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The SteelSeries Shift has a very impressive party trick up its’ sleeve; the ability to switch out the keyset. While this may not sound so special, if you check out the full range of available keysets which are designed with specific games in mind such as World of Warcraft and Medal of Honor, it quickly becomes a useful feature. When you replace the keyset, an inbuilt chip automatically reprograms the key functions making it incredibly easy to switch keysets quickly.
To remove the keyset we’re simply required to undo the clip on the right and lift out the keyset. To re-install the keyset, we just have to do this in reverse. When the keyset is removed, the rubber-dome switches are revealed. Although most rubber-dome style switches only have a lifespan of around a million keystrokes, the ones used in the Shift have five times the lifespan – yes, around 5 million operations. SteelSeries have tuned the force needed to activate the keys for optimum performance. The most used keys require 60g of force to depress while the less frequently used keys require 75g.
Along the left hand side, SteelSeries have included a selection of media control buttons which should fulfil the basic multimedia needs of most users. We’re glad to see that they are proper buttons rather than touch controls which we have found to be frustratingly unresponsive on some keyboards.
Above the keyset there are eight macro buttons. The three buttons to the right let you activate three different functions for each of these buttons meaning you can configure up to 24 macros for these buttons. On the far right there is a macro recording button which enables simple configuration of new macros without using a software interface. If 24 macro keys aren’t enough for you, the numpad and F1-F12 can also be configured as macro buttons and are enabled using the ‘Bar Lock’ and ‘Pad Lock’ buttons next to the ‘Shift’ logo.
Bought this last week, I really like it, but I dont think its a wonderful typists keyboard. not to the league of say the DAS or 7G.
WOW players should love this, with the addition of the WOW board. bit costly though, but I guess quality counts.
This was the first Steelseries item i bought, but I have been disapointed. First the keyboard looked awesome but it wouldn’t be recognised by the Engine. I then updated the firmware wich broke the keyboard completely. No response what so ever from it and the workaround released by Steelseries just plain don’t work. So now im stuck with a not working keyboard and a very bad feeling about it.
Really? shit thats bad. I had the update fail on me, but I managed to get their fix to work. Is the board completely dead man?
I wouldnt touch this board, not after reading a thread on anandtech about the failure rates after flashing the firmware. some serious under the hood issues with this product.
my brother bought one and its fine, no problems with the update, could it be related to a 64 bit os ?
Serious coinage, for a keyboard. but they seem to be well made. his this one got a steel chassis?
enteris, the exact same thing happened to me, im stuck with a keyboard that dosnt work!!! has anyone got any sujestions what to do? have heard of the “fix” for the board but not been given it off steelseries!! am really dissapointed, was hoping they’d get this sorted before putting it out there