Re: [ql-users] Keyboard membranes
On Sun, 13 Oct 2002 21:28:35 -0700, Zane Lewis [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Zane, sometime last year you had asked for cheap membranes. Well these are now available at $30 a piece incl. postage to West Coast (IIRC) If you are interested, let me know Phoebus -- Visit the QL-FAQ at: http://www.dokos-gr.net/ql/faq/ (Still uploading stuff!) Visit the uQLX-win32 homepage at: http://www.dokos-gr.net/ql/uqlx.html Visit the uQLX-mac home page at:http://www.dokos-gr.net/ql/uqlxmac.html
Re: [ql-users] Keyboard membranes
On Mon, 01 Sep 2003 16:25:02 -0400, Phoebus R. Dokos ( . ) [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On Sun, 13 Oct 2002 21:28:35 -0700, Zane Lewis [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Zane, sometime last year you had asked for cheap membranes. Well these are now available at $30 a piece incl. postage to West Coast (IIRC) If you are interested, let me know Phoebus Oopsss that shouldn't go here :-) Haha My bad -- Visit the QL-FAQ at: http://www.dokos-gr.net/ql/faq/ (Still uploading stuff!) Visit the uQLX-win32 homepage at: http://www.dokos-gr.net/ql/uqlx.html Visit the uQLX-mac home page at:http://www.dokos-gr.net/ql/uqlxmac.html
RE: [ql-users] Keyboard Membranes
-- --Expressing ones interest in public is fair enough, but has --anyone kept a record of those who did say they were --interested?? At least with the mini-poll, there is somewhere --where everyone can easily judge the amount of interest in --this project. -- Hello all, Sorry for jumping in late - I can usually only go through my messages at weekends :( I received one reply directly expressing an interest in membranes, and will try to keep a running total of those who have expressed their interest in replies to the original message and forward it to Rich to add a guestbook entry for 'anonymous' requests. If we figure one per (+) reply, that would be fair, yes? Some will want more, of course, but we should end up fairly even (allowing for those dropping out if the price is too high, etc.) I think it would be a shame to not 'follow-through' and make sure a supply is available in future for those people that want to continue to use their unmodified QLs in future. Given that there seems to have been a large (ish) number of them sold on eBay recently, I think it's reasonable to expect a few people will need them in the next few months and years. While there may not be an immediate 'rush', there may be a fairly steady demand (say, a couple a month?) and an increasing amount of interest. Callum
Re: RE: [ql-users] Keyboard Membranes
??? 3/11/2002 1:18:24 ??, ?/? Callum Davidson [EMAIL PROTECTED] ??: snip Callum Hi Callum, I spoke with Thomas of Sintech, he still hasn't received the template I sent him, but he'll inform me immediately when he does... I think that's the best bet for membranes :-) Phoebus
Re: [ql-users] Keyboard Membranes
Expressing ones interest in public is fair enough, but has anyone kept a record of those who did say they were interested?? At least with the mini-poll, there is somewhere where everyone can easily judge the amount of interest in this project. I believe that you should be (personally) worried why no one signed in your personal mini-poll :-) Is everybody avoiding you ? :-))) Sob, maybe you are right. sob Cheers Don't forget, Rich, that mailshots, questionnaires and other things which invite replies usually do well to get anything from 5% to 20% response. Given that th enumber who read this list is not that large, perhaps 5 to 10 people replying directly and a few general expressions of interest is what you may expect on that basis. I do have a QL used only a backup, already have one backup membrane which is quite old and will perhaps fail 5 seconds after I replace it ;-) I'm sure there'd be a lot of people like me who MIGHT want one in the foreseeable future but perhaps not urgently enough to place an order in advance of manufacture. It may well end up being necessary to manufacture a minimum quantity on these without really knowing demand - I'm not sure that the Super Gold Card, QIMI and Q40/Q60 demand was known yet did sell. -- Dilwyn Jones
Re: [ql-users] Keyboard Membranes
Hi I am interested in 2 membranes, but I haveinterested people. In the end I calculate we will be able to need 7 membranes. I am sure that there is more people interested outside this list. Greetings Javier Guerra Sinclair QL Spanish Resources http://badared.com/QL - Original Message - From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Tuesday, October 29, 2002 10:34 PM Subject: [ql-users] Keyboard Membranes Well,It is a sad thing to say that only 5 people have added their details to the mini-poll I was running on the keyboard membranes. I wonder if anyone else has received more response after several people on this list seemed to want new membranes??Maybe it just reflects the fact that people on this list are not willing to actually put their money on the table (or am I wrong), or more hopefully, it is that the people on this list are using an emulator and therefore don't need a working proper QL!!--Rich Mellor RWAP Software35 Chantry Croft, Kinsley, Pontefract, West Yorkshire, WF9 5JHTEL: 01977 610509http://hometown.aol.co.uk/rwapsoftware
Re: [ql-users] Keyboard Membranes
