got an Amiga board today

[Phenix]

Today I aquired my first Amiga board.
keyfeel is quite nice.(reminds me of mx reds somehow at the first place)

[macboarder]

Well done. Great computer, that.

[matt3o]

Fantastic! Congrats! I recently built myself an A1200 out of all new-old-stock pieces and added an accelerator card. Really love that beast! The keyboard is well... meh... but you can't have everything.

you just need some retrobright now

[seebart]

A classic, I had one of those back in the day. The memories...

[Phenix]

Sure, retrobrogting my first board will follow. Hopefully soon.

Are those convertable to USB?

[matt3o]

the easiest is to put an USB drive emulator (if that is what you mean)

[Findecanor]

There are a couple of keyboard to USB adapters mentioned in the Wiki.
The Amiga 600 and 1200 keyboards expose their matrix, the others have a serial interface.

[czarek]

Those are foam and foil linears and feel like crap. The other version of the same keyboard used buckling rubber cups and was used in A2000 and CDTV keyboards. If you can get hold of those rubbers, you can literally replace the springs with them and make this keyboard somewhat better.
The best Amiga keyboards are the NMB Space Invader linears (white and yellow versions of them, with super nice dye sublimated PBT caps that even includes space bar).
If you want to connect Amiga keyboard to PC look up Keyrah adapter, although it doesn't support A500/A2000 keyboard. They do have a controller however outputting signals in similar way (although totally incompatible) to PS/2 on PC, so you could modify soarer's code to make it work maybe? I always wanted to do that (and use my NMB A2000 keyboard with a PC) but never actually had time to twiddle with it. I also don't want to break the keyboard controller.

[czarek]

Oh BTW, let me show you my retro corner:

IBM Amiga.png (1.64 MiB) Viewed 8136 times

I've got plenty of Amigas, A500s, A600s, A2000s, used to have 1200s and 4000 too but sold them. I also had one of my A500 in a Micronic Tower expanded like crazy - here are pics:
http://www.ppa.pl/graffiti/obrazek/2578 ... z-zewnatrz
http://www.ppa.pl/graffiti/obrazek/2581 ... rozszerzen
http://www.ppa.pl/graffiti/obrazek/2165 ... dowodzenia
As you can see it was connected to 30" Dell monitor and IBM SSK (with SDL to USB cable).
At some point I realised it's a nonsense to have such powerful Amigas when all you do on them is playing games. Unfortunately such powerful Amigas (everything above 030 basically) are very incompatible with games (even when using WHDLoad) and everything that requires powerful CPU (web browsing, movie playback, quake) work like crap anyways so why bother? I ended up selling all the expensive Amiga parts and only kept couple A500s and slightly expanded A600 (with Furia card and CF storage). As you can see the Amiga I'm using mostly is bare A500 with 1MB RAM and Gotek drive connected with boot selector. That gives me 100% compatibility with 99% of software that was released on this platform ever. Nice CRT monitor and good joysticks (competition pro) give way more smiles than 060 inside
Oh and later games that suck on Amiga work beautifully on this IBM 486sx/33, with SVGA, SB Pro, Model M and original monitor, it's a beauty on it's own

[Phenix]

Nice pics! Wanted to use this arduino guide forum.arduino.cc/index.php?topic=139358.0

[Findecanor]

Those are foam and foil linears and feel like crap.

Are they really? I thought they did something similar with conductive rubber.
Anyway, Mitsumi had a few different revisions of the keyboards and switches. At least, my Amiga 500 and 1200 are a little bit different.

Mitsumi also made PC keyboards with the switches that had buckling rubber sleeves. If you want tactile switches you could perhaps scavenge those parts from one of those. If you find a keyboard with a pen tray behind the function key row, it is often a Mitsumi board from that era.

[czarek]

A1200 is normal rubber dome. Not a bad one, and definitely better than foam and foil. Later A500 foam and foil keyboards (like the OP's) feel worse than Cherry MY. They are a tad lighter and pretty smooth (because of heavy use probably), and that's where pros end. Keycaps are thin ABS with pad printing just to prove Commodore was cutting costs. Really the only good Amiga keyboards were early mechanicals by NMB and Cherry, I haven't had the mechanical Mitsumi bundled with A1000, so I can't say if it's any good, but might be.
I have replaced springs with those rubber cups between CDTV and A500 keyboards (along with keycaps) and that mod works. Internally those two are identical. I've even made a video of typing on a CDTV keyboard (mitsumi buckling rubber) few years ago:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qd9_UMNMhcA
It's definitely not a bad experience. One of the better rubber domes you can get.

Btw. note that the A500 I'm using currently has those crappy foam and foil Mitsumis. I do have 2 NMB boards, but I want to keep this Amiga original, it's exactly the same one as the one I had when I was a kid and grew up using

[snuci]

I do like Amiga's and have all but the A600, A1500 (Europe only), A4000T and the UX models. My pride and joy:



More pics here, if you want to see them: http://vintagecomputer.ca/commodore-amiga-3000t/

I can honestly say I've never heard of an A500 with foam and foil. Please do take pics.

[Phenix]

I pulled off one keycap while cleaning and nearly lost one damn spring in the garden

pics will follow..

[czarek]

I'll do better pics when I get some time to disassemble mine, but here are pictures of A2000's keyboard disassembled (the one with buckling rubbers instead of springs):
http://amigalounge.com/b449.html
If I remember correctly I disassembled some of those keyboards and posted pics on Geekhack a while ago.

snuci that's a perfect condition A3000T! What do you do with it? Just keep it as a collectible or actually use it for something?

[Findecanor]

That's a very nice 3000T! I think that must be the rarest model of Amiga.

