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 Contrary to
popular notion, there isn't a lot of nostalgia involved in the computing
world.
Sure, it's fun to get misty-eyed thinking about my old Apple II and all
the adventures we had together hacking into computers all across the
nation. The monochrome screen, the 110/300 baud modem, the single 5¼
inch floppy drives, BBSs, Wizardry...
But after that, my
computer memories fade into a blur of crappy 386 PCs running Windows 3.0,
"easy", "multimedia" 486 pieces of junk, P133s that skipped
while playing back mp3s, Windows
95, IRQ conflicts, 28.8 modems, "quality" HP and Creative Labs drivers,
Internet Explorer 2.0 and many, many other nightmares I'd just as soon
forget. And I'm hardly alone. Lots of folks fall in love with
their first computers, but find that the nostalgia factor quickly erodes by your 5th
or 6th PC - just like it does with cars, I suppose. But as much as we'd like
to forget most of those days, there were some awesome things back
then as well. Reliable floppy drives and disks, all metal "built
like a damn tank" cases, and
- most importantly - the IBM Model M keyboard. The Model M - made
from the mid-eighties to the early 1990s - has a huge cult
following. I can name at least two people from the Ars Technica
forum that own 20 or more of these keyboards, hedging their bets
about having a lifetime supply. There are websites
here,
here
and here dedicated to this awesome
piece of technology. There's even a company out there -
pckeyboard.com
- that still makes them with updates like Windows keys and new colors
like black. What's all the buzz about? |
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This is an IBM Model M keyboard. You might
remember them from a job or your college's computer lab. There are
approximately 9.8 trillion of these keyboards still in existence on the
planet today, even though IBM hasn't made them for years. And at
110 lbs. each, those 10 trillion keyboards are all that's keeping the
planet from flying out of orbit and smacking into Mars. But yet,
that's why us geeks love them. They're indestructible. They
weigh a ton. They "just work". They remind us of a time when
even a keyboard was an important part of your computer - not a $6 piece
of plastic crap you could pick up at Target. When an IBM salesman
would personally deliver said keyboard and install it for you if you
needed to order a replacement.
 The IBM Model M is also called a "buckling
spring" keyboard because the keys have a spring underneath them that snaps
back after you release the key (see pics of springs on left). This
is why these keyboards make their characteristic "click" when you type
and is also why they're sometimes called "clicky keyboards".
Keyboards today simply have rubber membranes inside with sensors.
The keys don't snap back and feel kind of... mushy. New keyboards
feel cheap. I know that if someone ever broke into my place,
I could beat them to death with my Model M and go back to writing dumb
articles for this website without missing a beat. It might be
bloody, though. But unlike most modern keyboards, I could get that
blood off easily by putting my Model M in the dishwasher and letting it
air out for a day or two. Try THAT with a $6 keyboard from Target!
Perhaps it's just the joy of using something that was designed well and
built well. There's a reason that colleges and companies all over
America bought these keyboards by the truckload - they work. And
work. And work. They're bulletproof - literally! I
guess I'll never fully be able to explain my passion for this keyboard.
It's "Made in America" computing Nirvana. It's the quality of
things like the Model M that made Big Blue big.
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