I think that you are jumping to very wrong conclusions. I do not think that anybody was obliged to sign in your personal mini-poll. Alot of people (including me) have expressed their interest so far in public. I believe that you should be (personally) worried why no one signed in your personal mini-poll :-) Is everybody avoiding you ? :-))) Cheers - Original Message - From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Tuesday, October 29, 2002 11:34 PM Subject: [ql-users] Keyboard Membranes Well,It is a sad thing to say that only 5 people have added their details to the mini-poll I was running on the keyboard membranes. I wonder if anyone else has received more response after several people on this list seemed to want new membranes??Maybe it just reflects the fact that people on this list are not willing to actually put their money on the table (or am I wrong), or more hopefully, it is that the people on this list are using an emulator and therefore don't need a working proper QL!!--Rich Mellor RWAP Software35 Chantry Croft, Kinsley, Pontefract, West Yorkshire, WF9 5JHTEL: 01977 610509http://hometown.aol.co.uk/rwapsoftware
Re: [ql-users] Keyboard membranes
On Sun, 13 Oct 2002 at 21:28:35, Zane Lewis wrote: (ref: [EMAIL PROTECTED]) Do you mean West Coast of the US? If so, that would bring the West Coast tally up to 4. California.. I have 3 QL's sitting in a shed waiting for either me to hit the lottery, or someone to make a membrane cheap enough to ship here. Hermes boards are $160 a piece.. IF they can be gotten at all. superHermes of course. That is the full sH price - the sH LITE is about half that. I make them fresh to order so they can be had any time (8-)# There are other interfaces no longer though - Falkenburg for a start. It works OK but the build quality was awful. He had the pcbs made by a friend in Uni (he said). One board I had to 'repair' had the traces each side of the double sided board so much out of alignment that the pins of components had to be bent sideways to get to the tracks on one side of the board. but it worked OK. There must be someone in the US with s/h interfaces. I also think someone (an ex QL dealer) has a few. It wasn't Frank Davis. Anyone remember who? Don Walterman? -- QBBS (QL fido BBS 2:252/67) +44(0)1442-828255 tony@surname.demon.co.uk http://www.firshman.demon.co.uk Voice: +44(0)1442-828254 Fax: +44(0)1442-828255 TF Services, 29 Longfield Road, TRING, Herts, HP23 4DG
Re: [ql-users] Keyboard membranes
On Mon, 14 Oct 2002 at 09:52:04, Tony Firshman wrote: (ref: [EMAIL PROTECTED]) I also think someone (an ex QL dealer) has a few. It wasn't Frank Davis. Anyone remember who? Don Walterman? On second thoughts, I think it was Paul Holmgren [EMAIL PROTECTED] -- QBBS (QL fido BBS 2:252/67) +44(0)1442-828255 tony@surname.demon.co.uk http://www.firshman.demon.co.uk Voice: +44(0)1442-828254 Fax: +44(0)1442-828255 TF Services, 29 Longfield Road, TRING, Herts, HP23 4DG
Re: [ql-users] Keyboard membranes
On Mon, 14 Oct 2002 at 12:24:18, QL recursos en castellano wrote: (ref: 007e01c2736b$db0ccfa0$0201a8c0@badapc) Somebody knows about a company in England called NFI? Yes - as I said, we bought thousands from them using the original Sinclair spec and equipment. I have spoken today with Investrónica, who imported the QL to Spain, and assures that it was its membrane supplier. Sinclair must have dual sourced. Maybe they are prepared to do short runs? I bow out of the negotiations (have no time) but maybe someone could take this up. -- QBBS (QL fido BBS 2:252/67) +44(0)1442-828255 tonysurname.demon.co.uk http://www.firshman.demon.co.uk Voice: +44(0)1442-828254 Fax: +44(0)1442-828255 TF Services, 29 Longfield Road, TRING, Herts, HP23 4DG
Re: [ql-users] Keyboard membranes
At 10:39 AM 10/13/02 +0200, you wrote: I believe that there are many potential clients. I am one of them. Greetings. Badaman Put me on that list as well.. Perhaps you could get in contact with one of the user groups in the US and have then distribute your product.. Zane - Not just living on the the other side of the Pond, but on the other side of the Continent
Re: [ql-users] Keyboard membranes
Title: Message Just a quick comment, although (I think)self-evident: it's impossible to make profit on making 1K~5K membranes and storing them for the next 10 years repairing QLs :-). It's too expensive to build less than several 100smembranes per batch. It's just helping romantics (like me) to have fully working systems for our personal collections. - Original Message - From: Callum Davidson To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Sunday, October 13, 2002 7:06 PM Subject: RE: [ql-users] Keyboard membranes Hello all, Thanks for your responses to my message so far - hopefully I'll be back in the 'QL Zone' pretty soon since I've had some very helpful replies already, and a couple of promising possibilities to explore. I don't know if the estimates by Voyager are accurate or not, although I imagine they're probably about right, or maybe a little on the low side. My technical skills are somewhat limited, but I don't mind doing everyday running-repairs and simple upgrades myself. I generally avoid it unless really necessary since I'd hate to damage an otherwise great machine by sticking a curious finger in the wrong