deskthority

https://goo.gl/photos/5phzWXQMQZ9jwcvD9

I've been working since June of 2016 to catalog my keyboard collection!
As of now, I've documented 233 distinct keyboards. This number is slightly off: the numbers either correspond to a box, or to a keyboard. When they correspond to a box, I have the problem that two boxes contain two keyboards, and one box is empty!

Still, this is my best attempt to date to catalog my collection. Long term I'll be building a nice Web page with all of these. But for now I wanted to share these all with you in case I could answer some questions!

Each keyboard (or box) has a three digit code. Please refer to keyboards by either the code ("099"), or XMIT plus the code ("XMIT099") outside of this thread.

My earlier attempt at classification - UUIDs - was not great since that only tracked keyboards to a database entry, not a physical location. As of this writing I don't have a great database for all these boards.

There are some real gems in here, including an FSSK, some M15s, and one very SAD board. Post if you find something you like!

Nothing is for sale at the moment (well except for XMIT035 which is already in the Classifieds) but that could change.

The little girl in the photos is my daughter.

Reserved.

Reserved.

Reserved.

Quite the collection there man, very impressive. I love that Skidata Tipro PoS board!

Ail wrote: Quite the collection there man, very impressive. I love that Skidata Tipro PoS board!

Ah yes, good old XMIT127. Thanks to touch_it for trading me that board (originally a Goodwill find!), and to kbdfr for sending me some delightful spare key caps for it!

I see your daughter is interested in the IBM XT. Fine tastes!

You should get with haata and create a keyboard museum. He has quite the collection, as I understand. Although this functions nicely as an ad hoc digital museum.

XMIT wrote:

Ail wrote: Quite the collection there man, very impressive. I love that Skidata Tipro PoS board!

Ah yes, good old XMIT127. Thanks to touch_it for trading me that board (originally a Goodwill find!), and to kbdfr for sending me some delightful spare key caps for it!

XMIT_0499.jpg

Looks good

vivalarevolución wrote: You should get with haata and create a keyboard museum. He has quite the collection, as I understand. Although this functions nicely as an ad hoc digital museum.

haata's connection is sort of online but not in the same way. What he has online is not complete.

The two challenges I needed to solve are:
1. I need to be able to quickly and easily find any keyboard.
2. What I have needs to be complete.

If I were serious about moving keyboards (like what elecplus does taken to a new level) this would be part of how we inventory, store, and list keyboards for sale. The system works great but it is resource intensive. Nothing is easier than just throwing keyboards in a pile!

I will ping haata though. I may have mentioned this cataloging project to him, I know he'll like it.

XMIT wrote:

Ail wrote: Quite the collection there man, very impressive. I love that Skidata Tipro PoS board!

Ah yes, good old XMIT127. Thanks to touch_it for trading me that board (originally a Goodwill find!), and to kbdfr for sending me some delightful spare key caps for it!

XMIT_0499.jpg

Yeah I've never seen one like it before, everyone goes gaga over the blue and orange Skidata, but I prefer this one by a long shot. I'll have to keep an eye out, but it seems like it is probably rare.

XMIT wrote:

Ail wrote: Quite the collection there man, very impressive. I love that Skidata Tipro PoS board!

Ah yes, good old XMIT127. Thanks to touch_it for trading me that board (originally a Goodwill find!), and to kbdfr for sending me some delightful spare key caps for it!

XMIT_0499.jpg

This is ridiculous. There's not even an XMIT key on that. What's the point?

:p

Awesome!

Some of those boards deserve a proper cleaning though, like that SGI Granite and Compaq 1800!

The most interesting thing to me was this Sharp, is that SKCL Cream? What model is it? Never seen it before and if so that would make it the second 100% SKCL Cream board ever found. The only other model that had 100% SKCL Cream was that Bondwell laptop.

No, I'd say that looks more like SKCL Yellow. The colour of SKCL Yellow is pretty desaturated, and I think the camera's colour balance just masks the colour a bit.

Awesome collection, and great job documenting everything! I've never seen that second NCR 3xxx board before, it's quite nifty. Does it have MX or 1st gen MY switches? Looks hard to tell from the photo ><. Very interesting keycaps on it too.

I try not to be a green-eyed monster but seeing a Cherry 1080HAU and 2550HAD under the same roof leaves me filled with envy!

My favorite non-Cherry board is probably that Type-5 with SA Space Cadet...looks amazing and fits in very well with the current banner on DT!

Do you manage to rotate all of these boards onto your desk, or do you just stick to a daily driver?

I'm not worthy!

That's a killer collection, to call it comprehensive and awe inspiring wouldn't do it justice

Norman_ wrote: I'm not worthy!

That's a killer collection, to call it comprehensive and awe inspiring wouldn't do it justice

So true.

This where all Keyboard Fanatics go when they die, their spirits all head straight to XMIT's place to enjoy this heavenly delight .

XMIT wrote:

vivalarevolución wrote: You should get with haata and create a keyboard museum. He has quite the collection, as I understand. Although this functions nicely as an ad hoc digital museum.

haata's connection is sort of online but not in the same way. What he has online is not complete.

The two challenges I needed to solve are:
1. I need to be able to quickly and easily find any keyboard.
2. What I have needs to be complete.

If I were serious about moving keyboards (like what elecplus does taken to a new level) this would be part of how we inventory, store, and list keyboards for sale. The system works great but it is resource intensive. Nothing is easier than just throwing keyboards in a pile!

