geekhack

geekhack Community => Keyboards => Topic started by: Ludovician on Sat, 14 February 2015, 00:37:14

Title: Does anyone recognise this keyboard?
Post by: Ludovician on Sat, 14 February 2015, 00:37:14

So I was looking at this keyboard on ebay: http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/AMSTRAD-PC2086-640K-PERSONAL-COMPUTER-KEYBOARD-VINTAGE-/251836744338?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_15&hash=item3aa2a3c292

I'm guessing by the third picture that it's a buckling spring one, but the springs don't come out when you pull the keycap on my Model M, so it might be a different mechanism? Was hoping someone might know more about this type of keyboard before I decide if I want to buy it as an experiment/backup.

Title: Re: Does anyone recognise this keyboard?
Post by: Findecanor on Sat, 14 February 2015, 02:30:50

It is a linear type of key switch where the spring touches a membrane. People call it "Amstrad switch" because it is most found in Amstrad keyboards. ;)
Also common in typewriters.

Title: Re: Does anyone recognise this keyboard?
Post by: Chromako on Sat, 14 February 2015, 02:52:33

I learned something new today!

Also, that's one weird yellowing pattern.

Title: Re: Does anyone recognise this keyboard?
Post by: Findecanor on Sat, 14 February 2015, 05:54:04

The F, J and 5 keys use to be different in that they have nubs, but this... ?  A different batch of a different type of plastic, maybe ...

Title: Re: Does anyone recognise this keyboard?
Post by: Daniel Beardsmore on Sat, 14 February 2015, 08:26:02

There's several different, very similar designs, and they're very hard to pin down to manufacturers.

We found something that was attributed to Matsu****a (Panasonic) that I think was similar to this but whether it came from their factory or from a contract manufacturer, we don't know. It never got added to the wiki, and Google denies that the topic ever existed.

SMK also made keyboards with very similar switches.

Title: Re: Does anyone recognise this keyboard?
Post by: Daniel Beardsmore on Sat, 14 February 2015, 19:01:32

Here's the topic I was looking for:

https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=64208.0