From: Iain on
Dell Dimension 5000. When powered on the keyboard is initially
recognised, as I can hit F2 and enter the bios screen. When the boot up
process completes and the log-in screen is displayed the keyboard is
totally unresponsive. Has anyone an idea as to how to sort this?
Cheers,
Iain
From: William R. Walsh on
That's a common problem, especially with Windows XP or earlier. During
bootup time, Windows resets the USB bus and sometimes it forgets that
a keyboard or mouse was attached.

There are two ways to fix it that I know of:

1. Boot without the keyboard attached to the computer and plug it in
after Windows has started up completely and is sitting at the desktop
or login screen. Within about a minute or two, Windows should find the
keyboard.

2. Change the USB port to which the keyboard is attached. This usually
prods Windows into noticing it.

William (real keyboards plug into PS/2 ports, and real computers HAVE
PS/2 ports)
From: Daddy on
William R. Walsh wrote:
> That's a common problem, especially with Windows XP or earlier. During
> bootup time, Windows resets the USB bus and sometimes it forgets that
> a keyboard or mouse was attached.
>
> There are two ways to fix it that I know of:
>
> 1. Boot without the keyboard attached to the computer and plug it in
> after Windows has started up completely and is sitting at the desktop
> or login screen. Within about a minute or two, Windows should find the
> keyboard.
>
> 2. Change the USB port to which the keyboard is attached. This usually
> prods Windows into noticing it.
>
> William (real keyboards plug into PS/2 ports, and real computers HAVE
> PS/2 ports)

I can vouch for both of William's suggestions, since my HP computer at
work (model POC#1) sometimes likes to pretend that no keyboard or mouse
are attached until I finally unplug and re-plug them into the same or a
different USB port.

Daddy
From: Ben Myers on
On 5/27/2010 1:19 PM, William R. Walsh wrote:
> That's a common problem, especially with Windows XP or earlier. During
> bootup time, Windows resets the USB bus and sometimes it forgets that
> a keyboard or mouse was attached.
>
> There are two ways to fix it that I know of:
>
> 1. Boot without the keyboard attached to the computer and plug it in
> after Windows has started up completely and is sitting at the desktop
> or login screen. Within about a minute or two, Windows should find the
> keyboard.
>
> 2. Change the USB port to which the keyboard is attached. This usually
> prods Windows into noticing it.
>
> William (real keyboards plug into PS/2 ports, and real computers HAVE
> PS/2 ports)

Yes, XP and earlier do a poor job of managing USB keyboards and mice.
Plug in a USB mouse, you can wait a minute or two at a Windows login
screen while Windows finally figures it out. Happened for me today.

.... Ben Myers


From: Boris on
"Iain" <iain(a)swarfmaker2.co.uk> wrote in news:htllcm$mbt$1(a)news.eternal-
september.org:

> Dell Dimension 5000. When powered on the keyboard is initially
> recognised, as I can hit F2 and enter the bios screen. When the boot up
> process completes and the log-in screen is displayed the keyboard is
> totally unresponsive. Has anyone an idea as to how to sort this?
> Cheers,
> Iain

I have a Dimension 4550, and when I started using USB devices such as
printers, kbds, and mice, I began to have problems such as yours. I went
through some of my old posts, and found this from August 2006:

------------------------------------------------------------
Dimension 4550
Dell USB Keyboard

When I restart my machine, the POST screen gives me keyboard failure, and
the keyboard will not light up. It finally lights up at the Welcome
screen

I want to enter Safe Mode, or Set Up, but I can't due to the keyboard not
being recognized early in the boot up process.

It dawned on me that the USB keyboard failure may be due to a setting I
made in the BIOS a few weeks ago. After installing a Canon printer, the
machine would hang at the boot screen. Canon advised me to turn off USB
Emulation in the Legacy Devices section of the BIOS. (Don't know if
conflict was with the USB printer itself, or onboard multi-card reader.)
This worked.

Guess I have to install a non-USB keyboard to talk to machine during
POST. Seems dumb, but do you think this is the problem?
-------------------------------------------------------------

I also began to have endless problems when I began to use USB external
drives. Someone advised that I update the BIOS, which I've always been
reluctant to do, but I did, because the particular BIOS update said it
fixed USB issues. Presto, all of my USB problems disappeared.

Maybe check out the BIOS updates? Just thought I'd mention it...

Good luck.