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geekhack Community => Keyboard Keycaps => Topic started by: dman777 on Mon, 25 February 2019, 08:03:55
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I have a Ducky Shine 3 blue switches(home) and a Ducky One RGB brown switches(at work). The Shine 3 has the ABS key caps while the Ducky One has PBT.
After using both for awhile, I think I might like the feel of ABS better because of the smoothness. Also I like the lighter feel(I think). Is that strange? Maybe because the ABS is on blue switches and those are my favorites? It would be so expensive to buy another keyboard just to see.
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Just for info, Ice Cap (https://pimpmykeyboard.com/sa-ice-cap-keyset/) from Signature Plastics is a very smooth PBT set.
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Not strange at all.
Good ABS is good.
Good PBT is good.
From there on, its just preference
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Never mind. I did not realise the ABS keycaps in question were painted.
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Just wait until the thin black coating has worn off the ABS keycaps and the backlight is shining in your face.
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Not strange at all.
Good ABS is good.
Good PBT is good.
From there on, its just preference
qft
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Just wait until the thin black coating has worn off the ABS keycaps and the backlight is shining in your face.
This isn't a thing with Ducky ABS keycaps. I had one for 2 years and it's a little shiny but definitely no black coating coming off.
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I think ABS looks pretty slick but the shine does bother people... until someone finds an easy way to reduce it back to matte without sanding away material :P
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Just wait until the thin black coating has worn off the ABS keycaps and the backlight is shining in your face.
Clear caps with rgb lighting = nightlight for room
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I have a Ducky Shine 3 blue switches(home) and a Ducky One RGB brown switches(at work). The Shine 3 has the ABS key caps while the Ducky One has PBT.
After using both for awhile, I think I might like the feel of ABS better because of the smoothness. Also I like the lighter feel(I think). Is that strange? Maybe because the ABS is on blue switches and those are my favorites? It would be so expensive to buy another keyboard just to see.
ABS seems to have better acoustics in my opinion.. I had a ducky one with abs keycaps and I have a ducky one rgb with pbt, needless to say I dont care much for the rgb, it also has transparent switch housings instead of the nylon housings on regular cherry switches so the sound is kinda tinny and sharp, rather than deeper sounding like on my regular ducky one.
This is the order i would rate the sound of keycaps..
ABS SA profile (best sound of any keycap in my opinion)
Pom ( I have a set of these and they are slightly better than ABS in cherry profile)
ABS (its what SA is made of, its what alot of keyboards come with, either in cherry or oem)
PBT (I love the material itself for durability, but I do not like the way it sounds at all in contrast to the other types)
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It really depends imo.
Not only is the keycap material of importance, but also manufacturing process, since this effects overall keycaps density and sound. For example, I really enjoy anything PBT dye-sub with a decent thickness, whether it be mt3 or xda, since the keycaps just feel really solid. On the ABS side of the haus, most of the GMK keycaps I've used have been a pleasure as well, being doubleshot and having a bit of weight behind them.
Conversely, I've grown to semi-hate DSA even from the big mfgs since everyone wants to do them in the double-shot ABS styling. They end up thin-walled and cheap sounding imo. As far as I'm aware, the only notable set of DSA done in PBT is a specialty run of the Mito Godspeed (Minutemen) that oddly ran alongside the [ur=https://www.massdrop.com/buy/massdrop-x-mito-mt3-godspeed-custom-keycap-setl]mt3 drop[/url]. I almost pulled the trigger out of want of a good DSA set with solid shine durability and sound but opted not to because of other competing interests. My DSA sets, Legacy, LightCycle, and Miami Dolch, I've kind of unmounted and never remounted because of this. I eventually passed on the Miami Dolch set to a friend in a trade, but haven't let the others go due to sunk cost fallacy.
You really just like what you like and that's ok.
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Absolutely. You should consider seeing a therapist.
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Just wait until the thin black coating has worn off the ABS keycaps and the backlight is shining in your face.
This isn't a thing with Ducky ABS keycaps. I had one for 2 years and it's a little shiny but definitely no black coating coming off.
I'll second this, I got a set of red Ducky ABS doubleshot for their shine boards & was actually pretty impressed with their quality. They are very thick for shine through caps & being doubleshot you do not have to worry about the color wearing off leaving a quasi blank key that blasts the LED light right in your face. They do get shine like any other ABS caps, but that is about the worst i can say about them. Honestly they are great to use for boards you game with as they only run around $35 to $40 per set & you don't have worry about beating on your high quality sets. The only drawback there is that they just come in 104/108 key sets, so you can only use them with TKL & full sized boards that are WK & use a 6.25u space bar.
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As for the original question from the OP I don't find it strange at all to prefer high quality ABS caps over high quality PBT caps. They both have their pros & cons, but when you're dealing with high quality caps (GMK, SA, DSA for ABS & ePBT or Hammer for PBT) you really can't go wrong either way. :thumb:
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I also feel like if people are so concerned about shine, just don't eat oily foods right before you use the computer... or wipe the keys after use or something. Or wash your hands more often? idk
(idk I'm talking out of my rear, here...)
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I also feel like if people are so concerned about shine, just don't eat oily foods right before you use the computer... or wipe the keys after use or something. Or wash your hands more often? idk
(idk I'm talking out of my rear, here...)
Or shine > new?
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Or shine > new?
I mean I can only speak for myself but my issue with shine isn't the shine itself, but the lack of uniformity. Some keys get used more than others and so some keys will be shiny and others less so, and the shine itself isn't evenly distributed since we tend to only touch part of the cap.
Usually for me, that small spot on the spacebar is the first to go. After things start shining up it just doesn't look as nice/even/uniform.
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My Pennines on my Planck are ABS, I used some alcohol to actually polish some of them, I like the shine on the retro looking style. looks like I took them off an original POS machine
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every1 needs to do their journey through ****ty abs to PBT to GMK perfection :)