oh hey, it’s Ellipse! 
Funky layout, sir.
Looks pretty interesting, but I never actually used four-finger arrows cluster, so I have no idea would I be ever able to embrace it.
Hopefully, sometimes in the future you will be able to introduce something more akin to Leopold FC660C. This is pretty much perfect layout, and it would look even beter without those two island keys.
Pretty much what was I trying to say the whole time.
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I’m curious when/where they listed NOS boards in any quantity, let alone large quantities. I don’t ever remember there being NOS boards on the unicomp site.
What do you mean by that? Is there something recently that has not been in inventory? If they offered NOS boards at some point, and all the IBM people had left, is it not possible that the old IBM people or the person previously responsible for inventory didn’t do their job correctly?
I don’t know. I can easily see it being assets that were held somewhere else that took a long time to track down and get returned in the case of the various language boards.
That also depends on their warehouse and the sales agreement with IBM/lexmark also. I can believe that there was something in the sale document that any items found in IBM or Lexmark warehouses that were not discovered at the time of sale go to Unicomp.
I think I just don’t find fault or malice behind putting up NOS intermittently. And I don’t think it’s poor inventory management. I think 15 years is a lot of time for a lot of things to get lost, and any warehouse can easily do that. But we also have no idea where the NOS stuff came from. It could have been an overseas asset, or another purchase made from a US warehouse, etc.
I think it’s unfair to say that because they put NOS products up they are bad and have bad inventory practices unless you have more inside information than the rest of us.
It feels to me that they’re a small company that they’re a small company that’s keeping afloat and doesn’t want to take on too much more stuff.
I wouldn’t say they’re blowing it at all. They’ve not tried to expand for sure, but they’ve never had a large presence in the community either. Perhaps if they were active in the community and talked to people and worked with them and continued to not expand or not try to expand, then I might agree with you more, but I have never seen them active in the community.
I have never been to the Unicomp HQ. If it is indeed as large as you say, perhaps they are sharing the space or selling something else or to a large unknown client? If there’s math that doesn’t add up, perhaps there’s another variable that hasn’t been considered.
I haven’t gotten my hands on one of their keyboards to be able to make comments about build quality, but if they work, they work. (Also, are there legit cigarette burns in them, or was that more for effect?)
I currently own 8 IBM-manufactured Model M keyboards (four SSKs and four 101-key full-size monsters).
I have owned two Unicomp 101-key models in the past. Both of them had thinner keycaps and shittier springs than my genuine-IBM boards - I had to replace springs on each within a year of purchase.
I know, personal anecdotes don’t mean much, but I have yet to have a single spring fail in any of my O.G. IBMs.
I have heard that the quality is less than the original IBM stuff, but I just haven’t had one in my hands to look at.
fair enough. And yeah, if they’re original, they’re bound to have imperfections by now.