The Ducky Shine 3 line has a plethora of variants – spanning different backlight colours, different switch types and even an upgraded aluminium body. Having so many options means there is literally every possibility catered for. Here are the options available:
• Backlight models: Red, Blue, Orange, Magenta, Green, White
• Switch models: Cherry MX Black, Blue, Brown, Red
• Body Models: Plastic or Aluminium
Our sample uses White backlight, Cherry MX Brown switches and features the plastic body.
An overview of Shine 3
A close up of the multi-command buttons
The actual layout of Shine 3 is similar to the standard ‘QWERTY’ design, except there are different options and customisation available for the alternate combination commands – we will explore these commands later in the review. Each key is UV coated and has a lasered print.
Customisation is a fundamental principle with Shine 3. Even on the underside of the keyboard there is a dip switch to allow further modifications. The dip switch can allow the following:
• Windows Key disable
• Ctrl and Capslock swap
• Windows key and Alt swap
• DEMO Mode
The underside also has four rubber strips to prevent the keyboard from slipping on smooth surfaces. Shine 3 has no cabling hard-wired to the keyboard, instead there is a detachable USB cable which needs to be connected and Ducky has designed a special channel for the cable to feed through on this underside.
The underside of Shine 3 with dip switch
A closeup of the dip switch
Ducky supply a key removal tool with Shine 3 and the WASD keys can be swapped out for the red keys if desired. Shine 3 is of course mechanical and as such Cherry MX switches are utilised. Our sample uses the Cherry MX Brown switch, offering a good balance between general usage and gaming.
Cherry MX Brown switches used on our sample
Shine 3 features a LED spacebar which has the image of a snake – when powered up this snake illuminates and it even has the option to customise three LEDs behind it, we’ll cover this in the next section of the review.
This spacebar incidentally can be swapped out for the spare which has been supplied within the bundle. Often this particular key suffers the most “wear n’ tear”, so having a spare is very handy.
Snake design on spacebar has customisable options
