Customizing my Compaq MX-11800 keyboard | Hacker News Reader

Customizing my Compaq MX-11800 keyboard

blog.webb.page

32 pointsNetOpWibby14 comments

Nice strategically-placed pussy.

The keyboard layout is terrible on account of its misplaced trackball. There's a special hell reserved for people who design keyboards with trackballs below the numpad; that shit needs to be situated either in the middle of the typewriter keys, or directly below the space key(s), in line with the golden ratio and with some space to rest one's wrists.

It also can't compete against something like https://i.sstatic.net/QMf052nZ.jpg which is...err was Siemens 'tri-modal'/triple mode for BS2000, SINIX and 'normal' PC-modes.

I almost forgot how shitty the Siemens keyboards were.

Hrrm. Depends on what you mean by shitty? The looks? The typing feel and sound?

I actually quite liked some of them, having used them for years.

Another thing is that they were made according to ergonomic guidelines, which were mandatory to fulfill for many of their customers(Government, (former) government Telcos, and the likes).

So even if they were rubberdomed, they weren't absolute trash.

They could also be had in slightly different sizes, if you knew how to navigate the insanely bizarre ordering options, or knew about them in the first place, and had access. (Vee don't do fkn enduserz! Vee deal wiff big biz only! Go avay!)

That wasn't so 'ergonomic' at all ;->

This still applies to more or less enshittyfied contemporary stuff, made by Cherry, Logitech, Dell, Fujitsu, Lenovo, whomever.

Don't be so snobbish, Gamerlamer!

That looks atrocious

It's a rack KVM keyboard and constrained thereby. The remainder was a heavy-duty shelf-drawer and a 14" CRT monitor. I decom'd a few of these in a very, very legacy facility a few years ago. They're decent keyboards.

Funny thing is, my cat was actually out of shot but he pulled himself closer to me (while laying on his side) so I just kept him in, haha!

Desoldering those original switches could've been a big mistake if they were in good condition! Those are very likely old cherry MX brown-stem switches, known as "vintage browns" (or "vint browns"). Not only are they excellent light tactiles, they are relatively rare. You can swap in a new set of springs for greater consistency between keys, and lubricate the slider part of the stem with an overengineered oil such as Krytox GPL 104 or VPF 1514.

Plus this board is a plateless design. The classic Cherry "dry" click-clack sound works perfectly with it, and the plastic case and switches mounted directly on PCB contribute a bouncy feel that prevent prevents the tactile switches from feeling too jarring, which I think is a common flaw when combining tactile switches and a very rigid plate+PCB arrangement in a metal custom.

Milky-top Gateron is almost never a bad choice, but unless you absolutely hate tactile switches then you really should just keep the originals.

My MX-11800 was one of the first keyboards I ever customized, and it's still one of my favorites in my collection.

That said I agree with the other comments about the layout, it's really not comfortable to use the trackball, nor the keys above it in the upper-right corner.

I really like this website design. That's all I came here to say :) Well, and keyboard mods are always fun to read about (I too know the struggle of a PS2 keyboard, hah) but I really just dig the text-first layout.

Homepage is cool too.

Cool project, cool blog post, cool web page.

Cool kitty.

> I really like this website design

Reading it on my phone, I beg to differ.

The mobile design is compromised as hell, it looked worse before.

I could probably figure out a way to make mobile work with some time but I don't care enough for my blog. It's just Markdown docs and some styling.

Thank you!

Reply on news.ycombinator.com