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Cherry's New Keyboard Switches Emulate IBM Model M Feel
crookedvulture writes "Slashdot has already covered the four main flavors of Cherry MX mechanical key switches: red, black, blue, and brown. Now, there's a green MX variant that emulates the feel of the buckling spring switches in old-school IBM Model M keyboards. The green switches combine tactile feedback, an audible click, and a stiff spring that requires 80g of actuation force. They're a stiffer version of the MX blues that more closely matches the characteristics of IBM's buckling spring design. Previously reserved for use with space bars, the green switches have now taken over an entire Cooler Master keyboard. And, unlike the old Model M and contemporary copycats, the new CM Storm Trigger has modern conveniences like an integrated USB hub, LED backlighting, and programmable macros." I've had my hopes raised and then dashed by some other keyboards whose makers promised Model M feel, so I'll believe it when I feel and hear it.
I would dearly love buckling spring keys but still the "bend" of my MS "natural" that I have gotten so used to. I can still type faster on a model M - I have several, but the ergo keyboards are so much better for my beat up wrists.
As opposed to actual Model Ms which are still made. With the same switch design. By many of the same workers. On the same machines.
http://www.unicomp.com/
Why bother "emulating" the buckling spring feel when you can get a brand new keyboard with real buckling springs. Oh, and it's made in the USA too!
(Also, they have keyboard layouts that offer the Ctrl key in the correct location. 'cause it's about damn time...)
The real litigious bastards...
1000 fake modpoints to you sir. You win an internet.
Or just buy a used model M. All the ones ever made likely still work. Some of them might be in the dump but even those likely still work.
Typed on a keyboard born on 1990-07-17.
Yes, because they are the best ever made.
Things that are good people still want. I also have a cast iron pan in my kitchen, am I emulating the second century BC or just using a good tool?
You shut your whore mouth. Buy one made by IBM and show some self respect.
Worst. Site. Ever.
I can't even see what the thing looks like from those thumbnails, and nowhere is there an explanation as to what "Classic 104" is vs "Ultra 104" and the like.
Thanks, I'll stick with my Das Keyboard.
For large sets, this will be our guide even unto death, for the LORD will work for each type of data it is applied to...
.......This was the best keyboard they ever made... http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:IBM-3279.jpg One of the first products I ever worked on, over 30 years ago.
Why purchase an imitator when you can buy the original âoeModel Mâ. We have produced the buckling spring âoeClickâ keyboard for IBM and thousands of discriminating users worldwide for 15 yearsâ¦. Join the many that have made the switch to a much more accurate data entry alternative.
http://www.pckeyboard.com/
IBM originally contracted out their keyboards to Lexmark and, when the contract ran out, Lexmark employees bought the rights and formed Unicomp.
[Fuck Beta]
o0t!
It's been used in spacebars on Cherry Mx Blue keyboards for a while, just not an entire keyboard.
This is a Cherry Mx Blue switch with a stiffer spring, nothing more. Enthusiasts have been making keyboards like this for a while now (which is where Cooler Master got the idea), and it most definitely does not replicate a model M feel or sound.
If you want a Model M, buy a Model M or a Unicomp.
I also have a cast iron pan in my kitchen, am I emulating the second century BC or just using a good tool?
No, you're not, unless you're Chinese. Only the Chinese had cast iron in the second century BCE.
Ezekiel 23:20
So true, 8" cast iron skillet belonged to my grandmother, it really shows no signs of wear that a good wire brushing of the outside surface won't fix. Probably good for a couple hundred years of use, easily. No stickier than your average 'no-stick' thing that even if you pay $100 bucks for it will last 2 years tops.
Older ain't better, but it ain't worse either.
"Malo periculosam, libertatem quam quietam servitutem." -- Jefferson
Marketing on Slashdot again, huh... *sigh*
The Cherry MX Green does not feel like a buckling spring from the Model F or Model M keyboards, really.
While it is a stiff clicky switch, it is far less tactile, and the tactile point is different.
The Buckling Spring on a IBM Model M or Model F has a slow progression in resistance followed by a sharp drop at the actuation point at around 2/3 - 3/4 way down the stroke.
The Cherry MX Blue and Green have a small bump at the actuation point, which is higher up, at about 1/2-way down the stroke.
As other posters have already written, the MX Green is just like a MX Blue with a stiffer spring. It was made to be used for the Space Bar on a keyboard that is otherwise populated with MX Blue.
Compared to the Blue, with the Green's stiffer spring you tend to press harder on it and that diminishes the feel of the tactile bump somewhat.
The Green has always been used as the space bar switch on Cherry's own keyboards with Blue switches. The only new thing is that it is used on a whole keyboard.
Having a stiffer switch on the space bar is common. Ordinary rubber dome keyboards often come with coiled springs under the space bar to make it stiffer.
