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Magic Refiner Mk25 Review 60% Mechanical Keyboard With PBT Pudding keycaps

Monday, October 18, 2021

 

Offering incredible quality and value for money, the Magic Refiner Mk25 is better than its price tag suggests! It is a wired mechanical keyboard with detachable power cable, quality PBT keycaps, vibrant RGB backlight, lightweight (577 grams) and small 60% form factor so, you can carry it back and forth from place to place.



On the base of the Magic Refiner Mk25 keyboard, there are four anti-skid rubber strips and dual feet risers that let you adjust the height of the Mk25 keyboard in two levels. The feet risers are made of plastic and are securely hinged so, they do not wobble. The feet risers also integrate grippy rubber pads that prevent the keyboard from sliding off when the feet risers are extended.


The base of the Mk25 keyboard is slightly angled but the keybed sits almost flat so, the top row of keys is about the same height (4cm high) as the bottom row of keys. With the feet risers extended, the height of the the top row of keys gets elevated to 4.5cm high (using the shortest feet) and 5.5cm high (with longest feet risers). The Mk25 keyboard measures 29.5cm long and 11cm wide.


The Magic Refiner Mk25 Keyboard has a plastic body shell with a metal top plate and non-hot swap BSUN brown leaf switches, which have a tactile, light travel actuation similar to Gateron brown switches. 

 

Being hot-swap, the switches are soldered onto the PCB; hence the key switches are not hot swappable. The Mk25 long keycaps have been stabilized via plate-mounted dummy switches, which makes replacing keycaps much quicker. Because there is no metal bar stabilizers, it is also much easier to clean the keyboard.


The stock keycaps have a nice feel and do not "grease over" like ABS keycaps. The Mk25 uses quality double shot PBT pudding keycaps, which are made of thicker plastic than ABS keycaps. The keycap legend is also permanent too, thanks to the double shot design. Being pudding keycaps, the bottom half of the keycap is made of semi-translucent plastic. When the backlight is turned on, the keycaps produce a lovely glowing diffuse effect, which spills onto the metal top plate, giving the illusion that the keycaps are hovering over light.


There are a total of 61 physical key switches, as well as 39 virtual functions that can be accessed via the Fn function key switch. Virtual functions include volume, mute, f1-f12 function keys and navigational arrow keys. As well as virtual functions, the Magic Refiner Mk25 keyboard is equipped with on-board controls for changing lighting effects, adjusting brightnesss and speed of the lighting effect, all of which can be adjusted from the keyboard without having to download software. There are five effect speed levels to choose from, as well as five levels of brigthness that are adjusted in 20% increments. The lowest brightness setting turns off the lighting.

There are a total of 15 lighting modes, ranging from single solid colors, multi-color and wave effects. There is also a game mode, which lights up the WASD keys on the keyboard. This is handy since the Mk25 keyboard doesn't have navigational arrows. 

There is also a custom mode, which allows you to save a custom lighting color of your choice (you can change the RGB color of each key switch on the keyboard). The custom lighting color gets automatically saved onto the keyboard, even when removing power from the keyboard. After a custom color lighting is saved, you still have access to the other backlighting effects, which you can switch, using the Fn+0 command. To delete the custom lighting effect, simply use Fn+spacebar (refer to user guide for more details).

The 1.5 meters long power cable (USB-A and USB-C) is unbranded but it's a quality one with a thick rubber outer sheath (a velcro tie is also included). There is also a keycap puller, which is a nice addition but it isn't the best because this type of keycap puller can scratch the keycaps. The best keycap puller are the metals ones that look like a whisk. The Mk25 is available in white color only with BSUN brown and red switches. If you prefer blue switches, there is the Magic Refiner Mk21, which is very similar to the Mk25. You can buy the Magic Refiner Mk25 Keyboard from MechDIY.


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