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Model F-XT score
JP:
Glad to hear you found a nice one. It never hurts to see more pics.
ander:
--- Quote from: JP on Fri, 04 August 2017, 19:57:21 ---Glad to hear you found a nice one. It never hurts to see more pics.
--- End quote ---
Thanks! BTW, does anyone know what the data on the label means---other than the p/n, obviously? I'm guessing the pen marks were put there by inspectors, the way Model M's have little coloured dots on their labels.
Voixdelion:
--- Quote from: ander on Fri, 04 August 2017, 17:36:18 ---
Here's a brief audio demo. (Love that ping!)
--- End quote ---
Sweeeet! Like music =)
That is the sound I associate with Turbo Pascal and madly trying to throw together an essay in the free period before my paper was due back in the computer lab in high school. It was a very satisfying sound of productivity under pressure.... I have gotta make that USB thing so I can use my XT - I just never seem to get around to it, but that audio clip has made me want to get back on that project ASAP. I also have an F-AT, but that one doesn't have the same lightness to it, I think.
There has never been another keyboard quite like that, though the cherry Blues come close to the sound. Unfortunately they seem a lot more fragile and temperamental about getting dirt and debris in the works whereas the XT was always as smooth as butter even with crumbs in it ....
ander:
--- Quote from: Voixdelion on Tue, 08 August 2017, 02:29:17 ---
--- Quote from: ander on Fri, 04 August 2017, 17:36:18 ---
Here's a brief audio demo. (Love that ping!)
--- End quote ---
Sweeeet! Like music =) ... That is the sound I associate with Turbo Pascal and madly trying to throw together an essay in the free period before my paper was due back in the computer lab in high school. It was a very satisfying sound of productivity under pressure.... I have gotta make that USB thing so I can use my XT - I just never seem to get around to it, but that audio clip has made me want to get back on that project ASAP. I also have an F-AT, but that one doesn't have the same lightness to it, I think.
There has never been another keyboard quite like that, though the cherry Blues come close to the sound. Unfortunately they seem a lot more fragile and temperamental about getting dirt and debris in the works whereas the XT was always as smooth as butter even with crumbs in it ....
--- End quote ---
Thoroughly enjoyed your post! It's always been a cool thing about GH, the range of ages and experiences that seem to cover the entire history of keebs (ha, I said "keebs")—all the way from us old-timers, who clicked and clanked away on the original mechanicals; to the younguns who are discovering the joys of modern MKs, and then, if they're lucky, opening their minds to vintage ones too.
Re your comparison of buckling springs to MX Blues: I've no doubt Cherry was inspired to some extent by buckling springs. (MX Greens are probably the closest they came to them.) But the sound you describe is much more than a switch; it's the whole board. Those fat springs are part of the chorus, but there's that big ol' Model F plate, ringing like a gong in that impractically heavy case (which, in some F's, are partly metal themselves).
It's a sound from the days when computers were still so relatively uncommon—and of course, costly—they weren't required or expected to be modest, toned-down. If you had a computer, you wanted people to know about it. Clackity clack!
BTW, I gotta ask:
--- Quote from: Voixdelion on Tue, 08 August 2017, 02:29:17 ---...whereas the XT was always as smooth as butter even with crumbs in it ....[/size]
--- End quote ---
Was that a deliberate food metaphor, with the butter and crumbs? :?)
ptrouton:
Useful info, thanks for sharing
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