The two primary reasons I got the Z20/Linear was for the color programmability, and what ultimately sold me was the ability to program macros. I was moving from a failing Logitech G11 (18 macro keys with three profile each, for 48 macros!) and trying to scale back a bit in the process of getting something with a quality build and bright keys.
 
My findings:
 
Good:

• The keyboard feels and looks very nice. It's very solid. The lighting is bright and adjustable, and it has other features that I like.
• Once you figure out (on your own) how to actually program the key lighting, being able to color individual keys or groups of them is fairly easy and very useful.
• Overall, I like the keyboard—when it works like it should. I just feel like I shouldn't breathe too hard on it or think bad thoughts about it, because it can be temperamental at times.

Bad:

• There's ZERO documentation on how to use the keyboard's features, and the interface is anything but intuitive. Basically you'll need to poke around this forum and potentially other forums and review videos to learn some basics even about how to encode colors to the keys. This is really terrible.
• The software needs to be running in the background for any of your customizations to work. This is a bit ridiculous. And if you log into multiple profiles on your PC, it can be problematic. I learned the hard way that I need to make any changes under the user profile I installed the software from, or it will simply kill the software dead. My first time attempting to uninstall the software after it failed was a 2 hour nightmare.
• The firmware and software are a bit flakey, enough that I've learned to take screenshots of my custom color encoding once the profile is complete. Because simple things like unplugging the keyboard can zero out ALL of your hard work, forcing you to do everything over again. YMMV.
• Five "Lighting Effect" color layers per profile, max. I wish there were more, but oh well. Basically when you customize colors in a single profile, you can create up to five layer of different or even the same color (so you can control the brightness, etc), selecting any variation of individual keys or groups of keys to display one specific color out of those five. I like this feature, but had to learn it the hard way because: zero documentation.
• Press the FN key to hot-select a keylighting/macro profile you've "saved" (again there's no backup anywhere). Normally keys 1-9 light up white and most everything else goes black, so you can see which profile you're selecting—except that this doesn't work when you're currently on a profile with custom color layers. In this case, pressing the FN key has no effect on the keyboard color, until you go ahead and just pick a different profile. It's not critical, but it's an other example of the lack of polish the software displays.
• The keyboard is loud, as you've probably seen complaints of here. Each keypress causes a weird resonant ringing sound that's a bit irritating until you get used to it. Again, I'm using the linear keys. I hate to think what the clicky keys sound like.
• Macros: The macro functionality of this keyboard is terrible, is less than half-baked.
  • Again, there's no documentation to assist with this, and the interface is very unintuitive. Recording a macro is fairly simple, but the process of assigning it to a key (using the software) is surprisingly vague.
  • Yes you can record macros directly from the keyboard, but in my test just now, using this method (rather than the software) results in a 1/4 speed playback rate. Accurate, but S L O W. Using the software, instead, results in a more or less double-speed output of the macro, from my experience.
  • When you record a new macro using the software, the default delay timing is 20ms, but you can change this default. You can also manually change the delay for each individual recorded up and down movement (which is not so unusual). So this counts as a good thing. But...
  • Once you figure out how to record and assign a macro to a key (all of which are given variations of the name "New Macro" which you cannot change), you cannot actually export/save it to back it up anywhere. You can apparently import macros, but there's no guidance for what's actually contained in the macro (and so, no clue as to how to actually write one outside the software).
• I have nitpicky complaints about things like the silver EVGA wart at the top of the all-black keyboard, but they are relatively minor compared to the rest.

Sorry to be so negative about this. I'd really be peeved if I'd paid full price for this keyboard. As it is, I'd say it's mostly worth what I paid for it. But I would definitely buy it on sale or not at all.
 
Hope this helps.

EVGA_James
Unleash does Not need to be running in the background once you have saved all your settings. You need to make sure that you click apply after any change so that it saves it to the onboard profile memory.

Not true for me, unfortunately. Of course I learned to click Apply long ago to set my changes on profiles. Unfortunately there is no Save, or I'd have learned to use that as well.
 
If I close the app with a custom lighting effect profile selected (five layers of colors, FWIW), the keyboard instantly goes into default rainbow swirl display. This is true for any other profiles which contain custom color layers. Other profiles containing only a single applied color or function (no layers) will display as normal when clicking FN+profile# to select them
 
When I re-open the app, the keyboard is able to immediately display the custom lighting effect profiles.
 
If you have an explanation for this, I'd definitely be grateful for it.

EVGA_James
The settings should be saving the the keyboard and I can confirm the macro and key assignments do not require Unleash. I'll check with our software team to see if this is a bug and if it can be fixed.

 
Thank you, James. If you do hear anything, please let me know.
 
What's odd is that today I had to reset my PC (for unrelated reasons) and the keyboard maintained my "Witcher 3" custom color profile before, during, and after restart (not shutdown). And I could not change to any other profile until I logged back in and ran the software.

EVGA_James
However the software is needed for custom lighting effects since the multiple custom layers and light effects is to much to flash to the keyboard's firmware.

That's very disappointing, and surprising considering the retail cost of the keyboard, but it's good to know. Thanks very much for confirming this.
 

Making macros on this keyboard are incredibly frustrating and awful. The software is just garbage.

strange behavior

Strongly recommend 3rd party software

ajchai
3rd party software is the way to go there are several online that you can use for free

Can you give a few examples or names of 3rd party software to look? I just got this keyboard and I love the feel, but the loss of functionality is frustrating. I moved from a gigantic keyboard with tons of dedicated macro buttons and solid (eh...better than Unleash) so this is all new to me.

If you want to work with setting up a macro, remember to look at directions that come with your keyboard and/or software
 

I have loved EVGA since they and xfx battled it out circa 790i Ultra days thus I supported the move to peripherals. hardware is fine, software IS GODAWFUL GARBAGE.
PLEASE STEP BY SIMPLE STEP TELL ME HOW TO MAKE "1" OR "~" E5 and "r" E4.
please please please.I'm a hardware tech, e/waste-asset recovery business owner, and XOC. not a whole lot stumps me, well done..

Is there a video I can watch that shows how?
 

rogeryoung
Is there a video I can watch that shows how?
 

Nope it's by trial and error.  It took me a long time to program my macros to work correctly.  Reboots seems to reset the my macro settings.  I made a few post about it on the mouse section.  I picked up the x17 as well as the Z20 which I really like, but the software and making macros really is awful.  I'm really not sure who even approved the software or if any R&D was performed on the unleash software.  It's that bad! For some reason when you record a keystroke it defaults the time of 5000ms+.  I know it doesn't take me 5+ seconds to tap a keyboard button.. that's more of a long press time.
 
I'm no longer using the X17 because of it's poor design and the macro's not working correctly.

There is a Setup button next to the record. There you can set the specific delay between keystrokes/button presses. Or after you've created the macro you can select each entry and edit the delay. 

rogeryoung
Is there a video I can watch that shows how?
 

We do not have a video, but we did post a guide on our forums here: https://forums.evga.com/How-to-Set-up-a-Macro-in-Unleash-RGB-m3505700.aspx
 
If you are looking to set up a specific Macro, feel free to email Support@evga.com and we would be happy to take a look into providing a step by step guide on how to do that.