Help with an old PC - keyboard and mouse

Long story longer... I got a free laser vector/raster/engraver/cutter thing.  It came with an old Windows tower that already has an unlocked Corel Draw suite as well as all the drivers.  I can always find the drivers, but there is no work budget for $300/yr subscription to Corel, especially because I will likely use this thing infrequently.  But hey, free 40w laser bed, right?

Problem:  The old tower won't recognize my USB keyboard or mouse.  I get to the windows login screen and can't get past it because neither the mouse nor the keyboard will do anything.  They're likely P&P, but until I get windows open, I can't let it look for drivers.  I tried an adapter that converts the old round plug to USB but no dice.  Should I be looking for an old school keyboard and mouse?  Will that work without appropriate drivers?

Old Windows will see old mouse and old keyboard.

I would look on the back plate on the case where all of the ports are for a box drawn around two of the USB ports.  For a while it seemed like only certain USB hardware was recognized by the BIOS on motherboards so that keyboards and mice would work.  Make sure to use those jacks.  

What's odd to me is that the PC would start without a recognized keyboard.  That's normally a BIOS option, to not allow the computer to boot if a keyboard isn't recognized at time of boot.  

Push comes to shove, yeah, you might need to find a keyboard with a native PS/2 interface and use that.  The mouse should be easier to deal with once the machine boots, though if you can find one of those easily, might as well throw it into the mix as well and go without USB.

Frankly Curtis, I'm shocked, SHOCKED! that you wouldn't have a  junk box of old computer parts stashed in the attic.

It's probably easiest to bring the PC to a computer repair place. I would hope they could get you going in less than 10 min. 

If you're feeling stubborn? Goodwill probably has the hardware you need.

It likely has old PS/2 ports you could use:

But have you tested all the USB ports yet? Even just like, plugging in a thumb drive to see if they have power? Totally possible they're also blocked with crap and oxidized and need cleaning.

I might have a ps/2 keyboard and mouse but I bet shipping would cost more than a thrift store pair.

Unless the mouse and keyboard are specifically designed to work with a PS/2 port the cheap adapters wont work and you need an actual converter better yet, an old keyboard and mouse.  I'm pretty sure I have extras of both here that you can have for the price of shipping if you can't find something local.  There are no drivers required for them.  Actually, there is technically a mouse driver requried but it's generic, rolled into every version of windows and likely already installed on your machine.  The keyboards don't require drivers.

APEowner said:

The keyboards don't require drivers.

Well, they do, it's just that PS2/AT keyboards (they're the same other than the connector) were so universal that it's built-in and you don't even know about it.

It should not be hard to find a PS2 keyboard and serial mouse on ebay.  You could even get an original IBM Model M if you wanted the clicky noise. :)

GIRTHQUAKE said:

It likely has old PS/2 ports you could use...

I must take exception to your description of the PS/2 port as being old.  They replaced the DB-9 serial port attachment for mice and the 5-pin 180-degree DIN connector for keyboards.  PS/2 was introduced in 1987 and probably didn't fully supplant its predecessor until well into the 1990's.

1988RedT2 said:

Frankly Curtis, I'm shocked, SHOCKED! that you wouldn't have a  junk box of old computer parts stashed in the attic.

Dude... the ironic thing is that we had a box full of them at the theater from old computer stuff and we just gave them to Salvation Army about a month ago.  Sadly, they aren't on the shelves at that Salvation Army.

GIRTHQUAKE said:

It likely has old PS/2 ports you could use:

But have you tested all the USB ports yet? Even just like, plugging in a thumb drive to see if they have power? Totally possible they're also blocked with crap and oxidized and need cleaning.

Yes... PS/2.  That's the thing.

I did try all of the ports.  They power the keyboard and mouse (num lock light is on and mouse laser powers up).  Just no communication.

Curtis73 (Forum Supporter) said:

I did try all of the ports.  They power the keyboard and mouse (num lock light is on and mouse laser powers up).  Just no communication.

The original company to protect that machine, may have deactivated all USB ports in the BIOS. If that is true, then only PS/2 will work.

Have you cleaned anything on it yet?

I'll keep looking for a PS/2 set.  Thrift stores had nothing.  I did find a super-interesting bundle that looked like an early PS/2 wireless.  It had a little powered box with two PS/2 pigtails and a wireless keyboard/mouse, and (for the funnest part) a 3.5" floppy with the drivers on it.

In reply to GIRTHQUAKE :

No cleaning other than a can of air, but it's pretty clean.  I can hit the USBs with a q-tip and some Deoxit.

USBs seem to operate fine.  I can't get into it to see if it will view a file on a thumb drive.  I did go through bios setup and it populates with information about the USBs.  Couldn't find anything about mouse and keyboard.

What about holding f2 or whatever during boot and seeing if you can use the keyboard in the bios settings?

Edit, nevermind just saw your note about bios setup.

I had one a few years ago where I had to use the PS/2 mouse and keyboard until I could get into windows to install drivers. Or something like that, it's been a while. Microcenter had them for under $10 each. 

I'm cleaning out a bunch of old computer junk, might have the keyboard and mouse you seek.  Iirc I'm about an hour south of you, if that helps. I have a win 98 machine I'm offloading some stuff from that's using them currently, but that computer's destined for the scrapyard eventually. 

If that laser cutter takes standard HPGL, throw that old computer away and replace it with something new and cheap with the OS of your choice and use Inkscape to drive it..

I don't know if I have a PS/2  mouse, but I have a PS/2 keyboard that you could have.  I'm about 25min south of Lancaster.

Robbie (Forum Supporter) said:

What about holding f2 or whatever during boot and seeing if you can use the keyboard in the bios settings?

Edit, nevermind just saw your note about bios setup.

The keyboard works in bios setup, but as soon as Windows loads, it doesn't seem to recognize the hardware.

Honsch said:

If that laser cutter takes standard HPGL, throw that old computer away and replace it with something new and cheap with the OS of your choice and use Inkscape to drive it..

Is inkscape a viable alternative to Corel?  No idea if the laser is HPGL.  I don't even know what HPGL is.  The printer is an Epilog Legend model 6000 from 2001-ish.

On page 86 of the manual there's this line:

In addition to Windows based programs, the Legend can be used with many other programs that generate standard HPGL output.

Other lines mention that there may be special features only available with their driver, so maybe you might want to look in to that. 

Inkscape is a vector based page layout drawing program.  I use it to run my vinyl cutter with a USB to serial adapter.
If you've got any other windows boxes that work properly, I suggest you install inkscape on it and fool around and see if you like it.  There's lots of tutorials online on how to use inkscape for running vinyl cutters and you'll need something similar for your laser cutter.