My texan keyboards

Khers · 25 Oct 2014, 15:34

Took some photos of the BigFoot, NIB Model M and Apple Extended II that I got from Cindy the other week. The non-NIB ones were a bit dirty when I received them, but hot water, dish soap and some elbow grease really does make wonders.

I'll start off with a family photo:

IBM Model F 5291 Terminal Keyboard "BigFoot":

Beautiful BigFoot. Unfortunately one of the BigFoot's feet was damaged and is missing an ear and some of the case is broken. I have the missing piece of the case though and will probably try to glue it together some day. The ear was missing already in the photo Cindy posted, meaning that if you have a spare foot (why on earth anyone would have that), shoot me a PM!

Spoiler:

IBM Model M NIB:

Same type of box madhias showed the other week, containing the same type of keyboard. Unlike him, I could not resist to open the box...

... and this is what I found

. Looks swell!

Spoiler:

Apple Extended Keyboard II:
Now we are moving into the nineties

After cleaning the caps, I'm leaning on treating the case and the spacebar with some Retr0bright. Does look a bit odd with the white PBT and yellowy ABS.

Someone stabbed the spacebar on this one

It's got cream ALPS, but I forgot to take a photo with a keycap removed and now it's getting dark outside so you'll have to take my word for it

.

cinnamonrollz · 25 Oct 2014, 15:48

Has anyone tried retrobrighting then white vinyl dye on those? I think it would come out great. Plus the original texture would still be intact.

seebart · 25 Oct 2014, 16:29

real nice Khers! That M silver label is sweet! Much nicer than mine:

http://deskthority.net/photos-f62/post- ... 4-120.html

I need to be retrobrighting quite a bit next summer.Or I need to get a UV lamp.

bitslasher · 25 Oct 2014, 16:49

That model M is an AT keyboard, not a terminal model. You can plug that thing right into a pc if you have a model M PS/2 cable laying around.

Khers · 25 Oct 2014, 17:01

bitslasher wrote: ↑That model M is an AT keyboard, not a terminal model. You can plug that thing right into a pc if you have a model M PS/2 cable laying around.

Sweet, thanks and sorry for the error. Fixed. As a matter of fact I've ordered an IBM PS/2 cable from Unicomp as I figured it was worth a try. Also incoming are a couple of Teensies for the bigfoot and for the AEKII as well as a couple of other projects...

seebart wrote: ↑real nice Khers! That M silver label is sweet! Much nicer than mine:

http://deskthority.net/photos-f62/post- ... 4-120.html

I need to be retrobrighting quite a bit next summer.Or I need to get a UV lamp.

Yours is an ISO though, would have preferred that. Might be converted though.

seebart · 25 Oct 2014, 18:09

Yours is an ISO though, would have preferred that.

want to trade?

Might be converted though.

Sure.

quantalume · 25 Oct 2014, 22:34

Someone said that the inner foot/knob on the Bigfoot is the same as the XT. If so, I have one for you. My Bigfoot is at the office, otherwise I would check myself.

Khers · 25 Oct 2014, 23:33

quantalume wrote: ↑Someone said that the inner foot/knob on the Bigfoot is the same as the XT. If so, I have one for you. My Bigfoot is at the office, otherwise I would check myself.

If so, that would be awsome!

Madhias · 26 Oct 2014, 19:27

Great, now i know what i have to expect in my Model M box!

The BigFoot looks really good, except the issue on the left side. But it looks all in all very clean!

Khers · 26 Oct 2014, 20:02

madhias wrote: ↑Great, now i know what i have to expect in my Model M box!

The BigFoot looks really good, except the issue on the left side. But it looks all in all very clean!

But will you, or will you keep it time capsule style?

The bigfoot, while not very clean when I got it, was in pretty good nick and cleaned up nicely. While there was some rust on the plate, the foam was completely useable and after reading some guides, notably this one, it was not even that hard to put back together

.

Given that the spacebar of my bigfoot is a bit heavy, I wish I'd found this guide sooner as well.

Edit: Added guide
Edit 2: Added another guide

Muirium · 26 Oct 2014, 20:09

When mentioning guides, remember to link them, for positive karma!

I'm interested to see what you get up to with the AEK II. I've got quite a nice one, but I'm considering getting another so I could try a TKL hatchet job on it. Naturally, I should pop mine open and check the controller's in a smart place before getting any big ideas…

Khers · 26 Oct 2014, 20:30

Muirium wrote: ↑When mentioning guides, remember to link them, for positive karma!

I'm interested to see what you get up to with the AEK II. I've got quite a nice one, but I'm considering getting another so I could try a TKL hatchet job on it. Naturally, I should pop mine open and check the controller's in a smart place before getting any big ideas…

Guide and karma added

! The hardest part was fixing the spacebar stabilizer.

Regarding the AEKII, I'm thinking of something simple, along the lines of this: http://ifixit.org/blog/4468/hack-it-bet ... yboard-ii/ plus some retrobrighting.

TKL-mod is probably way out of my league

Muirium · 26 Oct 2014, 20:45

Yeah, popping in Hasu's ADB converter is a good choice. The AEK II, quite unlike this 3276 beamspring I'm on now, among so many IBM boards I like, is essentially perfectly laid out for my daily Mac needs, right out the box; so I really ought to do something with it. Even quite like those damped Alps. But it's still nice and pale and I don't even want to yellow it, let alone get nasty!

Khers · 26 Oct 2014, 21:02

Also, those damped Alps are rather quiet, appreciated when not having my own office at work. Guess my office mate would kill me if I brought a BS. He's rather annoyed by my MX Brown Ducky... But the feeling of BS is superior to MX IMHO.

quantalume · 27 Oct 2014, 19:13

Khers wrote: ↑
quantalume wrote: ↑Someone said that the inner foot/knob on the Bigfoot is the same as the XT. If so, I have one for you. My Bigfoot is at the office, otherwise I would check myself.

If so, that would be awsome!

I took a look at my Bigfoot today, and the foot is definitely different, unfortunately. I don't know where I read that they are the same. The knob actually connects to the outermost (largest) foot, which is not there on the XT.

Khers · 27 Oct 2014, 19:29

quantalume wrote: ↑
Khers wrote: ↑
quantalume wrote: ↑Someone said that the inner foot/knob on the Bigfoot is the same as the XT. If so, I have one for you. My Bigfoot is at the office, otherwise I would check myself.

If so, that would be awsome!
I took a look at my Bigfoot today, and the foot is definitely different, unfortunately. I don't know where I read that they are the same. The knob actually connects to the outermost (largest) foot, which is not there on the XT.

Ah, that's unfortunate! Thank you very much for checking though!