I thought I had one mechanical keyboard in my inventory, left over from around the 1997 time frame; given to me by my boss. It used to belong to the server the company was running at the time.
This particular board was a Hi-Tek Corp model RT-101+. According to Deskthority, these mechanical keyswitches have sliders that resemble Space Invaders, and are referred to as such on geekhack.org. Another name for them is “Angry Bear.” Popping a key off, I can see:
Here is a close-up of the spring and metal contacts. Sorry about the hair. This board is filthy and full of 18 years of grime! The slider holds those contacts apart until the slider is removed or the key is depressed.
I can’t say I really like the feel of the board. It is not clicky; I’d basically call it tactile and stiff. I would not care to type for any length of time on the board; I think my fingers would fatigue quickly! These presumably have a terminal force of 85g, but I’m not sure if that is accurate (see here for a description of force curves).
It is interesting that the difference in tactile and linear switches was the design of the contact arm. From the image provided by Deskthority, you can see that difference here:
More interesting details about the Hi-Tek keyswitches from Deskthority (love that site!) are that these also came in a wide variety of colors/characteristics, and some were even found in Amiga 500’s and 2000’s. I’d love to come across some others to see how they feel.
I have never been very fond of the board, but will probably keep it for nostalgia’s sake, or give it to one of my friends if they like the feel of it (but they’re gonna have to clean it!).
