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Comment by seltzered_

5 years ago

"the keyboard just flips up after pushing on two tabs."

This allowed for third party keyboards to be installed - https://web.archive.org/web/20060216223326/http://www.finger...

I get that they removed this feature to facilitate a unibody design later (weight/thinness), but I sorta wish they brought it back so one could possibly 'detach' the keyboard for desk / laptop stand use.

4 comments

seltzered_

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AdamJacobMuller  5 years ago

I had a later Macbook which had that same feature.

Beyond the ability to swap in an alternate keyboard the ability to pull out the keyboard and clean it well was amazing. The amount of junk which came out of that keyboard when you removed it and tapped it on the table was equal parts fascinating and disgusting.

Overall I don't lament the old laptops too much. While they made it easier to clean, the newer laptops seem to catch far less stuff.

Plus, the power cable on that generation of computer was... Awful. This was pre-magsafe and the center pin of the cable, which looked like a headphone connector, would break off INSIDE the computer. It was a huge hassle resulting in multiple returns until someone from the apple store figured out a trick with a toothpick and some super glue.

Reason077  5 years ago

I remember them being a pain to repair for anything that couldn't be accessed under the keyboard, though. Something to do with the hinge mechanism being quite complex and fiddly?

jareklupinski  5 years ago

imagine telling a present-day Apple engineer that a 3rd-party keyboard could perform better than their own butterfly mechanism lmao