The Greatest Keyboard of All Time.. Reborn
Linus Tech Tips
·Linus Tech Tips
·2018-05-06
·
1,554 words · ~7 min read
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if you've been a viewer for long enough you may remember that one time that i
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had a little moment reminiscing about my old model m keyboard so far out of all
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the keyboards i've used in my life this is the best
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most solid overall feeling one other than i did have an ibm model m and uh
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nothing can compare and i'm not alone not only did someone else care enough to
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re-upload that clip as its very own video but there is a healthy second-hand
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market for these things and you can even buy near identical
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brand new recreations today
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but in the age of bluetooth RGB and
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macros should you care
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let's find out speaking of random a semicolon lsd
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description
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now udarn kids today might think that the model m looks like a basic old
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school keyboard but that is exactly why
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it's special the layout that nearly every keyboard
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uses today is standard because of this keyboard
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from over 30 years ago now to be clear the qwerty layout has
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been around since the 1800s but by the
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time ibm was releasing personal computers in the 1980s keyboards needed
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a lot more keys than just letters and
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numbers and prior to the model m these keys
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could be found in all sorts of stupid and seemingly arbitrary places the
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reason that this board is different is that ibm put a lot of effort even
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developing a 10 person task force into
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developing a friendlier keyboard letting focus groups rearrange enlarge or even
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duplicate commonly used keys
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the result was this board that looks totally normal except it's missing
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Windows keys and a couple of other things you see
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this isn't actually a model m per se
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this is the zeroth generation ibm
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enhanced keyboard that launched in 1985
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as part of the ibm 3161 terminal that's
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why it doesn't have any lights for caps num or scroll lock those settings would
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be displayed on the terminal screen instead you'll also notice that it has a 5 pin
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din connector instead of a ps2 connector
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like other model m's this is significant because the model m
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launched with ibm's personal system 2 or
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ps2 computer with the ibm ps2 that is
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where the connector gets its name this
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is a second generation model m the most popular it was manufactured back in 1987
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just one year after i was born and we know this because every model m has a
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little birth certificate on its back
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but why do people still like these things so much after all these years
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well it comes down to feel sound
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and build quality model m's use switches that are very
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different to the cherry mx's that keyboard enthusiasts today might be used
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to in the patent these switches are
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actually called catastrophically buckling compression column switch and
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actuator but most normal people just call them
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buckling spring switches and that's because under each keycap there really
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is a little tiny spring
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so in the starting position the spring puts pressure on a rocker
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preventing it from closing the circuit but when you press the key down
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the spring eventually buckles tilting the rocker to contact a layer of
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membrane and registering your stroke at the precise instant that you feel the
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tactile feedback wait hold up
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did that say membrane yes
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model m's are often erroneously called
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mechanical keyboards but they are in fact membrane boards which is why they
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only have two key rollover just remember that this does not mean
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that they use rubber domes that is
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different or well okay actually some model m's do
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use rubber domes but more on that later
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anyway the result is a very balanced
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feel with a nice tactile bump and a 70
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gram weighting for pure typists there's
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very little on the market even all these decades later that feels this good
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but while the buckling spring switches create auditory feedback that some
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people find very satisfying at least the
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ones doing the typing anyway they also take a long time to register
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repeated strokes making them unsuitable for competitive gaming though you could
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always just bludgeon your opponents over the head
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when you lose because the model m's are heavy boards
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the plastic shell and the key caps are made from hard pvc and pbt plastics that
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aren't painted and don't yellow with age and inside there's a heat treated metal
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back plate that's responsible for the m's negligible deck flex and it's five
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pound heft at least they were five pounds
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thing is not all model m's are created equal in
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1990 ibm sold part of its keyboard
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manufacturing division to what would become lexmark
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lexmark continued to make these keyboards for ibm but
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more cheaper this model m from 1995 demonstrates some
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of the changes including one good one drainage holes to protect it from its
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arch nemesis water along with several
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less good ones like a lighter back plate and plastic shell a fixed instead of
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removable cable a monochrome legend on the keycaps and
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rubber dome switches to be clear they're good rubber domes
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but still anyway the keyboard gods work in mysterious
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ways and the growing popularity of rubber domes led to the collapse of the
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mechanical keyboard business with lexmark dropping their keyboard division
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outright in 1996 and here is where our story gets
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interesting a group of former ibm and lexmark
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employees began slowly purchasing the
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model m's intellectual property rights except for the logo
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and the physical manufacturing equipment that was used to make it
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the company they formed is called unicomp and that's where this came from
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it's a unicomp classic and it was manufactured on january 15
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2018 because of this heritage unicomp model
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m's aren't really clones but they're more like
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descendants so how do they compare to the original
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well if you didn't spend the 80s and 90s typing on model m's when they were new
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it's kind of hard to judge the feel of a brand new unicom classic against an ibm
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board whose spring switches are 30 years older
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but even if you ask the people who have been using model m's for decades you
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will still get some who claim that the unicomps feel identical and others
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who claim that they feel very different and from a certain point of view they're
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both right the unicomp boards are modeled after the
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last model that lexmark made so while they have the exact same
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switches as the early boards they are lighter weight and interestingly they
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can have imperfections on the case and less sharp lettering due to the aging
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mold and tooling equipment so
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our final take the unicom boards are as close as you
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can get to brand new anyway to the original model m
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while also offering new color interface and key options all for less money than
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most keyboards of a similar quality so as a well-priced typing board i can
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see the appeal but my money would go to either a more
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versatile cherry mx or an older
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generation model m off ebay even though i know that i'd be paying a
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pretty penny and i would probably need an adapter
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tech tips and enter Linus tech tips in the how did you hear about us section
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don't i seem super credible sitting here in this like jacket like this what do
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you think no all right well thanks for watching
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guys and a massive shout out to LTT forum user ultimate mythbuster for
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loaning us his three precious model m's for this video if this video sucked you
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guys know what to do but if it was awesome get subscribed hit that like button or check out the link to where to
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buy the stuff we featured in the video description also link down there is our
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merch store which has cool shirts like the one i'm oh i actually am still
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wearing it hold on
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like this one and our community forum which you should totally join how about
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now do i look credible now yeah yeah how about how about how about now
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yeah oh sorry not suitable for twitch