Once in a life time keyboard find!

[GivenZane]

Hi Everyone,
I really lucked out recently with my local recyclers. I know the owner and he sets keyboards aside for me. This week he had got in a massive amount. There was around 35 this week he had set aside almost all from one person. They're really grubby due to appearing to have been stored in an attic for the last couple decades, but from what I've tested they seem to work; just need some TLC. The stand out boards of the lot are as follows!

Zenith Tree Logo XT/AT keyboard with yellow Alps
Zenith ZKB-2R with unknown alps compatible switches.
Zenith K-150 (Black Logo) with Green Alps
IBM Model M (1391401)
IBM Model M (1397661)
IBM Model M2 (Buckling Spring)
IBM Model M2 (Rubber Dome)
NorthGate OmniKey Ultra with White Alps
Perpetual Systems (Dah Yang) with what appear to be Yellow Taiwan Jet Axis MX compatible switches
Focus FK-2001 with White Alps
Compaq Enhanced Keyboard II with KT Foam and Foil
Tandy 1000 with Fujitsu Leaf Springs
Mitsumi KPQ-E99ZC-13
Tandy Enhanced Keyboard with Fujitsu Peerless

Cheers mates! I'll upload Pictures when I get some time. Right now I'm trying to figure out how to store all of these... LOL
--GIven

[GivenZane]

P.S. I paid about 2-3USD for each board including tax.

[mcmaxmcmc]

mmmm, very nice! I'm certainly interested in one of your Zeniths, if it has the caps I'm looking for.

But overall, great haul! Congrats!

[Sturmtiger001]

Awesome Haul, I'd love to take a look at those Zeniths myself as I'm a huge fan of them! Anyway yeah man, awesome haul!

[Redmaus]

Wow that's quite the steal! That ZKB-2R sounds interesting with the unknown switches. Hope you have fun with storage! I'm currently spending quite a bit of time on storing my keyboards properly

[imdatperson]

Wow that's quite the steal! That ZKB-2R sounds interesting with the unknown switches. Hope you have fun with storage! I'm currently spending quite a bit of time on storing my keyboards properly

It’s so hard to find space Being a vintage collector with as many boards as I have, it’s just disgusting lol

[zzxx53]

Congrats on the great haul!
Time to ping my local electronics recyclers...

[Iwaju]

congrats on the haul!
maybe I should contact my own recyclers

[depletedvespene]

Congrats!

[GivenZane]

Wow that's quite the steal! That ZKB-2R sounds interesting with the unknown switches. Hope you have fun with storage! I'm currently spending quite a bit of time on storing my keyboards properly

It’s so hard to find space Being a vintage collector with as many boards as I have, it’s just disgusting lol

That's a problem I'm dealing with right now LOL Basically every flat service in my house has keyboards on it LOL I'm waiting on a shipment of boxes to store them in ATM. I'm considering getting a commercial Kitchen Speed rack to store them on. If you got one of those and a set of Full Sheet pans you could store over 40 keyboards on it; the trays are 18x24 and the rack has 20 shelves.

Also, after looking at the ZKB-2r for a while I figured out it Mitsumi Miniature Mechanicals. I'm not sure if its cause they are dirty or not but they feel terrible. They're super scratchy and have a terrible high pitched typing sound... That has moved the keyboard to close to the bottle of the restoration list.... Only thing below it are some BTC Dome and Slider keyboards LOL

Cheers,
--Given

[imdatperson]

Wow that's quite the steal! That ZKB-2R sounds interesting with the unknown switches. Hope you have fun with storage! I'm currently spending quite a bit of time on storing my keyboards properly

It’s so hard to find space Being a vintage collector with as many boards as I have, it’s just disgusting lol

That's a problem I'm dealing with right now LOL Basically every flat service in my house has keyboards on it LOL I'm waiting on a shipment of boxes to store them in ATM. I'm considering getting a commercial Kitchen Speed rack to store them on. If you got one of those and a set of Full Sheet pans you could store over 40 keyboards on it; the trays are 18x24 and the rack has 20 shelves.