hole - I'd much rather leave it to the professionals; i.e. those that alreadyknow which holes not to stick their fingers in :) I'd be very keen to see replacement membranes made, even if it could only be in a fairly small quantity - I'm sure there aren't millions of $ out there waiting to be made, but it could be quite a profitable enterprise over time, and would be a *great* service to the QL community. Callum Davidson -Original Message-From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] On Behalf Of VoyagerSent: Sunday, October 13, 2002 4:40 AMTo: [EMAIL PROTECTED]Subject: Re: [ql-users] Keyboard membranes Thanks for the messages and the interest. My point of view, is purelly the "retro-computing" as I collect systems for display/demonstration asnear as the original state as possible. All the hardware development effort since the days of the mid-80's is really great, but I know, that there are many more users/owners like myself, that do not want to hack their systems (at least all of them) to add extra keyboards, motherboardsetc. In Greece only, I have more than a dozen such users. I was planning on building a high quality alternative but 100% compatible membrane, in order to replace all the old and very fragile membranes, on several systems. I cannot evaluate the total volume yet, nor the future demand, but I expect it to be aprox 1K ~ 5K in the next 10 years. And I have the money and the resources to invest onthat venture starting today. My estimate is that from the 100K systems sold, only 10K are around nowdays, most of them thrown in closets, attics etc, having a purelly collector's value, and only 0.1K ~ 0.5K systems are active, used by QL power users / fans like you guys. Am I totally wrong? - Original Message - From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Sunday, October 13, 2002 11:44 AM Subject: Re: [ql-users] Keyboard membranes In a message dated 13/10/02 09:39:47 GMT Daylight Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: I believe that there are many potential clients. I am one of them. Greetings. BadamanThere are certainly a lot of people out there with QLs who need a new keyboard membrane (I have several ones here for a start which I could sell on the second hand market very easily).Please don't forget however, that Dave Park is working on the QeYboard replacement (not too sure how long this will take to get to market) and you can always attach a full size PC keyboard with SuperHermes or SuperHermes lite from Tony Firshman (I know he would not mention this himself - he would not dare to use this list to publicise himself!!).SuperHermes is also packed with other features which every QL user should consider essential in any event :-)--Rich Mellor RWAP Software35 Chantry Croft, Kinsley, Pontefract, West Yorkshire, WF9 5JHTEL: 01977 610509http://hometown.aol.co.uk/rwapsoftware
Re: [ql-users] Keyboard membranes
Thanks for the messages and the interest. My point of view, is purelly the retro-computing as I collect systems for display/demonstration as near as the original state as possible. All the hardware development effort since the days of the mid-80's is really great, but I know, that there are many more users/owners like myself, that do not want to hack their systems (at least all of them) to add extra keyboards, motherboards etc. In Greece only, I have more than a dozen such users. I get some emails from people who are not QLers as such, but have several old computers, people who are interested in retro computing. I am pretty sure that although demand from users like this might not be high enough by itself to make more keyboard membranes, they are users who would not buy add on Qeyboards or Superhermes'es etc. I keep an old version JM QL and Gold Card myself for testing software on original QLs and do not want to add external keyboards to it. I was planning on building a high quality alternative but 100% compatible membrane, in order to replace all the old and very fragile membranes, on several systems. I cannot evaluate the total volume yet, nor the future demand, but I expect it to be aprox 1K ~ 5K in the next 10 years. And I have the money and the resources to invest on that venture starting today. My estimate is that from the 100K systems sold, only 10K are around nowdays, most of them thrown in closets, attics etc, having a purelly collector's value, and only 0.1K ~ 0.5K systems are active, used by QL power users / fans like you guys. Am I totally wrong? Although the total number of QLers is probably higher than this, many are like myself users of other computers with QL emulators, or Aurora based machines or Q40/Q60 users. Many of these people have a QL as a second computer. When you go to QL shows these days you do not see that many original QLs, but people who attend shows tend to be people who have more up to date systems, and a well expanded QL is often not as easy to carry to shows as a tower cased system (more loose bits to carry). While I suspect that the number of people using an original cased QL as their main computer is probably not much higher than you guessed, I know full well from correspondence received that plenty of people have QLs, even if only as a second or backup QL computer. A vital question of course is what is the minimum number of keyboard membranes any manufacturer would be prepared to make and what sort of prices at these fairly low volumes. Of course, if you have to order say 500 or 1,000 membranes, you might find that some of the QL traders might wish to buy with you and share the 500 or 1,000 among all of you so that membranes can be made available in the UK, Europe and USA, the 3 main usage areas for the QL. If you are interested in trying to get more membranes made, send me a short article we could publish in QL Today, Quanta and on this list inviting those who might want membranes in the near future to get in touch with you to help you to gauge demand for them. -- Dilwyn Jones
