vintage Acer switches

[Chyros]

I found an Acer 6312 recently. I find 6312s very regularly, but this is the oldest one I've found to date.

It's a winkeyless model from 1995 and it uses UV-printed caps with the same legends as the KB-101A, unlike the later blocky UV-printed ones, and the lasered caps that came after that. It also has the secondary metal grounding plate inside.

I didn't think too much of it until I noticed that the switches look distinctly different from all the other Acer switches I've seen so far (and I've seen MANY). The housing is not matte, but much shinier, and the writing on the logo isn't centred, but aligned to the left. About half of them have thin writing, the rest bolder lettering, but in both cases it looks different from those on other Acer switches. Most notably, all of them have lubricant on the slider. The board had the black version all over, but the numpad + and enter, return key and Caps Lock had white switches - again with left-aligned lettering.

I took some pictures. First is the normal switch, below that the two varieties of vintage Acer switches. I wiped the top part of the lubricant off of one of the sliders, but found it very hard to make a good picture. Still shows pretty clearly though.

Has anyone ever seen this before?

[ohaimark]

It hasn't been noticed before... I think that Acer switches are so near-universally loathed that no one has spent the time trying to find different variants.

I can second your findings, though. In fact, I have a whole keyboard worth of them.

[Chyros]

I don't understand why people loathe them. I think they're pretty good switches tbh.

[ohaimark]

They're... Okay. Even my buddies, who were completely inexperienced with keyboards, rated other switches above them when I brought in a few 'boards for them to sample.

I think it's that they have a sort of plastic-y or papery feeling to them.

[E3E]

Wait, does this mean that the method of printing for the Silitek Dell AT101's caps and the Acer caps has finally been figured out? It's UV-coating?

[Touch_It]

I've always wanted to try them. Will probably have to buy a board someday. Do the new switches feel any different from the normal switches?

[Chyros]

I've always wanted to try them. Will probably have to buy a board someday. Do the new switches feel any different from the normal switches?

Hard to say tbh. Probably easier to say once I reassemble the board (I'm deep-cleaning it atm). Judging by loose switches the difference isn't night-and-day.

[ohaimark]

Wait, does this mean that the method of printing for the Silitek Dell AT101's caps and the Acer caps has finally been figured out? It's UV-coating?

It isn't UV *coating*. The printing method places materials sensitive to high intensity UV light (possibly Titanium Dioxide) in the plastic mixture itself. The caps are then exposed to UV lasers which aren't quite intense enough to etch the material, but which are intense enough to cause a photochemical reaction that turns exposed areas blackish/grey.

Similar techniques are used in medical applications where high quality lettering without etching or small ridges (as those can hold bacteria) is necessary.

[Chyros]

Titanium dioxide is very white, and although it's quite UV active, it doesn't really turn black at all after exposure.

From my cutting tests the material penetrates relatively deeply into the caps, though - considerably deeper than dye-sublimation.

[ohaimark]

Huh. Then ignore that part of my post.

Something UV sensitive is in there, though. Do you have any material analysis equipment at your disposal?

[E3E]

That's interesting, but I've seen both Silitek AT101 caps and Acer caps with printing that had started to rub off, so it's not quite as resilient as dye-sublimination, though I'd say it's more hardy than pad printing for sure.

If it is a UV reactive sort of thing, then I guess it's just some kind of surface layer that builds up but doesn't actually bind with the plastic in the same way dye-sub printing does.

Oh, but Chyros mentions the printing goes deep into the plastic. I don't know anymore! Maybe the caps were just worn that deeply.

I mean, I -have- taken PBT dye-subbed caps and scratched off the printing before as a test, so I guess it's possible for both. That's a heck of a lot of key cap sanding ala typing though.

[Chyros]

Huh. Then ignore that part of my post.

Something UV sensitive is in there, though. Do you have any material analysis equipment at your disposal?

It's outside my field tbh. I do some surface analysis, but of an entirely different nature. Regardless, I am now in nominal registration and no longer have access to analytical equipment :/ .

[ohaimark]

That's interesting, but I've seen both Silitek AT101 caps and Acer caps with printing that had started to rub off, so it's not quite as resilient as dye-sublimination, though I'd say it's more hardy than pad printing for sure.

If it is a UV reactive sort of thing, then I guess it's just some kind of surface layer that builds up but doesn't actually bind with the plastic in the same way dye-sub printing does.

Oh, but Chyros mentions the printing goes deep into the plastic. I don't know anymore! Maybe the caps were just worn that deeply.

I mean, I -have- taken PBT dye-subbed caps and scratched off the printing before as a test, so I guess it's possible for both. That's a heck of a lot of key cap sanding ala typing though.

There were both UV printed and rimless pad printed caps produced by Acer. I think the caps you had were the latter -- it's quite difficult to tell that they're pad printed until a legend craps out.

[E3E]

There were both UV printed and rimless pad printed caps produced by Acer. I think the caps you had were the latter -- it's quite difficult to tell that they're pad printed until a legend craps out.

I've had several different caps and seen several different sets.

As far as we know, the AT101 old logo by Silitek only had one model and no variation and yet I've seen a board on eBay with missing legends and I think we're all fairly certain that they aren't pad printed caps.



So, it could be either or, really. They seem not to be as robust as dye-subbed caps.

Just checked to see when the wear started to become noticeable on some of my Silitek caps, and while it did take quite a bit of sanding with 180 grit, a set of dyesubbed caps I tried took a lot longer to get down to the bare plastic.

Could it just be wear resistance of PBT vs ABS? Maybe.

[terrycherry]

Thanks for the info about the difference of it.
This keyboard also have the left side logo: [PS／2][TW]Acer 6311-KW[(Clicky)Black,(Clicky)White]
Are they have any difference on internal?

[andrewjoy]

I don't understand why people loathe them. I think they're pretty good switches tbh.

Me nether Acer switches are awesome , its just they are usually put in sub standard boards with poor construction.

I wish there was a tank of a board with them.

[Muirium]

I neither loathe them, nor think they're awesome. Acers are… okay. They've got character anyway. Not one I particularly like, and the rollover on them is seriously shite. Acer never handled its membranes as well as IBM did on the Model M. The caps can be good, though. Albeit covered in Arial, blech.

[Chyros]

I don't understand why people loathe them. I think they're pretty good switches tbh.

Me nether Acer switches are awesome , its just they are usually put in sub standard boards with poor construction.

I wish there was a tank of a board with them.

Construction is a relative term. Acer switch boards are supremely serviceable, by far the easiest of any board I've come across so far. Ease of maintenance is a construction pro as well .

[keycap]

I don't understand why people loathe them. I think they're pretty good switches tbh.

Me nether Acer switches are awesome , its just they are usually put in sub standard boards with poor construction.

I wish there was a tank of a board with them.

This was also a problem with Monterey switches, most of the time they were thrown in really poorly-constructed boards like the Chicony KB-5181, but the switches themselves were extremely good. I've yet to try Acer switches though, and I really should pick up an older Acer board to match my mid-90s Acer PC.

[Tuntematon]

I don't understand why people loathe them. I think they're pretty good switches tbh.

Me nether Acer switches are awesome , its just they are usually put in sub standard boards with poor construction.

I wish there was a tank of a board with them.

My Acer 6311-K with Data General branding uses the KB-101 style case and it's solid enough. Not a tank, but definitely adequate I'd say.