Really the only good Amiga keyboards were early mechanicals by NMB and Cherry, I haven't had the mechanical Mitsumi bundled with A1000, so I can't say if it's any good, but might be.

Twenty years ago I wasn't as picky with keyboard feel as I am today but I do remember from back then that I actually liked the Cherry board the least because the keys were not as light as on the others.

I think I'll get my Amiga 500 and 1200 up from the basement and take them apart...
My Amiga 500 is one of the later models, with a chipset that was in-between OCS and ECS, with support for 1MB of chip RAM but not the other improvements of ECS that I know of.
Edit: The keyboards are more similar than not. The A1200 keyboard has an empty spot where the controller would have been and its membrane is coming out at a different position. The springs are similar, but the slider colour differs and the A1200 is slightly less mushy on bottoming out.
Legends on A1200 are slightly thicker, but you can see that only when comparing directly. Keycaps are the same shape and thickness, but slightly different on the inside. Both have a identical plastic barrel plate and metal backplate except for the A1200's slot for the ribbon cable (extension of the membrane).

[snuci]

snuci that's a perfect condition A3000T! What do you do with it? Just keep it as a collectible or actually use it for something?

At this point, I don't do anything with it. Just finding it was enough at the time. Thankfully, the original owner removed the battery a long time ago so it's clean. At some point I will use it for a bit but it is a collectible because it is the rarest model outside of prototypes so I will keep it stock and not do any mods. It came out of a Canadian university so it is special in that way to me also.

[czarek]

snuci that's a perfect condition A3000T! What do you do with it? Just keep it as a collectible or actually use it for something?

At this point, I don't do anything with it. Just finding it was enough at the time. Thankfully, the original owner removed the battery a long time ago so it's clean. At some point I will use it for a bit but it is a collectible because it is the rarest model outside of prototypes so I will keep it stock and not do any mods. It came out of a Canadian university so it is special in that way to me also.

Just... WOW, my jaw is on the floor

[mr_a500]

Those are foam and foil linears and feel like crap. The other version of the same keyboard used buckling rubber cups and was used in A2000 and CDTV keyboards. If you can get hold of those rubbers, you can literally replace the springs with them and make this keyboard somewhat better.
The best Amiga keyboards are the NMB Space Invader linears (white and yellow versions of them, with super nice dye sublimated PBT caps that even includes space bar).

Old thread, I know, but... what the hell?? I never even heard of a foam & foil Amiga keyboard - and I've been using Amigas since the the late 80's and have owned nearly every model (except A1200 or A600). Is there a picture of it?

The best Amiga keyboard I used was the A1000 with the "Mitsumi standard mechanical Type 2 switches". I like it better than the A2000 NMB or black Cherry.

[seebart]

Old thread, I know, but... what the hell?? I never even heard of a foam & foil Amiga keyboard - and I've been using Amigas since the the late 80's and have owned nearly every model (except A1200 or A600). Is there a picture of it?

I'll believe that when I see it. Like you, I've never heard of or seen such an Amiga keyboard. We do know a variety of switches were used including NMB.

[Findecanor]

I would believe that Czarek referred to the Mitsumi hybrid which operated in a slightly similar way. They do have springs or rubber sleeves directly below the keycaps like e.g. Key Tronic foam-and-foil, so they do look similar.
Mitsumi's do not use foam or capacitative sensing but flexible conductive rubber together with contacts on top of membrane or PCB, or with a membrane switch underneath.

[mr_a500]

Mitsumi's do not use foam or capacitative sensing but flexible conductive rubber together with contacts on top of membrane or PCB, or with a membrane switch underneath.

Exactly. But that's not foam & foil. I actually would have preferred an Amiga foam & foil - if it was light and smooth, with black double shot keycaps, like the 1982 Victor 9000.



Everybody bad-mouths foam & foil, but this is a wonderfully smooth keyboard.

[Daniel Beardsmore]

The best Amiga keyboard I used was the A1000 with the "Mitsumi standard mechanical Type 2 switches". I like it better than the A2000 NMB or black Cherry.

From your comparison with linear switch types, am I to understand it that you perceive the Mitsumi switches as having only minimal tactility during typing? Loose switches feel very tactile, but this tactility in all Mitsumi metal contact switches seems to disappear when typing.

[mr_a500]

If it is tactile, it's only lightly tactile. But then, I usually bottom out when I type (from my old days on manual typewriters), so I wouldn't notice as much as somebody obsessed with not bottoming out. I usually only notice if it's strongly tactile or tactile and clicky.

[Daniel Beardsmore]

If you press one key slowly the tactility should be quite noticeable, assuming of course that yours are the same switches as what someone once took apart.

[mr_a500]

As far as I know, I was the first person on geekhack & Deskthority to take an A1000 keyboard apart (and warn others not to because of the fragile switch casings!), so yes, they have the same switches.

I rushed to try out the "tactility" after posting, then remembered I have it packed away in the A1000 box, behind loads of other boxes - which I still haven't sorted out after moving. It could take a while.

[Daniel Beardsmore]

Fragile? None of mine are fragile at all.

[mr_a500]

Well your switches aren't embedded in a 30 year old keyboard with keycaps so tight they feel like they've been glued on - are they?

In my experience, taking keycaps off hundreds of keyboards, these "Mitsumi standard mechanical Type 2 switches" are by far the most fragile I've ever experienced. This is the only keyboard I've ever damaged, simply by trying to take the keycaps off. (and I am very careful)

[Daniel Beardsmore]

And yet you've never documented a shred of evidence for this? Even if I break something accidentally I tend to document that for the record.

[mr_a500]