First Impressions of the Poker 3 Mechanical Keyboard

published 01/24/16

I just got one of those fancy mechanical keyboards so I could look really cool while I program computers and I wanted to share my initial impressions. I went with a black Vortex Poker 3. It's the backlit version with Brown Cherry MX switches.

This is my first mechanical keyboard and so I wasn't sure what to expect, but I really like it already. The feel of typing on it is great and that sound! That sweet, sweet sound. The build quality is very nice; I was especially happy with the aluminium case, I think it adds a really nice heft to the thing.

Programming

Programming the keyboard has been a lot of fun. I was confused about how to get started, but after reading a few things and some trial and error, it's pretty easy. Here are some of the customizations I've set up:

• Swap the Win and Alt keys. Out of the box the Win key behaves as the Cmd key on OS X, but it's in the wrong spot, so I switched it with the Alt key.

• Mapped Caps Lock to Ctrl. Many programmers like to remap Caps Lock to Ctrl key, especially Vimmers like myself. While I was at it, I also mapped Fn + Caps Lock to be Caps Lock. I rarely use Caps Lock, but this'll make screaming at people on Twitter MUCH easier!

• Move Fn to left Ctrl. With Caps Lock remapped, I was free to move Fn over to the left Ctrl key. This makes it a little easier to fire off macros.

• Vim arrow keys. As stated, I'm a big Vim fan, so I wanted to be able to use the Vim motion keys as arrows. Simply hold down Fn and then pretend I'm in Vim. :D

Macros

I've just starting thinking about how to make good use of Macros - my first idea was to add a few to help me fill out forms. For instance, I'm on a project that has some staging accounts that I'm constantly signing into so I mapped the email and password to a couple keys. Now I can just fire off a macro and the credentials get typed in for me.

Tilde

Really, the only thing I'm annoyed about at this point is the tilde key - to press this key, it's Fn + Shift + Esc. OS X has Cmd + ~ for switching between windows in a program and getting this to fire is pretty annoying.

Keycaps

I'm trying to resist buying a bunch of keycaps until I've used this thing a little more, but I've got some ideas about ways to make it look even more cute. I'm still on the fence about blanks - I think I like to have the labels on there. Plus, I think the back light affect would be diminished.

Other than the tilde, I'm very happy with this keyboard so far and I feel like I'm well on my way to becoming the 10X programmer I've always wanted to be!!1!