The Lelelab Y2K 76 is the wildest keyboard I have ever had on my desk. Its layout and construction may be wild and hard to get used to, but it’s awesome to use and looks stunning when it’s fully illuminated. Lelelab is a mechanical keyboard manufacturer that is now on my radar -- it should be on yours, too.
The Lelelab Y2K 76 Hotswap Mechanical Keyboard is a work of keyboard art. It is the wildest, but most beautifully-designed cybernetic keyboard I have used so far.
I am usually cautious to make a hyperbolic statement here, but it’s hard for me to gloss over how much the Y2K feels like it was designed for me and looks starkly different from any other keyboard I have seen or used.
Before I get too far down the rabbit hole, let’s talk about Lelelab and the Y2K 76. Lelelab is a smaller keyboard manufacturer with a 7-year history of designing radically unique keyboards that look more cybernetic and mechanical instead of refined. Some of their keyboards, like the Scorpio 46, might look similar to the elegantly modern mechanical keyboards like those from Wuque Studio or Wobkey. Others, like the Y2K, adopt a radically different design and utilize an edgy circuit board aesthetic.
My familiarity with Lelelab is admittedly minimal, occasionally coming across them on /r/mechanicalkeyboards or in a keyboard digest. Because of their niche designs and smaller collection of keyboards, I am not surprised that my colleagues are unaware of Lelelab’s existence or their commitment to uniquely designed keyboards. Upon visiting their website, their tongue-in-cheek “Lele is a pig” prominently displays their sense of humor and edginess.
I digress. They’re an intriguing keyboard designer. Let this review of their Y2K 76 be your first exposure to the brand. If this review doesn’t excite you as much as the keyboard has excited me, I don’t know what will.
Check out the Y2K 76 at Lelelab’s website (non-affiliated URL).
The Lelelab Y2K 76 Hotswap Mechanical Keyboard is not-your-average 75% keyboard. If anything, it’s a 70% keyboard because of how it also includes the F1-F5 keys on the left-hand side of the unit (more on this in a moment). Lelelab claims that this keyboard incorporates a “through-hole” aesthetic alongside other “gimmicks” onto a one-of-a-kind keyboard at an affordable price. This keyboard is wild, folks. Not only does it have a knob, a screen, and gorgeous LEDs, but the entire top of the keyboard has a transparent acrylic bar that reveals the keyboard’s PCB and some additional dot-matrix lights which correspond to the buttons on the keyboard.
Prior to receiving my unit, I took a gander at how users discussed the Y2K 76 online. One individual called this keyboard the “Everything Bagel of Mechanical Keyboard,” which is quite apt. It literally has everything and the kitchen sink. Three USB ports? Check. An onboard-temperature and humidity sensor? Check. A set of LEDs at the top of the unit that light up when pressing keys? Check. Knob? Check. Animated screen? Check.
It’s a wild unit to have in hand. All of the pictures don’t do it justice because it’s unlike anything I’ve had on my desk before. Lelelab’s “through-hole” aesthetic successfully comes out as a keyboard that looks and feels like a computer. I’m personally a fan of PCB-inspired designs – check my reviews of Kiiboom’s Phantom keyboards. Transparent keyboards are effortlessly 90s and remind me of the early days of the transparent Game Boys.
The keyboard’s layout was jarring to get used to. I’m used to have function keys at the top of my keyboards, so having something on the left-hand side where I expected the Tab/Caps Lock/Shift to be took a bit of getting to use to. There’s a noticeable gap between the left-handed F keys and the traditional left-hand-side buttons, though. One of the things I had to start doing was push the keyboard to the left so that my fingers naturally rested in their usual places on the keyboard instead of putting the unit at the middle of my desk.
I know 75% keyboards dominate the mechanical keyboard space, but the sub-75% layout of the Y2K 76 has just the right number of F keys to get most of my work done. I might prefer to use the number pad, but if I was to use a 75% or smaller, I would want a handful of F keys to remain. The five keys on the Y2K 76 are easily configured to serve my personal purposes.
The Y2K utilizes what Lelelab calls a “suspension mount” system involving flexible pillars. The result of this suspension mount is a flexible and floaty typing experience. Imagine pressing firmly down on an arrow key on the lower right-hand side and feeling the entire bottom corner flex and move downward. The closest similar experience I can think of is Meletrix Zoom65’s maglever mounting style.
I am certain that the suspension mount will be an acquired taste for many keyboard owners. Most hope for their keyboards to feel stable when in use, associating stability with quality. When I felt the Y2K 76 move underneath my fingers from regular use, I kept feeling like I was going to break the keyboard from pressing too hard. It’s not flexible to the point of being outright distracting, but the little voice in the back of my head kept instilling some doubt in my mind as to the keyboard’s durability. The keyboard held up exceptionally well in my testing, though.
The Y2K 76 comes in a single color, but there are three options to consider. You could get the barebones kit (which lacks switches and keycaps, but you need to build it), the full kit (which comes with switches and keycaps, but you need to build the unit on your own), or it comes fully assembled. The unit I was sent was the Y2K 76 Full Assembled kit, so I didn’t have to bother with the assembly process. One thing to note, though, is that my specific unit came with unique switches and keycaps different from what is shown on the Y2K 76’s store page. I’ll discuss the switches and keycaps in a moment.
