IQUNIX EV63: Ghost in the Shell Edition – Shell Core Keyboard Review

Who is IQUNIX? It is a tech brand that has been producing high quality mechanical keyboards since 2014. IQUNIX partners with esports teams and now has a brand deal with Kodansha to produce Ghost in the Shell themed versions of its EV63 keyboard.

This is a dense keyboard, featuring multiple layers of materials for performance and sound control. Cubed3 dives into what comes in the box!

The box itself shows the keyboard in all of its glory, surrounded by familiar Ghost in the Shell artwork and colours. Imagery from the original movie is on the top and back of the box, helping drive home the brand connection. Sliding off the outer cover the inner box is interesting, its artwork is all sketchy and greyscale giving it the air of a comic book or manga page. Inside is an insert with more movie artwork underneath, plus the keyboard itself with a nice rigid plastic topper to protect the keys.

Behind this is a silver box containing the wire, key removal tool and a cleaning brush which is a pleasing extra. There is also a user manual and a little shiny envelope with the warranty information. All in all a great, sleek and interesting package. Lifting the keyboard out and feeling the heft is a great experience. This product feels premium, with layers and layers of metals and plastics making it all pop. Even the power cable has a shaped end so it fits snugly and won’t move out of place.

Plugging in the keyboard it will light up; the lighting is all RGB with user-controlled lighting or basic default settings that have a nice slow hue-changing effect. These lights are in the base so they don’t shine through keys unless swapping out with keys that have light pass-through. It’s quite modular and moddable.

For this Shell Core design, the keys are all Ghost in the Shell themed, there are lots of see-through blue keys with GitS motifs like the major and quotes from the movie which is very stylish. However, IQUNIX did a fantastic job and provided extra key caps with other designs and replacements for the glowing keys (except the spacebar) for those who like something less flashy.

The keyboard has three onboard profiles that can be edited using browser software on the IQUNIX website. It’s interesting that it runs in the browser and not locally on the user’s computer. This adds some limitations as the app will not start in non-chromium browsers locking out people who use Firefox. Once loaded, though, it’s a simple interface with a ton of options. The sheer number of lighting and button customisation on show is excellent, challenging companies such as NZXT and Razer, but lacking the layering of effects many of those companies offer.

The keyboard uses hall effect switches meaning they are incredible responsive yet slightly muted keys. They feel fantastic to press but there was a slight issue on the review unit where on the slowest setting the ‘w’ key wouldn’t press properly and the ‘e’ key would cause ‘w’ to spam endlessly. Luckily a firmware update and key actuation tweak has resolved this issue entirely as seen by the fact it managed to type up this review. Additionally, it has been revealed that IQUNIX has added controller emulation to its EV63 gaming keyboard, showing it is proactive in keeping its kit as up to date as possible.

Technical Details