Re: [ql-users] Keyboard membranes
At 06:44 AM 10/13/2002 -0700, you wrote: Zane - Not just living on the the other side of the Pond, but on the other side of the Continent Do you mean West Coast of the US? If so, that would bring the West Coast tally up to 4. Tim Swenson
Re: [ql-users] Keyboard membranes
On Sun, 13 Oct 2002 at 20:25:34, Voyager wrote: (ref: 011601c272dd$90b8e350$0100a8c0@voyager4) Just a quick comment, although (I think) self-evident: it's impossible to make profit on making 1K~5K membranes and storing them for the next 10 years repairing QLs :-). It's too expensive to build less than several 100s membranes per batch. It's just helping romantics (like me) to have fully working systems for our personal collections. The original manufacturer (NFI) would not make less than 5000, but last time we combined with a Spectrum order. and also would not change the spec for the nasty plastic in the majority. The only type worth doing would be the original (first 100 or so units) clear plastic type. Anyone know who did these? -- QBBS (QL fido BBS 2:252/67) +44(0)1442-828255 tonysurname.demon.co.uk http://www.firshman.demon.co.uk Voice: +44(0)1442-828254 Fax: +44(0)1442-828255 TF Services, 29 Longfield Road, TRING, Herts, HP23 4DG
Re: [ql-users] Keyboard membranes
Do you mean West Coast of the US? If so, that would bring the West Coast tally up to 4. California.. I have 3 QL's sitting in a shed waiting for either me to hit the lottery, or someone to make a membrane cheap enough to ship here. Hermes boards are $160 a piece.. IF they can be gotten at all. Tim Swenson Zane
Re: [ql-users] Keyboard membranes
Hi! Tony had a stock of membranes, but he is running out on them. I am planning on mass-producing them, but I have none available yet. Are you in desperate need? I have a couple of spare membranes, but I need them for my systems. Regards George - Original Message - From: Callum Davidson [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: QL Mailing List [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Sunday, October 13, 2002 6:12 AM Subject: [ql-users] Keyboard membranes Hello, As a relatively new member to this list, please excuse me if you've answered this all before :) I'm trying to locate a source of QL keyboard membranes, either in Europe or the US. I know they're becoming very difficult to find, but understand someone was trying to produce a number of 'new' replacements. Is this the case? If so, does anyone know the current status of these efforts, and how I can get in touch with the person concerned? Thanks, Callum Davidson
Re: [ql-users] Keyboard membranes
I believe that there are many potential clients. I am one of them. Greetings. Badaman
Re: [ql-users] Keyboard membranes
In a message dated 13/10/02 09:39:47 GMT Daylight Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: I believe that there are many potential clients. I am one of them. Greetings. Badaman There are certainly a lot of people out there with QLs who need a new keyboard membrane (I have several ones here for a start which I could sell on the second hand market very easily). Please don't forget however, that Dave Park is working on the QeYboard replacement (not too sure how long this will take to get to market) and you can always attach a full size PC keyboard with SuperHermes or SuperHermes lite from Tony Firshman (I know he would not mention this himself - he would not dare to use this list to publicise himself!!). SuperHermes is also packed with other features which every QL user should consider essential in any event :-) -- Rich Mellor RWAP Software 35 Chantry Croft, Kinsley, Pontefract, West Yorkshire, WF9 5JH TEL: 01977 610509 http://hometown.aol.co.uk/rwapsoftware
Re: [ql-users] Keyboard membranes
Dear Voyager, I have 2 working QLs on my desk and I want to keep them in original state as long as possible. I have one or 2 spare membranes somewhere but if you or Dave produce an alternative to goes into the original black box then I would buy some. Arnould (France) I was planning on building a high quality alternative but 100% compatible membrane, in order to replace all the old and very fragile membranes, on several systems. I cannot evaluate the total volume yet, nor the future demand, but I expect it to be aprox 1K ~ 5K in the next 10 years. And I have the money and the resources to invest on that venture starting today. My estimate is that from the 100K systems sold, only 10K are around nowdays, most of them thrown in closets, attics etc, having a purelly collector's value, and only 0.1K ~ 0.5K systems are active, used by QL power users / fans like you guys. Am I totally wrong?