If you’re torn on whether you should save some money and opt for the unassembled version, it’s better to be safe than sorry. I read through the assembly documents. While it may seem a smidgen easier to build than other keyboards of late, the fully-exposed PCB, filaments, and the suspension parts feel too intricate for the average keyboard fan to put together. Yes, it held up well for me, but I wouldn’t trust myself to not break some of the fragile pieces of the PCB.
On Lelelab’s store page, it says that the Y2K 76 comes with a randomly-selected SuperX UV keycap set. However, my unit came with the Clear Yellow Crystal Clear ABS Keycap Set. While I’m not the biggest fan of the color yellow, the transparent keycaps felt sturdy and featured an excellent degree of shine through so that the keyboard’s LEDs could shine brightly. If you’re considering a separate set of transparent keycaps, though, consider the Lelelab x ICE CAT Seasides or the LeleLab x PointWorks SuperX Splinter R2 in Black/Orange.
The lights on this keyboard are bar none some of the best LEDs I’ve used to date. Part of this is because of how I could customize the LEDs’ brightness, saturation, and color to a greater degree than any other keyboard, but it’s also because of the keyboard’s use of transparent acrylic and the lack of a keyboard frame. On the side of the keyboard is a set of side-mounted LEDs, too, which add some nice color to the side of the unit.
When fully illuminated, the Y2K 76 feels less like a keyboard and more like a multicolored transparent unit. I recently got a LIANLI O11 VISION COMPACT, which is transparent from just about every angle and lets my LED-fueled PC innards light up the floor of my office. The Y2K 76 is similarly transparent, featuring LEDs at every angle and adds so much delightful color to my desk. It’s the most colorful keyboard I’ve used to date.
My unit came with unique HMX switches that are currently unavailable for purchase from Lelelab. It wouldn’t surprise me if these switches became the default switch in the Full or Assembled Kits going forward. These switches are linear, with a POM stem and PC/PA66 blended housing. They have a relatively light operating force of ~43gf with a good mid-range 2mm of pre-travel.
From my prior experience with HMX switches, the harder the stem and the housing materials, the louder and potentially clackier the switch. The Y2K 76 has a relatively harsh bottom-out because of the lack of acoustic filler and the harder switch materials, and it’s also one of the loudest typing experiences I’ve had thus far. It’s louder than the Epomaker Flamingoes, so I’m not expecting to use this in a shared office. It sounds otherwise fine for a clacky switch, albeit higher-pitched than I would have expected from HMX. There’s a light degree of wobble, but sturdy enough to use for heavier gaming.
The black and white screen on the Y2K 76 is a unique screen. It’s an LED screen, but black and white only. It prominently displays the keyboard’s temperature (in Celsius), a cute little animation, and my keypresses per minute. Lelelab claims that there’s also a pomodoro timer, but I wasn’t able to activate it during my review period.
To control the screen and the keyboard’s lights, I had to press the gold-plated knob and scroll through the settings. The keyboard’s on-board customization software is simple, letting me select from four animations for my screen along with a myriad of settings for the lights. It’s awesome that I could control the saturation of the LEDs – usually LED customization involves simple colors and the same handful of RGB effects. The only strange, but welcome, thing about customization via the screen was that I had to use the knob. Knobs are typically associated with volume adjustment alone, so it was interesting but nice to use it for customizing my keyboard’s lights.
I wasn’t able to get the Pomodoro function on my screen, unfortunately, so I cannot comment on how that looks or functions. I loved the four cutesy animations (the bongo-cat was my personal favorite), but I would have liked for there to be a way to upload my own animation or design via the LeleConsole.
To manage the keyboard, I could use Lelelab’s online version of the LeleConsole or the downloadable package. Here, I could add some macros, customize individual keys, and update the keyboard’s firmware (when applicable). It’s pretty barebones, but it’s easier to use than other software packages I’ve used to manage keyboards. Oddly, there was no way to adjust the keyboard’s colors using LeleConsole despite there being screenshots of a Lighting Control function on Lelelab’s website. Hopefully, a future version of LeleConsole will let users adjust their LGBs.
As for the Y2K 76’s gaming capabilities, I am legitimately torn. On one hand, I’m afraid to abuse the keyboard when playing games of higher-intensity, such as any first-person shooter or an action RPG. On the other hand, the Y2K 76 felt great to use, buttery smooth, and held up well because of the floaty suspension mount. In testing the keyboard across a battery of games of varying intensity, it felt most appropriate to use the keyboard for medium-to-low intensity titles just out of safety. It held up pretty well in Counter-Strike 2, though, so you’re welcome to roll the dice if you’re interested in using the Y2K 76 for higher-intensity gaming.
The Y2K 76 has a ton of features that most folks won’t need, let’s face it. A temperature sensor, humidity sensor, and screen are mostly unnecessary features for a peripheral that is primarily utilitarian. I love it when designers experiment with funky features to test the waters of what could make our keyboards unique. Lelelab should be commended for putting together such a wild keyboard. I don’t know what to expect next from Lelelab, but if it’s anything like the Y2K 76, it’s assuredly going to be wild!
The Lelelab Y2K 76 is the wildest keyboard I have ever had on my desk. Its layout and construction may be wild and hard to get used to, but it’s awesome to use and looks stunning when it’s fully illuminated. Lelelab is a mechanical keyboard manufacturer that is now on my radar — it should be on yours, too.