If you want a Buckling Spring keyboard, you could buy a new Model M from Unicomp. They are built using the same machines and tooling that the old IBM keyboards were. They even cost less than many gaming keyboards with Cherry MX switches.
BTW. This post was typed on a Dolch keyboard (Cherry G80-1813HFX) with Cherry MX Blue switches, except for the Green switch on the space bar.
"We mustn't be caught by surprise by our own advancing technology" -- Aldous Huxley
Its a keyboard you can beat a man to death with, and still be perfectly usable as a keyboard.
"I have a hell of a time finding Model M keyboards. "
Goodwill is where I've found all of mine.
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
Thrift stores are the cheapest bet (think out-of-the-way Mom and Pop Christian Ministry type thrift stores, not Goodwill).
Stopped by one recently and asked if they had any old keyboards in the back. The employee pointed me outside to a shed behind the building. There was literally a pile of old IBM Model Ms laying behind the place, had been hit by rain several times. Took a garbage sack of them home, let them dry out and everything was fine (there was even an old IBM model 5150, but my wife wasn't about to let me add that to the PC graveyard in the office).
The annoying bit is that so many of them are AT instead of PS/2 (good luck even finding PS/2 ports on modern hardware, now it is just 4 USB ports in the back).
Nothing beats the original... I said, 'NOTHING BEATS THE ORIGINAL!' (needed to shout over the keyclick noise...) ;-)
One bit of warning about the Unicomp keyboards (I run two), I would suspect the same for USB adapters... is they take a bit of power, so if your USB port isn't offering enough juice (500ma), you may want to pickup a USB adapter that has an additional power source (I've had to do this for use with my KVM at home). I have to say I love the things... I went through almost a decade of a new keyboard every 6-8 months, until I got a Unicomp 104-key... swear by them.
Michael J. Ryan - tracker1.info
. . . i hate those clicky keyboards and wind up busting them over my knee and trashing them.
Do not, repeat, not, under any circumstances attempt the same thing with a Model M. If you do, you'll know why.
I am not a crackpot.
Good news! The Unicomp Keyboard uses the type-m switches. They bought the mfg rights to the type-m keyboard and they're proudly made right here in the United States of America! I am typing on my Unicomp Type-M keyboard right now and I love it.
http://www.pckeyboard.com/
**Highly recommended for the type-m keyboard fan**
Low force may be good for ergonomics -- basically coddling a damaged wrist -- but it's terrible for healthy people actually trying to type well. Modern squishy keyboards create terrible typists. The worst are laptop keyboards (for instance, first thing I do with my macbook pro when I set it up for use is plug a Matias tactile pro 3 into it.) Apple makes the absolute worst keyboards out there, nightmares from the chiclet age.
If you write for a living, as I do, you need a decent keyboard, and by that, I do not mean an "ergonomic" one. If your wrists are that bad, I'm sorry for you, but you'll never be a really effective typist. With squish comes missed keys, double presses, constant backing up for errors and overall low typing speeds. If one is a "hunt and pecker", who mostly lives by the mouse (as many are) that's fine, but if you write all day, every day... it's just not.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
You're buying a model M and you're worried about dimensions?
Maybe you're not in the target demographic. Just sayin'.
No sig today...
As Wikipedia likes to say [citation needed]. I can full well understand wanting a good keyboard, but I'd need some actual evidence that high activation force means good. Cherry switches can do a nice mechanical action with a positive bump AND low activation force.
Also you may want to be a little careful. Perhaps your body is structured such that no form of RSI will ever affect you, but probably not. Most people have a threshold where repetitive motion in an unergonomic form will cause a problem at some point. If you spend all your time typing and do so on a straight, high force, clickey keyboard, well you may discover that you no longer have that option later in life. You'll get some pain and numbness, then it'll get worse, then you'll start to lose range of motion and so on and it'll get worse, and worse until you either deal with it, or you are disabled.
Ergonomics aren't about "coddling", as though if you just toughened up and dealt wit it things would get better, they are about preventing problems. You ignore proper ergonomics at your own risk.
I'd suggest you pick up Dr. Emil Pascarelli's book "Repetitive Strain Injury" and educate yourself on it if you do indeed type "all day, every day" as you say. It is good information, and has several pages of references to journal articles on the subject.
My concern with good keyboards, desks, chairs, etc is not if I can be an "effective" typist by whatever artificial standard you've set in your head. It is if I can continue to use computers regularly for my whole career without becoming disabled. I already have had the problems of basic RSI so it is something I'm quite aware of. You should get yourself aware of it, given that your use sounds pretty intense, and deal with it BEFORE it is a problem.
Or, you can try and be a tough guy, and then end up at 40 or 50 crying because you can't work, have difficulty lifting a cup to your mouth, etc (it really can get that bad) because you thought you knew the One True Way(tm) to be a typist.