14 Jul
2014
14 Jul
'14
10:16 a.m.
On Mon, Jul 14, 2014 at 08:10:35AM -0700, Mark J. Blair wrote:
On Jul 14, 2014, at 05:15 , Raymond Wiker <rwiker at gmail.com> wrote:
[...]
I have a Unicomp keyboard that I bought within the
last couple of months or
so. It has the removable caps on most keys if I recall correctly. I can check
when I get to work today.
I had the opportunity to use a ~2009 vintage Unicomp when a friend imported one
from the USA. It's been slightly too long since I
used a genuine IBM Model M to
know for sure, but the Unicomp certainly felt as good
as I remembered. It
really is the kind of keyboard that the BOFH could use to club a luser to
death, and then write his obutuary with it afterwards.
So when I finally wore out my beloved decade-old Cherry keyboard in January, I
decided to order a Unicomp, and found a UK seller via Amazon. The unit I
received claimed to have been assembled in late 2013, and was a badly-assembled
creaky thing with sharp edges on ill-fitting plastic parts, and failed within a
couple of months. Comparing it to the other one is like night and day to the
point I'm wondering if mine is counterfeit, and if so, who would actually go to
the bother of counterfeiting Model Ms!
(I tried to reject the goods as Not Of Merchantable Quality and the seller is
giving me the run-around. I'm sure they'll change their tune when the court
paperwork drops through their letterbox.)
I agree that the quality of the keyboard isn't
quite on par with my
recollection of original IBM keyboards back in the day. There's a lot more
mold flashing on the case, imperfect alignment of the keys to the case, and
it arrived with one dead LED. But the keys do feel good, and they're
available with key layouts consistent with today's PC clones if that's
important to you.
What's the build date on yours? I bet it's quite recent and akin to the junk
one I've got.