete disregard for support and at their lazy or incompetent design and development teams.To add to this, a review I placed for this keyboard on their UK website has strangely failed to appear. I verified my email address days ago but no sign of it (or any other reviews). I wonder if they only publish glowing reviews? That could explain why they still ask people to be the first to review this item...So, for now I'm back using the old PS/2 keyboard the Logitech was supposed to replace. It's beige, ugly and lacks backlighting, but it hasn't skipped a beat in a quarter century, and works better now after 25 years than the Logitech does after 3 months. Needless to say I will be avoiding all Logitech products in future.
