Miss the internet from the 80s? Want to (re-)experience BBS scene vibes but still participate in today’s conversations? Then Neon Modem Overdrive is for you!
Probably not authentic as getting a secondary monitor that’s an old-school CRT and an an HDMI/DP/USB-C-to-VGA plug and sticking it right into an authentic CRT, but I’m on a laptop in a restaurant and can’t screenshot that anyway.
In 1996, Lexmark International was prepared to shut down their Lexington keyboard factory where they produced Model M buckling-spring keyboards. IBM, their principal customer and the Model M’s original designer and patent holder, had decided to remove the Model M from its product line in favor of cost-saving rubber-dome keyboards.
Rather than seeing its production come to an end, a group of former Lexmark and IBM employees purchased the license, tooling and design rights for buckling-spring technology, and, in April 1996, reestablished the business as Unicomp.
I have one of their Endura Pros at home, which is an old-school IBM buckling-spring keyboard. That has the IBM Trackpoint nipple mouse. The buckling spring keyswitches will last forever, as far as I can tell, but I wore out the mouse button keyswitches. They might have fixed that over the years, but I would probably just one without the Trackpoint if I got another.
If you have one of those and are typing away (“click ping! click ping! click ping!”), looking at a CRT, that’s probably about as close as you get to the BBS era.
Probably not authentic as getting a secondary monitor that’s an old-school CRT and an an HDMI/DP/USB-C-to-VGA plug and sticking it right into an authentic CRT, but I’m on a laptop in a restaurant and can’t screenshot that anyway.
You can still get the keyboard, too:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unicomp
https://www.pckeyboard.com/
I have one of their Endura Pros at home, which is an old-school IBM buckling-spring keyboard. That has the IBM Trackpoint nipple mouse. The buckling spring keyswitches will last forever, as far as I can tell, but I wore out the mouse button keyswitches. They might have fixed that over the years, but I would probably just one without the Trackpoint if I got another.
If you have one of those and are typing away (“click ping! click ping! click ping!”), looking at a CRT, that’s probably about as close as you get to the BBS era.
Probably a way to rig up simulated 9600 baud too.