The New Unicomp IBM Model M

I've had my IBM Model M for over 10 years (even though it predates me) and it's been a staple in my computing. Nothing has been more of a staple and a constant in my life than that keyboard.

Unfortunately the left shift key pivot key became loose, and thus the left shift became unreliable. After looking at finding replacement parts, the one place that sells the part...also sells brand new Model M's. Killing two birds with one stone and I just ordered the Unicomp IBM Model M

Coming from the 139041 model, I gained a Window key (Tux key as you can see) and opted for the larger spacebar.

New IBM Model M

Does it feel the same? Pretty much, I find the keys to be a bit more stiff but perhaps they need a breaking in period. USB is a great upgrade, but I've been functioning just fine with a PS/2 converter (blue dongle in the picture). I find it is slightly lighter in weight than the IBM Model M, I believe some parts were replaced with plastic versus metal, making this less lethal if war were to suddenly break out and you chose your keyboard as your first line of defence.
I will say that the buckling spring keyboards are not for everyone. This one is large and extremely loud. I have to mute myself on conference calls if I want to type without pissing everyone off on the call. Does it make me feel superior? Hell yeah it does.

Looking over my blog posts from ten years back, I posted about a IBM Model F I owned. Tragically, I lost it when moving and it hasn't seen since. At the time I purchased it for $48 USD in 2013 (back when USD and CAD were near parity). The same keyboard has now doubled in price, nevermind the shipping price. I'm kicking myself in the pants for losing that treasured piece of keyboard history.

New hardware

 

So, I recently came into posession of an IBM Model M (1391401) and wow. This beats the hell out of my Logitech G15. A long with the keyboard, I thought I'd buy myself a new mouse while I was at it. Well, I ended up buying a Kensington Orbit with scroll ring.

 

The keyboard is amazing to type on. Though some may find it a bit loud, it's a pay off for the sheer coolness of it. I'm still getting used to my trackball and, as you can see, it has an extra wrist-rest attached to it.

I finally got the PowerEdge 6400 going. Turns out it was the RAM. It needs to have one entire bank to be filled, rather than two DIMMS. Debian Squeeze and even CentOS 5 didn't detect the RAID card so it couldn't see the disks at all. For the hell of it, I popped in Windows Server 2003 (as it only has a CD drive and no PXE) and what do you know: it sees the card. I installed Server 2003 and got VMware Server running on it. Although this setup is not lightweight, it does the job.

 

 

"I hear ya', but can ya' C?"

I figured I should go all out, so I bought another GB of RAM, the Razer Diamondback mouse (http://www.razerzone.com/p-62-razer-diamondback-3g-gaming-mouse.aspx) and a headset (http://www.logitech.com/index.cfm/webcam_communications/internet_headsets_phones/devices/2980&cl=us,en) and with the G15 (http://www.logitech.com/index.cfm/keyboards/keyboard/devices/3498&cl=us,en) this is becoming quite the awesome setup. All I need now is a kickass computer. With all this gaming gear, I feel like the geeky coding side of me has left me. Its quite sad. Well, back to playing AoM or B&W2, or maybe even later; some PHP or C!

Gehoorbeschermers!

EDIT: Read bottom Back home now, loving the G15. For once, I think I'm actually going to work on something, but lately I felt like making either, a)CMS/social networking/forum or b)a theme for Drupal. In the end, I'll probably end up making a CMS and a theme for Drupal in GIMP. On that note about the CMS; I already have a login/register forum, I also have JAB (blogging script, which I am in the process of re-writing) and numerous other scripts I could add to make one flexible, simple, easy CMS. Comments are appreciated. P.S: I feel like learning C, so I think I'm gonna start on up on that. EDIT: Wait, nevermind. It's 2:30am and I just can't code nevermind stay awake. I'm going to start on the CMS tomorrow (Sunday)....till then -Easton

Flying Monkeys!

Went down to Futureshop today and bought the Logitech G15 2nd Ed keyboard. I'm using my Asus EEE so I can't exactly use the software. Other than that, I love it. I haven't been able to work on anything at all, since I'm not at home right now, and I just don't feel up to it. Once I get home Saturday night I'll be back to my geek lair, coding away on my G15