I will ping haata though. I may have mentioned this cataloging project to him, I know he'll like it.

From my conversations with haata, I'm not sure if he knows everything that he has in his collection.

Chyros wrote: This is ridiculous. There's not even an XMIT key on that. What's the point?

I ask myself this all the time. I guess it's time to get some XMIT keys made.

Mattr567 wrote: Awesome!

Some of those boards deserve a proper cleaning though, like that SGI Granite and Compaq 1800!

The most interesting thing to me was this Sharp, is that SKCL Cream? What model is it? Never seen it before and if so that would make it the second 100% SKCL Cream board ever found. The only other model that had 100% SKCL Cream was that Bondwell laptop.

Yes, they all deserve a good cleaning. In due time, they will get one. The SGI Granite's key caps did get a good bath since I was thinking to use them for another project and didn't. It does need to be de-yellowed.

As for the Sharp board, that's XMIT048. I'll see about pulling it down this weekend. They are linears, IIRC.

Here's another random gem: XMIT178.
This is a Sun Integrix board with MX Blacks and is still a work in progress. As you see it the keys are not stabilized! I need to do a plate mod and install some Cherry stabilizers. This board was previously covered here:

photos-f62/sun-type-5-keyboard-t7700.html

It's a near perfect recipient for Round 6, though.

Aw crud, the Selectric isn't in here, that's XMIT234. I'll see about getting some photos of that one up soon.

XMIT wrote:

Mattr567 wrote: Awesome!

Some of those boards deserve a proper cleaning though, like that SGI Granite and Compaq 1800!

The most interesting thing to me was this Sharp, is that SKCL Cream? What model is it? Never seen it before and if so that would make it the second 100% SKCL Cream board ever found. The only other model that had 100% SKCL Cream was that Bondwell laptop.

Yes, they all deserve a good cleaning. In due time, they will get one. The SGI Granite's key caps did get a good bath since I was thinking to use them for another project and didn't. It does need to be de-yellowed.

As for the Sharp board, that's XMIT048. I'll see about pulling it down this weekend. They are linears, IIRC.

Yea you can tell from the LED cutout. They look like SKCL Creams to me. That would be a nice undocumented find.

I'm a bit of a Alps fanatic as you can tell

Great collection! You already have a few of my dream boards. Hopefully I can also get them someday.

XMIT was so excited when we found that Sun keyboard. Things went down like so (dramatized & paraphrased) . . .

"I've been looking for a Unix layout mechanical 'board with certain characteristics since I started collecting."
(I pull the Sun out of a box.)
"Like this one?"
"WTF ohaimark."
"I told you I'm lucky when finding random loot."

I think that Sharp is SKCL Creams. That's what I remember it having, anyways.

XMIT wrote: Here's another random gem: XMIT178.

XMIT_0899.jpg

This is a Sun Integrix board with MX Blacks and is still a work in progress. As you see it the keys are not stabilized! I need to do a plate mod and install some Cherry stabilizers. This board was previously covered here:

photos-f62/sun-type-5-keyboard-t7700.html

It's a near perfect recipient for Round 6, though.

Now that's what I'm talking about .

Nice work, XMIT, and impressive collection! Organizing all those photos must've been quite a daunting task! I though getting photos for my collection was demanding enough, and I've only got 10% of yours...

Anyway, I do wonder what this is


What have you used to make the function layer stickers on your (presumably) Apple Alps64 (#175, but present way earlier in the album, unless you've got two)? It's a neat idea!

Wth has happened to this one?


E: Images don't load from the links google provide when clicking get link... The first linked photo is the third photo of XMIT100 and the second is the side shot on XMIT221.

This is XMIT175 an alps64 with "Creamsicle" switches: Orange spring and tactile leaves in Cream damped switches. I'm going to overhaul this board soon to give it Orange lower housings and switch plates. I only have one of these! XMIT100 is a jumky Model M. There are a couple of issues with the Google album for organizing this many photos and this is one of them!

As for the side stickers, I made those using a P-Touch labeler with a USB connection. I found the Univers 57 font online, drew up the labels, printed them from the computer, and carefully cut and placed them.

A similar board is XMIT152. These caps were on that board originally but I got too frustrated by the bottom row so I made another!
As for XMIT221...
I believe it had chemical damage of some sort, it came from the recycler like this! It and XMIT220 were parts donors for boards like XMIT175.

As for my remark on XMIT100, I was just trying to be funny but I erroneously called it XMIT100 rather than XMIT098 which I guess is the correct identifier. It's a yellow/white out-of-focus shot...

Khers wrote: As for my remark on XMIT100, I was just trying to be funny but I erroneously called it XMIT100 rather than XMIT098 which I guess is the correct identifier. It's a yellow/white out-of-focus shot...

Gotcha.

I switched to a Fujifilm X70 for keyboard work recently. It's a neat little camera. It looks like a point and shoot but is really a 16MP APS-C DSLR camera with an 18mm f/2.8 lens (27mm equivalent focus on full frame or 35mm film). It's small, light, and distortion free, and seems to handle dynamic range out of the box way better than the Nikons. The lens is fixed (which means better optics and a smaller camera). It does have "35mm" and "50mm" digital zoom modes that I use fairly often.
The one issue is, that, by default in "Auto" mode, tapping the screen releases the shutter, which is what happened here. There are a couple more like this if you look for them.