Good stuff that works
I was given an IBM model M keyboard a few weeks ago, and I am still amazed over how good it is! The first thing you realize when you pick it up is how heavy it is, 2.2 kg (5 lbs). Yes, I had to put it on a scale. I think that is a unusually thing nowadays, when low weight means cheaper transportation from Asia. This one was however manufactured in UK 1993, from a design made in 1985.
Can computer parts be vintage? If so, the model M is qualified. As a reference, windows 3.1 was released in 1993. Doesn't that seem a long time ago? I started up my first laptop again a few years ago that runs windows 3.1, and oh boy how astonishingly primitive it was.
But the really good thing about it is its tactile qualities, slightly firm (we need the word "lagom" in english!) with a nice "click" at the end of the stroke. It is a little like a weighted piano keyboard. It really is worlds apart from your average flimsy Dell keyboard which basically is a conductive rubber mat with buttons on top.
The key of wonderThose who appreciate such qualities can buy one at clickykeyboards.com, where I borrowed the pictures.
Thanks Olle, this one is a keeper.
/O.K.
(Listening to wile posting: Igor Stravinsky - Rite of spring)
10 comments:
OK, so I have one of those Dell keyboards, four years old or so, and the keys kind of stick, or rather, don't want to be pushed down very easily. Any suggestions without having to put it in the dishwasher, which I don't think this one can manage? My keyboard is made in Thailand and is model RT7D20. The worst is when the shift or enter key is hard to push down, because the little finger isn't very strong...
Once I dropped a 3 kg book from a top shelf down on my laptop keyboard. It survived, but the keyboard got completely bent out of shape. Happily enough, it was covered under the warranty.
On my keyboard you can see which keys are used the most, they are shining black on the surface. I remember the old grey mac keyboard, the most used keys had black grease on them, especially in the lab. Some you couldn't even read the letters on. Ick.
Suggestion: Follow the link in the post. :)
Serious though, the IBM keyboard may not suit everyones taste. Your Dell keyboard is (diplomacy disabled) one of the very worst keyboards I have encountered. It is on par with the foil keyboard of the Sinclair ZX-81 (Timex ZX-81 in the US). But you get excercise! And you still type about five times faster as me...
Why the keys are so stiff I don't know, but I'm not sure running it in the dishwasher will help much. Open it up and take a look. It might be worth a try, if it doesn't work you have a very good reason to get a (good) new one. :)
Or just sell it on Ebay as a exercise keyboard. ;)
Keyboards are likely one of the dirtiest things we touch, it is scary just to think about it...
I remember the ZX-81 - you had to press so hard and some keys stopped working, right? And some made many letters in a row? Well this isn't that bad, but it is not good.
I think telephones are dirtier, don't you think? At least if you talk dirty :)
But I don't want a keyboard that makes huge clicking noises all the time, isn't that what the IBM M does? Well, not that this one is quiet either...
Haha, telephones and keyboards might be equally bad! Reminds me of Douglas Adams' "Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy" where he tells about a planet that gets rid of the "useless" third of it's inhabitants, among them the staff of telephone sanitizers, by telling them that they were going to colonize a distant planet, and the following consequences. "You go first, we're coming later" :)
"All this lay in the planet's remote past. It was, however, a descendant of one of these eccentric poets who invented the spurious tales of impending doom which enabled the people of Golgafrincham to rid themselves of an entire useless third of their population. The other two-thirds stayed firmly at home and lived full, rich and happy lives until they were all suddenly wiped out by a virulent disease contracted from a dirty telephone."
"remember the ZX-81 - you had to press so hard and some keys stopped working, right? And some made many letters in a row?"
No, my ZX-81 is in good working order, but cousin E wore out his combined zero- and delete-key. He then moved up to the Sinclair Spectrum that had keys like erasers.
But the ZX-81 keyboard does not have a good "feeling" since it just flexes a few microns or so.
I just compared the IBM with a generic cheap keyboard, and they are about equally loud, but with different sound characters. The click of the IBM is not just audible, you feel it too. I think that is an important part of why I like it.
Another thing, it lacks a "windows"-key (designed in 1985, remember?), but I can surely manage without that. If I should need it I assume it could be mapped to some other useless key. Caps lock is high on the list of candidates...
And of course someone have thought of a solution to the problem with dirty phones as well.
Ultrasound cleaning phones, wow! Why don't they have them in hospitals? Probably too expensive.
On my keyboard you can feel the 'click' too, but for the wrong reason - they stick :)
Ha, that is funny about the Adams book. LA is reading it now, and I think he likes it, but I hated it as a teenager. I don't know, maybe I just didn't have that absurd sense of humor.
"Ultrasound cleaning phones, wow! Why don't they have them in hospitals?"
Why don't we live in a perfect world?
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