Industrial Grey Model M2 mod?

[micrex22]

Has anyone ever tried cerakoting an M2? I doctored one of webwit's photos to get an idea of what it might look like:


Something I was thinking of doing whenever my M2 arrives; although I'd have to buy the cerakote equipment. I do want to solder in amber LEDs since it'll be taken apart regardless to get at the SMT capacitors.

[Chyros]

Dayum, that actually doesn't look half bad.

[Nuum]

Pah, dark gray/black is the new industrial gray!

DSCN4170.JPG (2.1 MiB) Viewed 4205 times

[Chyros]

I didn't know any black M2's existed xD .

[Nuum]

They do! The only other one I found apart from mine is this Italian one: http://www.1000bit.it/scheda.asp?id=2250

[Daniel Beardsmore]

The only gotcha there is that you've added legend wear onto capacitor failure!

[micrex22]

The only gotcha there is that you've added legend wear onto capacitor failure!

The labels look to be printed with different technology (although I can't confirm without a macro shot). The reason I say that is it is taking the colour scheme and style of early ThinkPads which do not use M13 printing--with the vivid green 'alt' w/ grey-yellow and grey sub legends; and they are also finer. Plus the enter key has enough wear to develop shine without having anything sloughed off.

Capacitor failures are trivial since anything of that period will need a cap replacement; but I guess it can be a pain if you lack the equipment. I had some regular Model Ms that needed it after what... 30-31 years of aging.

While I had a feeling black M2s existed, I *did not* expect there to be genuine black PS/1s... but I guess it only would make sense since it would be paired with said PS/1.
EDIT: Actually, I do remember seeing that black PS/1 on that italian page, I just forgot about it :p

I'll have to be on the lookout for an ANSI black M2 (I like the early ThinkPad legend scheme); while quickly browsing for one I found a NIB Model A... well I'm definitely not buying it since I have enough rubber dome keyboards:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Brand-New-Genui ... Sw9GhYl6Oj

[micrex22]

I'm under the impression that the part numbers are agnostic as to which colours they can be, although at some point retailers were distinguishing between 1395900 'WHITE' vs 'BLACK'.

I took a quick look at the HMM for some random PS/1s and couldn't find anything that differentiates colours, I like the opening logo (some PS/1s BIOSes had that as a splash screen):


1 1395900 1 - U.S.
1 1395900 1 - Australia, Bangladesh, Brunei, China, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Macau, Malaysia, Myanmar, New Zealand, Philippines, Singapore, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Thailand
1 1396497 1 - Arabic countries
1 1395910 1 - Belgium (Dutch)
1 1395908 1 - Belgium (French)
1 1399045 1 - Brazil
1 1399358 1 - Bulgaria (Cyrillic)
1 1395900 1 - Canada (English)
1 1395901 1 - Canada (French)
1 1399377 1 - Czech Republic
1 1395916 1 - Denmark
1 1395913 1 - Finland
1 93F0114 1 - France
1 1395907 1 - Germany
1 1399078 1 - Greece
1 1399379 1 - Hungary
1 1395919 1 - Israel
1 1395912 1 - Italy
1 1397036 1 - Latin America (Spanish)
1 1395909 1 - Netherlands
1 1395914 1 - Norway
1 1399376 1 - Poland
1 1395915 1 - Portugal
1 1399380 1 - Romania
1 1399375 1 - Russia (Cyrillic)
1 1399374 1 - Serbia (Cyrillic)
1 1399378 1 - Slovakia
1 1395920 1 - Spain
1 1395913 1 - Sweden
1 1395921 1 - Switzerland (French)
1 1395922 1 - Switzerland (German)
1 1395912 1 - Switzerland (Italian)
1 1395917 1 - Turkey
1 1395906 1 - UK/Ireland
1 1399081 1 - Yugoslavia (Latin)
---
I think it's probably too late to hunt some of this stuff down since it's all long gone and recycled, we'll need a time machine. And black PS/1 setups weren't common to begin with; I wonder if their keyboard were even sold separately or only exclusively bundled with a system. Sadly, it is looking like they were only ever bundled and not sold individually--which would explain their obscurity.

