Filesixty Keyboard

[Moggy]

Is it the keys that are made of hard plastic, or the entire framework of the stick-on keyboard?

Frame,keys sprung "nubbings" all hard plastic.

[David G]

Here is the underside of one of the soft rubber type keyboards ...

Ah, now i get it. Totally different from the white-key version. This version is like the keypad membrane on a modern TV remote

[avrovulcan]

I remember this.

I had one fitted just before I got my Memotech Keyboard.

If I can ever find the original case for my ZX81, (for some unknown reason I took the case off ???) it should still be attached.

[TMAOne]

I have this one in my collection:

My opinion? It is a definite positive improvement over the flat membrane, but of course no where near as nice as a full keyboard. My unit is attached with 2-sided tape which I feel may be a tad on the thick side, requiring a too-hard keypress to make positive connections, but I've been too lazy to re-do it.

I treat like gold my full keyboard, bought back in the 80's.

There is just no comparison with that one.

I know folks who have had good success with keyboards transplanted from scrapped Texas Instruments TI99/4A's. I had one raw piece but I gave it away to a friend to intends to Zeddy it.

[mrtinb]

I treat like gold my full keyboard, bought back in the 80's.

I see you have a ROM selector. So that changes between ROMs in 0-8k address.

However Z80 Assembler runs on address 8-16k. How is this achieved?

[TMAOne]

How is this achieved?

It is not.

The ROM switcher was an experiment which has not worked out for other reasons. When I was preparing to burn the actual ROM chip, I simply gathered together 8 images, (unfamiliar with almost all of them), to try out. The key guide stuck on the corner is moot I'm afraid.

The larger reference is for RAM swapping. I load up TK (toolkit), ZXAS, and Arctic's ZXBug into the 2nd 16K of RAM provided by the ZX-Team mod, and reserve enough space above RAMTOP for the largest of the three. Then I swap in whichever product I want at the time.

That part works. I wrote most of it in the 80's, following the development of a BASIC (& some machine code I had help with) "lock picker" I'd developed because I was tired of having no backup tape for TK. (In truth, I did, because my Scrubber-Dubber let me make direct copies, but hey, there was principle involved! ) I recall having a lot of fun developing the tool, but not actually using it much. By the time it was complete there were other development platforms besides the actual Zeddy, and my continued interest in Assembler(s) has never blossomed into actually learning to use it.

[Orac]

Anyone have any experience of sticking one of these down?

What’s a good modern adhesive strip that fits and sticks well?

What have you actually used on your ZX81?

[TMAOne]

I used two strips of double-sided adhesive foam, but I don't remember where I got the stuff. A caution however: the foam I used was perhaps a tiny bit too thick, requiring the maximum key travel the board can manage, and a very firm press to register properly. I've never revised it, but if I had to do it over again I'd look for the thinnest foam I could find, or perhaps even try "tape". Good luck.

[Lardo Boffin]

Just got one of these:

[Moggy]

The stiff "finger hurty" version before they brought out the much better neoprene improvement, I had three of those and binned all three.
Thank god for Fuller and Karl's "clicky" jobbies.