Author Topic: Good Buy? NMB and Black Alps  (Read 4720 times)

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Offline Reckthor

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Good Buy? NMB and Black Alps
« on: Mon, 09 September 2013, 00:55:02 »
34684-0

Found theses and a yard sale. The at 101 is wot working and i can not test the Nbm due to a port adapter.
I paid 1$ dollar each. Good deal or no?

Offline Daniel Beardsmore

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Re: Good Buy? NMB and Black Alps
« Reply #1 on: Mon, 09 September 2013, 14:58:35 »
WTF???

WHITE CLICKY NMB? Seriously these guys are having a laugh. They changed their colours more frequently than their underpants. (Clicky is supposed to be black, and white is supposed to be linear. Linear white is normally one-eye, and I don't know for certain that the two-eye whites I saw were linear.)

Clicky NMB has a very good reputation. For the record, can we have a photo of the rear label for cataloguing purposes? Also, what colour are the space bar and caps/num/scroll lock switches? Those four are often a different colour, and the space bar switch should have a spring twice as long inside.

The Dell with black Alps — hard to say, it's a bit of a love/hate switch, that.
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Offline Reckthor

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Re: Good Buy? NMB and Black Alps
« Reply #2 on: Mon, 09 September 2013, 15:12:45 »
Looks like all the key are white.

Offline Daniel Beardsmore

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Re: Good Buy? NMB and Black Alps
« Reply #3 on: Mon, 09 September 2013, 15:32:39 »
Ah, the coloured dot (previously found to be red) on the space bar slider indicates that it's destined for the space bar. The space bar switch is clicky like the others, correct?

The little arm at the back of the switch is what makes it click. However, here are examples of the same switch, but with the click arm omitted, to make them linear, revealing the click track in the slider:

http://sandy55.fc2web.com/keyboard/n-97_kana.html
http://sandy55.fc2web.com/keyboard/rt101-LC-WL.html

(The tactile ones use different metal leaves and sliders, while the clicky and linear sliders are interchangeable.)

It's a fairly old keyboard. Note that the rear label attributes the keyboard solely to Hi-Tek Corporation — it would be interesting to confirm whether the PCB says NMB on it. I'm trying to get an idea of whether Hi-Tek ever sold these keyboards before their apparent acquisition by NMB. We already know that the switch was patented by Hi-Tek, not NMB.
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Offline Daniel Beardsmore

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Re: Good Buy? NMB and Black Alps
« Reply #4 on: Mon, 09 September 2013, 15:34:01 »
PS: the rotters used "RT-101+" to refer to a lot of keyboards :)
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Offline Reckthor

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Re: Good Buy? NMB and Black Alps
« Reply #5 on: Mon, 09 September 2013, 17:48:56 »
Yes the space bar feel the same as the rest.

and here are some photos on the PCB and model numbers.


Offline Daniel Beardsmore

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Re: Good Buy? NMB and Black Alps
« Reply #6 on: Mon, 09 September 2013, 17:58:59 »
Thanks. Interesting, so the PCBs were updated before the labels … It would stand to reason that it would be the other way around.

Over at DT, I just learnt that there's also a latching (alternate action) switch — will see what photos come out of that.

That only leaves two space invader variants left to figure out — I've asked Sandy to ask MouseFan (in Japanese) if he can shed any light on the photo he posted. And then there's the stupid back-to-front pink ones that don't make any sense.
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Offline Reckthor

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Re: Good Buy? NMB and Black Alps
« Reply #7 on: Mon, 09 September 2013, 20:31:34 »
Wow thank you for all of the information.

Do you think it may be worth anything? I am trying to get some extra money to but some cherry MX switches fro my Main keyboard.

Thanks for any help.

Offline Reckthor

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Re: Good Buy? NMB and Black Alps
« Reply #8 on: Mon, 09 September 2013, 20:44:28 »
Here are some more photos. Hope this can be a reference for someone else also.

Offline BlueBär

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Re: Good Buy? NMB and Black Alps
« Reply #9 on: Tue, 10 September 2013, 02:21:10 »
You should really clean that.

Offline Daniel Beardsmore

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Re: Good Buy? NMB and Black Alps
« Reply #10 on: Tue, 10 September 2013, 17:13:10 »
I couldn't say owt about value, only that they're respected switches — it's not something that everyone hates. I've already used this page as a wiki reference, so it's great to see additional photos.

It looks like enter is nicely stabilised too, so it shouldn't bind when hit in row ....... the QWERTY row (apparently nobody agrees on how to name/number the rows!)
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Offline frogamic

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Re: Good Buy? NMB and Black Alps
« Reply #11 on: Sun, 15 September 2013, 17:47:43 »
Here are some more photos. Hope this can be a reference for someone else also.

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Offline blueSmoke

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Re: Good Buy? NMB and Black Alps
« Reply #12 on: Mon, 16 September 2013, 03:10:37 »
Wow thank you for all of the information.

Do you think it may be worth anything? I am trying to get some extra money to but some cherry MX switches fro my Main keyboard.

Thanks for any help.

I am into NMBs. I am interested in that one if the price is right. Shoot me a PM.
Model M, Filco Tenkeyless White, Few others, few more others, Noise-hater (ongoing project), blah-blah (to be fillled later...)

Offline terran5992

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Re: Good Buy? NMB and Black Alps
« Reply #13 on: Mon, 16 September 2013, 03:28:29 »
Great find.

I never get good deals like that in Singapore

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Offline Reckthor

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Re: Good Buy? NMB and Black Alps
« Reply #14 on: Mon, 16 September 2013, 03:46:45 »
Thanks. I'm keeping my eye out for more.