Photo: P. Musgrave, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons
One example. Colors, sub-models, and production years vary; the machine you find may differ.
Smith-Corona Silent-Super
wiggly, responsive but not smooth, a bit of clack
Hermes-adjacent in silhouette but a different hand: looser tolerances with a perceptible wiggle, more clack, and a normal rather than glassy travel.
Often cited as the high point of Smith-Corona's portable line. The Silent-Super refined the Silent's mechanism into something that competes with the Hermes 3000 on touch and sound, at typically a third of the price. American mid-century styling, two-tone case, a quiet bell. A working writer's machine that's still abundant on the secondhand market.
What people say
among the finest American portables
the peak of the Smith-Corona segment-shifted line
— community consensus
See & hear it for yourself
Manuals & repair
All sources
External, in their original form. The people who know these machines best — click through to read and watch.
Where to find one
Listings come and go. These show whatever Smith-Corona Silent-Super machines are on the marketplace right now.
See Smith-Corona Silent-Super listings on eBay marketplace
Some links here are affiliate links. If you find a machine through one I get a small share at no cost to you, and it doesn't change which machines I point to.
Specifications
- Manufacturer
- Smith-Corona
- Origin
- United States
- Years
- 1955–1960
- Form
- Portable
- Mass
- 5 kg
- Shift
- segment