24 Feb
2018
24 Feb
'18
11:15 p.m.
On Feb 24, 2018, at 18:57, Ian wrote:
Glen, thanks for the response.
The keyboard I?m looking for which I need for the 2/120 looks like this:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/alanc/4013376694/in/photostream
That is a Sun Type 2 keyboard.
Part #: 540-1006-01
It terminates with a registered jack and not a d-sub.
Perhaps maybe some late mode Sun2s used the one you pointed at... I have one for the
Sun3. I?m not sure.
I also know the mouse for the Sun2/120 looks like the one for the 3, but is in black and
again terminated with a registered jack that connects to the CPU directly, and not via the
keyboard as on the keyboard you posted.
The Sun 2/120 had the two RJ connectors for keyboard and mouse and the Type 2 Keyboard and
Type 2 Mouse (which you correctly describe) fit them.
I am thinking that there was a passive adapter box that went between the 15-pin D
connector on later Suns and the two RJ connectors. Maybe for the Sun 2/50. It also
allowed one to use the Type 2 keyboard and mouse on the Sun 3/60 (and probably other
models too).
Type 2 and Type 3 are electrically the same, the big differences are the connectors and
that the Type 3 keyboard is where the mouse signals are split out.
I?m sure somewhere, some rotten keyboard collector is
using the keyboard I need with their Dell PC because the keys click with some vaguely
unique hysteresis curve or something?
I remember preferring the Type 2 keyboard to the Type 3 keyboard, and for a while using a
Type 2 keyboard and mouse with a Sun 3/60 through one of the passive adaptor boxes. I do
not recall why I preferred the Type 2 keyboard.
And the keyboard collectors want "decent mechanical switches".
<https://geekhack.org/index.php?topic=12506.0>
And look at this page, and the 12th picture, for another Type 2 keyboard:
<http://www.9999hp.net/botnet/>
I have to wonder whether that is a sort of thing the keyboard collectors get up to.
-Frank McConnell