The Whirlwind FX Atom is a 60% keyboard with funky RGB. Currently priced at $59, it is one of the cheapest 60% keyboards, but one might wonder about its quality. Aside from a few drawbacks here and there, it's a pretty good gaming keyboard for the price.

For the uninitiated, a 60% keyboard is a keyboard without a number pad, arrow keys, home key, or function row. This means that you have to use a combination of Fn keys to access these functions; on the Atom, the arrow keys are secondary to the IJKL keys, and the function keys are co-located with the number keys. If you are looking for a larger keyboard, check out our guide to the best gaming keyboards.

The Atom is built on a plastic chassis with a textured finish. The board is sturdy yet light and doesn't feel cheap, but I feel more comfortable with the HyperX Alloy Origins Core 60 thanks to its heavy, sturdy, aircraft-grade metal chassis. detachable USB Type-C braid that supports a 3,000 Hz polling rate. The design with cables is fairly minimalist. The base has two height-adjustable feet, but one of them wobbled on mine, which was frustrating.

The keycaps are matte-finished double-shot ABS for excellent grip. The keycaps are replaceable and a keycap puller is included. The keycaps themselves are more wobbly than many other mechanical keyboards I have used. This gave me a strange sense of unease while typing, as if I were walking on drifting debris.

Whether the caps need stabilizers or the Whirlwind FX needs quality control is unclear. Thankfully, the Gateron Brown Switch made up for the discomfort with my personal favorite. It's delicious for lots of typing and fast enough for twitch gaming. The Brown Switch's slightly heavier actuation force also reduces unintentional key triggering. They are also pleasantly quiet, making them ideal for shared workspaces.

However, there are several problems with the design choices for the Atoms keys. First is the rather unique font design used for the key legends. At first, I thought that the @ symbol key was poorly printed and that something was just in the way and the symbol was not properly finished. However, upon looking around, I noticed that several other keys had the same strikethrough pattern. Not a good look, and if you're OCD about details, it's always going to be a trigger.

Another thing is that the caps lock key has no kind of indicator to let you know it is active. Similarly, unlike other small boards, pressing the Fn key does not isolate the function keys and does not black out the other keys.

The Atom's RGB lighting is also aided by the board's white baseplate, which accentuates the brilliance of the lighting; the Atom uses Whirlwind FX's proprietary SignalRGB software to control not only the RGB lighting, but also other RGB peripherals connected to the setup other RGB peripherals connected to the setup. We have seen something similar in the Razer Chroma ecosystem, but SignalRGB is not limited to single-brand products.

I tested this on a setup that included a HyperX Quadcast S microphone, Roccat Kone Air mouse, Asus Zephyrus S17 laptop, and Asus ROG Swift PG35V monitor. The software recognized the RGB Quadcast and mouse well, but not surprisingly, the laptop and monitor did not. Nevertheless, the other three monitors could be synchronized.

In addition, the software has tons of game integration features that automatically control the lighting of the Atom and connected peripherals; big names such as "CoD:Warzone," "Valorant," and "Destiny 2" are supported, turning the setup into an interactive It can transform your setup into an interactive disco. To access them, you must pay a $2.99/month Pro subscription, but unless you have a large number of mismatched peripherals that you absolutely want to sync, the free version is more than sufficient.

Now, the software worked well enough, but we did encounter one odd bug. That is that lighting effects, such as those displayed by the SignalRGB software, do not scale properly on small keyboards. It was obviously designed for full-size keyboards, and the small 60% form factor would not scale down, causing some of the light shows to be missing. However, there is nothing that a software update cannot fix.

That said, the Whirlwind FX Atom is a lovely little keyboard. The build quality could be better, but considering the $59 price, there are no drawbacks. With great Gateron switches, portability, and good performance, this is one I can easily recommend to small keyboard enthusiasts on a tight budget.