I'm afraid it's terminal
I've been looking into getting a dumb terminal. I've seen quite a few used ones. I don't want to pay much, but I do want it to work. US Computer Exchange has a quite few that fit the bill, but I have no idea whether the keyboard is included, or what exactly I'd be getting.
Ideally, I'd like to find a working DEC terminal, or even an old adm3a (hopefully one with lower case ... yep, they made them with upper-case only), even though they were dying when I first used them in the 1980s. I can only imagine what shape they're in 20 years later.
Ideally, I'd like to spend no more than $25.
I found this interesting Web page on dealing with dumb terminals and Unix. It might be helpful.
Also: check out VT100.net, one of the best sources of information for DEC terminals.
And that site led me to The Archive of Video Terminal Information, which includes the "interesting Web page on dealing with dumb terminals" link above. So I'm in a terminal loop, or so it appears.
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You'll need to test any dumb-terminal yourself. Aside from the screen and serial-port working , you're dealing with (from the PC user's point of view) proprietary hardware; even if you're handy with a soldering iron, you might be stymied without a schematic. The WYSE-50s I used with my old CP/M machines, for instance, were both developing severe keybounce after half a decade of service. Internally, that keyboard looked nothing like the standard keyboard for an XT or AT, so just stripping out the microcontroller from one and wiring around it wouldn't have gotten me a working terminal again.
You might be better off with an old PC running ProCommPlus or (if it's a 386 or better and with enough memory to run Linux) minicom; at least then the parts that wear out are replaceable.
Maybe a hardware geek somewhere might tackle the challenge of a single-board computer (small, with a microcontroller in charge of it -- an 8051-derivative might be sufficient) built and programmed to hook an AT keyboard and a VGA screen together to form a VT-type terminal... or an assembly hacker might re-ROM an AT-clone motherboard to do that.
Or maybe this should be another mini LiveCD Linux project, so any PC that'll boot from CD can do a full-screen terminal emulation on demand; such a simple application can run in real-mode, so it can boot into FreeDOS like memtest86 does.
Kermit for DOS makes a very nice VT100 on any PC you can find. Fits on a bootable DOS floppy and is free.
There is also a VT100 for Palm. I used to use the Palm Professional with a serial adapter quite well. Plus the cable & palm fit in your pocket.
That's a good tip. I'll have to download Kermit and check it out.