deskthority

fohat

QFT

That project seemed to vacuum up the worldwide supply of Model F parts for the better part of a year, besides seemingly pulling a lot of otherwise hidden supply out of the woodwork.

fohat

And given it doesn't even have its original keycaps on, its not worth more than 100. Although I am rather agnostic about purity and keycaps, I will say that the Model M function keys with alternating colors look lame and that Wheelwriter typewriter keys are particularly well-made and good-feeling.

fohat

I probably didn't say, but what I got were metal caps that fit onto standard plastic stems. That is the right way to do it, obviously (to me anyway). To Vometia's point, there are many formulas for stainless steel (aka Inox in the rest of the world except the US) and you are always trading off prope...

fohat

I nave had several Omnikey 101s, and never seen those arrow caps.

fohat

Did you try clickykeyboards or Unicomp first?

fohat

And if you wear out WASD then you can just swap them for something like little-used function switches.

fohat

Myoth wrote: ↑
12 Jan 2020, 23:15

dangling money in front of owners is easy enough

True this.

I am sitting here thinking "how much do I really need or want my Unsaver?"

fohat

There was a sculptor in England who made some metal caps for buckling springs, it was probably 5 or more years ago and I don't recall his name. He sent me a few of them that I used in a few odd places, but not a whole board full. They were great but he had cast them out of a pewter-like metal so the...

fohat

Fkazim wrote: ↑
07 Jan 2020, 09:17

I have floss modded my IBM Model F AT. it sounds so much better.

As the vibration is dampened the feel is also much better too in my opinion.

I concur with this 100%

All of my Model Fs get a floss mod as a matter of course and it makes them civilized.

fohat

If you can wait a few months, the price will probably drop when the Unicomp line comes out, and even with shipping to Europe a new one shouldn't be too bad.

fohat

fohat wrote: ↑
03 Jan 2020, 23:36

SneakyRobb wrote: ↑
02 Jan 2020, 20:25

Getting that plastic case apart... felt like ripping a lobster in half. The entire time trying to pry it apart it felt and sounded like it would break!

Fixed that for you.

fohat

fohat

Fkazim wrote: ↑
02 Jan 2020, 15:57

as you know the model F's aren't exactly the easiest to take apart.

For what it's worth, the XT is by far the easiest to take apart and put back together. Back in the day I refurbished several of them by hand without resorting to clamps.

fohat

The blue hue of the slider looks more brighter/vibrant than the Leading Edge DC2014 and OEMAX ones that I've seen personally, The only blue Alps that I have ever had were LE 2014s and those colors were always wildly inconsistent. Perhaps it was getting toward the end of the run and they were runnin...

fohat

Soarer's original thread has a full set of documents in the original post, but Orihalcon will probably be happy to tell you how to set up one of his cables is you ask him directly.

fohat

Polecat wrote: ↑
15 Dec 2019, 21:56

If the device was spec'd for 5 volts it was PS/2. 12 volts meant USB.

Mu - I stand corrected. I had always assumed that those $1 "Y" connectors, like what swampangel showed, were passive.

But now another one: I thought that USB was 5V "universally" ....

fohat

That is correct. A passive adapter needs an internally USB savvy keyboard. So by definition it will fail with a vintage keyboard like the Model M. You can’t passively add USB to something made before USB was even invented! I disagree. I have used many simple cheapo adapters on many pre-USB keyboard...

fohat

Some people prefer 1-piece keys, they are considered more solid and vibration-free. There is no structural reason not to use them, it just makes swapping caps a little more difficult. I haven't bought from Unicomp in a few years, does anyone know whether they are saying that colored caps now come wi...

fohat

They are not that bad, and what are your other choices, anyway? Go ahead and order some more stuff to spread out the freight costs. They make nice red/green/blue Control, Shift, etc sets, and a red Escape is always good. Get some bright whites for dyeing, and the white latex blanket is worth $10 if ...

fohat

anmq91 wrote: ↑
14 Dec 2019, 11:52

I would recommend trying a cheap passive adapter first when converting PS2 to USB.

I have never had any problem with the cheap $1 ("Y" adapters with green and purple sockets for keyboard and mouse) Chinese adapters on ebay.

fohat

I think that somebody (Ripster perhaps?) posted a photo years ago with a Model M or F with caps in tatters like that.

This one only had a hole in Enter and near holes in spacebar and something else, maybe Tab. I stripped it for the chassis, of which Northgate is simply the pinnacle.

fohat

I can’t stand keyboards that fail. If you can't tolerate anything less than perfection, life must be a terrific disappointment! I personally used a Dell AT101W for at least 5 years with absolutely no problems, and I still have it in the closet and it still works fine. I also bought a Northgate with...

fohat

Also bad are environments where really tiny particulates are always hanging in the air. Warehouses are bad about that because forklift tires relentlessly shed tiny bits of rubber.

The cheapest and easiest dust cover is a small folded towel.

fohat

The copper one is my favorite. I bent it out of the inner wire of a TV cable and the grip is hot glue.

fohat

Those springs might be valuable. I have couple that fit buckling springs and they are very useful for stiffening space bars. If I had more I would put them around NumLock and CapsLock.

fohat

Spending 5 minutes to make something is worth it.

Old Alps can be touchy, pull straight up and be careful.

https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=43 ... #msg880111

fohat

fohat

Elrick wrote: ↑
10 Nov 2019, 01:51

ALWAYS buy anything via PAYPAL

I will agree in general but remember that Paypal almost always sides with the buyer, regardless.

As a seller you are in a weak position with Paypal even if you are in the right.

fohat

Model Fs are fickle beasts, and require a lot of fussy, tedious experimentation. I have read dozens of these threads where people were impatient and say something like "I took it apart THREE TIMES and it still doesn't work properly!" Personally, I have refurbished literally dozens of Model Fs and Mo...

fohat

So what's the Alps board that will do this but quietly? Dampened cream Alps are probably your best bet. The AEK2 "Nimitz" is a solid heavy keyboard with all the keys in standard ANSI position even if the legends are off for use under Windows. A Griffin iMate is the most common hardware converter or...

deskthority

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