[micrex22]

Apologies for the triple-post.

I may have found a source of black ANSI M2s; hopefully more details tomorrow. If there are multiple units in stock, I'll buy all of them, REPAIR the capacitors in every one with a full cleaning and sell the fixed extras here.

...That is... if all goes according to plan.

"Why on earth would you care about an M2, even if it's black?", a few reasons and some of them are personal:
#1 The colour scheme melds in with modern computers as everything is black now
#2 I *love* the early ThinkPad keyboard design with the cool green alt keys, IBM kept the 'black keycaps' with light black theme to this very day
#3 The M2s are very compact (while I love Model Ms, the size can be a problem in some situations)
#4 I cannot EXPRESS how ecstatic I am with how extra-noisy M2s are... considered a negative to most...
#5 The keycaps look to use the ThinkPad legend printing process, so the legends will hold up very well unlike the M13--which also only used one legend colour (white), the black M2 uses four different legend colours like early ThinkPads.

If someone had a gnarly M15 that was painted over and fitted with black M2 keycaps, that would be pretty cool as well (you'd need to sacrifice two black M2s, though).

[balotz]

Apologies for the triple-post.

I may have found a source of black ANSI M2s; hopefully more details tomorrow. If there are multiple units in stock, I'll buy all of them, REPAIR the capacitors in every one with a full cleaning and sell the fixed extras here.

...That is... if all goes according to plan.

"Why on earth would you care about an M2, even if it's black?", a few reasons and some of them are personal:
#1 The colour scheme melds in with modern computers as everything is black now
#2 I *love* the early ThinkPad keyboard design with the cool green alt keys, IBM kept the 'black keycaps' with light black theme to this very day
#3 The M2s are very compact (while I love Model Ms, the size can be a problem in some situations)
#4 I cannot EXPRESS how ecstatic I am with how extra-noisy M2s are... considered a negative to most...
#5 The keycaps look to use the ThinkPad legend printing process, so the legends will hold up very well unlike the M13--which also only used one legend colour (white), the black M2 uses four different legend colours like early ThinkPads.

If someone had a gnarly M15 that was painted over and fitted with black M2 keycaps, that would be pretty cool as well (you'd need to sacrifice two black M2s, though).

If you manage to get these, could you put one aside for me? I love the M2.

[Daniel Beardsmore]

If only they had 105-key layout! The M2 is very tempting. It demonstrates that we could make a modern buckling spring keyboard in a decent form factor if we wanted (I find the M just far too big).

[Findecanor]

In my opinion, modding the IBM M2 is not worth it - because you will break too many snaps.
Unless ... you could find a way to do a bolt mod on these!

[balotz]

In my opinion, modding the IBM M2 is not worth it - because you will break too many snaps.
Unless ... you could find a way to do a bolt mod on these!

The trick is to work from left to right, prying open the case carefully and releasing each snap in turn. I've opened many of these boards and never broken a single one.

[andrewjoy]

It also helps if you warm up the keyboard slightly , will reduce the chance the plastic will break

[micrex22]

If you manage to get these, could you put one aside for me? I love the M2.

I lost the email address to my original contact with the vendor, and their help desk guy doesn't seem to really understand what I'm asking... I'll try again.

In my opinion, modding the IBM M2 is not worth it - because you will break too many snaps.
Unless ... you could find a way to do a bolt mod on these!

Strangely enough I've taken apart an M2 four times and didn't break a single snap. Trust me, taking apart an M2 is WAY easier than screwing together an FSSK in mid-air. Bolt mods (at least for me) are dreadful, I just can't stand screwing the tiny nuts. Maybe it's because I don't use a re-assembly harness?