from Hacker News

In some parts of the US, the clack of typewriter keys can still be heard

by tigerlily on 3/23/25, 9:19 AM with 10 comments

  • by paulyy_y on 3/23/25, 12:48 PM

    Yeah, this cacophony of clacks is being recreated at my office by every other eng using a diabolical mechanical keyboard with no respect for the ears of their neighbors.

  • by KronisLV on 3/23/25, 11:19 AM

    > If, on the other hand, you want to buy a brand-new typewriter, that too remains possible. Many thousands are still manufactured every year. Todd Althoff is president of Royal, a US company that has been making typewriters since 1904. "We're going to continue," he insists. "Obviously [there is] not that much growth but it's sustainable and we keep the factory busy."

    > The factory is in Indonesia, he explains, and is run by a team from Nakajima, a typewriter manufacturing firm from Japan. Every year, Royal still sells around 20,000 new electric typewriters and more than double that amount of mechanical typewriters. The latter have become desirable partly as decoration – a librarian might buy one for a display at the front of their library, for instance, suggests Althoff. The mechanical and electric models Royal sells cost between $300 (£238) and $400 (£317).

    These might be it:

    https://royal.com/product/royal-scriptor-typewriter/

    https://royal.com/product/royal-scriptor-ii-typewriter/

    https://royal.com/product/royal-classic-manual-typewriter/

    I’ve only used a mechanical typewriter when I was a kid and you don’t really see those nowadays, but there is certain charm to them.

    Much like how I’d like to some day own one of those IBM Model M pattern keyboards (most likely one of the modern versions made by Unicomp).

  • by mihaic on 3/23/25, 10:26 AM

    Honestly, out of all the human activities that are being lost by the overextension of smartphones in all the corners of our lives, typewriters are not the ones I'll miss.

    I know a lot of people like their feel (I do as well), but it must have been distracting as hell to be in an office with all that background noise. I agree with C. S. Lewis as well that writing on something that makes noise disturbs your natural writing rhythm.