Help Identifying Keyboard

[beachycove]

This is not a new conquest, but one that I dug out of the pile while looking for an Apple Extended Keyboard. I have three or four of the AEKII, but here I believe I may have here the bones of an Apple Extended Keyboard (first version, SE vintage). 

It is, however Shreve branded and has a different top bezel than the AEK. Looking at the thing, however, it seems clearly to  have the early clicky switches, which I much prefer to those of the AEKII (I have a couple of the smaller keyboards with the earlier switches, and they are wonderful).

Does anyone know the background? Did Shreve Systems market these, by any chance?

Pics below:

1. set above an AEKII for comparison; as can be seen, it has the AEK markings in the arrow keys area



2. bottom label



3. rear

 

[Carboy7]

Oho! Weird, that keyboard looks almost identical from first glance!

 

[beachycove]

Actually, I just spotted that the Return, Backslash and Delete keys are different than on the AEK.

 

[Trash80toHP_Mini]

Shreve Systems was a great place for all things Mac waaay back in the day. They had a wild, wild west kinda clearance getting rid of everything around 2003 or so. Got a lot of great stuff, didn't know they produced or resold their own branded KBD.

 

[jhorvath911]

Shreve was still a great place to grab 20$ blue and whites in the 2006-2009 kind of time period. Last I looked at their site they didn't have much of anything though.

 

[Trash80toHP_Mini]

I got a 128K board from them for something like $50 and soldered a 68000 socket to its legs cuz I didn't wanna bork my 512K board building a CatMac/Hackintosh. The real hardware deal back around 1989, not mere firmware trickery that goes by that name today.

When they had their clearance I got stuff like PAS16 cards for LC, several PowerCache Adapters and a whole lot of stuff I don't remember. Glad to hear they're still around.

edit: just visited, what a blast from the past!

 

[Compgeke]

Microwarehouse Power User 105. I have one myself.

http://imgur.com/a/lmFDf

 

[beachycove]

That is helpful. So Shreve stuck a sticker of its own on the thing.

Any idea whether the white ALPS switches are a match for the orange and salmon used in the AEK?

 

[Trash80toHP_Mini]

MicroWarehouse was(is?) just a mail order reseller, whereas Shreve is a clearinghouse for overstock, discontinued and used "stuff." Quite different dstribution channels, reflected in the production values of their tags. I think it's safe to say that neither company necessarily had an exclusive on distribution. Neither manufactured anything of which I'm aware.

Shreve re-sold enough Macs taken back on lease that they may have bought these KBDs from a wholesaler or more likely bought direct. They could have bundled them with systems on a large scale or just got a deal on enough unsold, unbadged stock to have printed up those low-rent stickers.

Check the PCB on each to see if you can identify the OEM. The first part of the Shreve model number might be a clue.

Are the FCC ID numbers identical?

I wonder how many other companies might have branded that OEM's KBD?

edit: I wonder if the mfr. might have been the same company that OEM'd all those identical mice for multiple companies.

 

[beachycove]

Marked as follows (with copyright mis-spelling):

Multi-Keyboard Mac-105

Demmax Coypight 1987

Demmax Computer Ltd

 

[Compgeke]

This here's one of those boards that actually has no identified OEM as there are at least 5 different companies who've had the board branded as theirs. PCBs are often branded different but they're still identical. The Micro Warehouse and SIIG seem to be the most common though. Bit more info on these here: https://deskthority.net/wiki/Ortek_Mac-105

 

[beachycove]

An earlier version (MAC-101)?

http://www.vectronicscollections.org/gallery/ads/thirdparty/images/009301.jpg

Interestingly, it has a similarly angled bezel at the front.

 

[Trash80toHP_Mini]

MAC-101's my favorite Keyboard, it, the AppleDesign and the AEK-like KBD from my Radius 81/110 have absolutely nothing in common with that POS. DataDesk was a manufacturer with a long list of innovative KBD designs.



Horrid, inexcusably FUGLY layout with that misshapen, key robbing excuse for an enter key.

< /judgmental KBD elitist mode >

 

[beachycove]

Um, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Apple_(Standard)_Keyboard_M0116.jpg , and this really is an excellent keyboard, contemporary with and of comparable quality to the original AEK.

The real layout problem with this other one in my stash isn't the return key but the teensy delete key.

 

[Trash80toHP_Mini]

Well, dunno. It doesn't matter if the return key takes up the space for the pipe/backslash key on that (nicely clicky) POS. All they needed to do was tuck it in between the ludicrous straight cursor row layout and the spacebar. That's the ADB I KBD everyone raves about, but it's short somewhere between thirty and forty keys of being a real KBD in my book. I've got one and never use it.

The ADB KBD II drove me up the wall for lack of PageNav keys and a proper cursor array. The key-robbing two row return key never had a chance to irritate me as the first two glaring faults had me fanning out twenties on the sales counter at MacPlace on 21st for the MAC-101 before I ever noticed the deformed thing. Programmable Function Keys on the MAC-101 almost ruined me for life when it came to PowerBook Keyboards.

That said, the IIgs ADB is my favorite workbench KBD despite having all of the aforementioned failings. It's tiny, the ADB ports are in all the right places and I rarely need to use the idiotic straight row of cursor keys. For hacking I don't need the PageNav Keys or Function Keys I depend upon for real life computer work. I LOVE that thing, FUGLY return key and all.

Even the Tandy KBD I got with the 1000SX was head and shoulders above anything in the Mac lineup outside the AEK in terms of high key count flexibility and efficient layout of available keys.

MAC-101 Rocks!