Also, after looking at the ZKB-2r for a while I figured out it Mitsumi Miniature Mechanicals. I'm not sure if its cause they are dirty or not but they feel terrible. They're super scratchy and have a terrible high pitched typing sound... That has moved the keyboard to close to the bottle of the restoration list.... Only thing below it are some BTC Dome and Slider keyboards LOL

Cheers,
--Given

Mitsumi miniature mechanicals..... blehhhh XD Never tried em, probably never will. I’ve been pretty fortunate with my finds, as many of my boards required little to no work to get up and running good as new. I have a rule to only get boards at really good deals (sub $50), so it’s quite surprising that so many of boards came to me in such nice shape. Any large scale work I do to my boards is usually in modification, for example, I am currently linearizing a black NIB Dell AT101W.

[Yasu0]

Nice job saving those guys from the shredder Zane.

[GivenZane]

It’s so hard to find space Being a vintage collector with as many boards as I have, it’s just disgusting lol

That's a problem I'm dealing with right now LOL Basically every flat service in my house has keyboards on it LOL I'm waiting on a shipment of boxes to store them in ATM. I'm considering getting a commercial Kitchen Speed rack to store them on. If you got one of those and a set of Full Sheet pans you could store over 40 keyboards on it; the trays are 18x24 and the rack has 20 shelves.

Also, after looking at the ZKB-2r for a while I figured out it Mitsumi Miniature Mechanicals. I'm not sure if its cause they are dirty or not but they feel terrible. They're super scratchy and have a terrible high pitched typing sound... That has moved the keyboard to close to the bottle of the restoration list.... Only thing below it are some BTC Dome and Slider keyboards LOL

Cheers,
--Given

Mitsumi miniature mechanicals..... blehhhh XD Never tried em, probably never will. I’ve been pretty fortunate with my finds, as many of my boards required little to no work to get up and running good as new. I have a rule to only get boards at really good deals (sub $50), so it’s quite surprising that so many of boards came to me in such nice shape. Any large scale work I do to my boards is usually in modification, for example, I am currently linearizing a black NIB Dell AT101W.

The most I've ever spent on a keyboard was $80 USD for a near mint IBM Model M. Its in pristine shape and works flawlessly. It's a 1390120 from September of 86. The least I've paid was free for a BTC 5339R-O Foam and Foil board LOL The best deal I've got was an IBM Model F 5150 in quite good shape for 10USD LOL I don't have the money to buy every keyboard I want sadly. I buy whatever I can get cheap from my recyclers LOL In this case I paid less then 3USD a board LOL

Honestly, this was my first run in with the Mitsumi's and I can honestly say I am not impressed. I would take Clone MX Blues any day of the week over them; a good Rubber dome acturally is better then my first impressions. I'll clean it up and see what I think of them then. The feel of them reminds me of really dirty and very used Fujitsu Peerless with a rally bad sound added to them. LOL

I can't decide if I should do a linear mod on my AT101 or not :/ I am hesitant simply due to it being my first mechanical keyboard I got well over 10 years ago now LOL Paid like 2USD for it at a charity shop LOL I probably won't simply due to it have some sentimental value to me and honestly I don't mind the black alps in it to much. They're not great tactile switches, but I'll still take them over MX Browns LOL

Be sure to post about your progress on the AT101! I really jealous LOL I want a black AT101 really bad LOL

Nice job saving those guys from the shredder Zane.

Lucky for me I got to know the owner of my local recycler and he sets stuff aside for me! Its been great. The more i buy from them, the cheaper it gets for me LOL

Cheers,
--Given

[Tha_Pig]

Post pictures! :O

[jwmaxwell]

Hey cool, I recently got a Focus 2001 as well! I love its whole aesthetic, too bad I don't have an adapter for it yet, would love to daily drive it.

[GivenZane]

Hey cool, I recently got a Focus 2001 as well! I love its whole aesthetic, too bad I don't have an adapter for it yet, would love to daily drive it.

It's a nice board. I can't daily drive it right now sadly. It has several dead switches I haven't gotten a chance to fix yet... I need to go order a handful of white alps when I have a minute. I sadly don't have a donor board for them -_-