Keyboard key labels

From: Sark <ian_primus_at_yahoo.com>
Date: Sun Nov 24 17:25:01 2002

On Saturday, November 23, 2002, at 10:38 PM, Loboyko Steve wrote:

> Just making a guess here, but I'll bet the pad
> printing is less likely to wear off if it's off to one
> corner. Modern keyboards ARE junky. I'll bet you can't
> find any modern example of a double-shot molded keytop
> keyboard.
>

Actually, I've been planning on building my own. I am currently
tracking down old, broken keyboards from terminals, etc. to get keytops
and switches from, and I am going to canniballize a cheap PC USB
keyboard for it's encoder chip and associated circuitry. Basically, I'm
going to build a new key matrix from real switches, to replace that
membrane and rubber disc thing modern keyboards use. I've done stuff
like this before, rewiring a very old PC keyboard to replace a broken
TRS-80 Color Computer 3 keyboard. With any luck, I'll have something
that won't wear out nearly as fast as others, and be comfortable to
type on as well. The only thing I might run into is contact bounce. I
don't know if there is anything in a USB keyboard to deal with this, as
I don't think membrane keyboards have quite the problem with contact
bounce as mechanical switches do. Any ideas?

Ian Primus
ian_primus_at_yahoo.com
Received on Sun Nov 24 2002 - 17:25:01 GMT