Old-school keyboard doesn't work

After reading Ed's article on the old IBM keyboards, I realized that the first computer mom and dad bought did indeed have one of those steel-plated 'boards with the AT keyboard connecter. I went down to the basement, cleaned it up (and it's beautiful, lemme tell ya) and got me an AT/Ps2 adapter, plugged it in, and...

It doesn't work.

When it's plugged in hot, neither the Ps2 mouse, the old keyboard, nor my "usual keyboard" (a Ps2 connection) works. When it's plugged in before the computer is turned on, I get continual beeping and Windows won't boot because the <Windows root>\system32\ntoskrnl.exe file is corrupt or missing. When all original hardware is plugged in, it works peachy.

Any help or confirmation for this would be appreciated.

My thoughts:

One. Both AT and Ps2 'boards use 4 wires: a clock wire, data wire, ground wire, and 5VDC wire. My adapter does not correctly match wire to wire. In this case, I can probably splice.

Two. The old AT 'board has a short. Shorts are a pain to find, so please don't tell me it's probably a short. (kidding. If it probably is, please break the news to me gently)

Three. Something fried on my AT 'board when I plugged it in to a hot computer, and I'm a dumbass with a useless keyboard.

Four. There are keyboard drivers that need to be downloaded. Not a problem.

Option # Two seems the most feasible in my opinion. It may have just died over time or was exposed to some moisture.

It's rather hard to kill a machine by simply plugging a dead device into it. Just go buy a crappy AT keyboard. I can get them for $0.50 locally.

It sounds to me like you don't have an AT keyboard, but an XT one. Aftermarket AT keyboard used to have an XT/AT switch on the bottom to allow them to work on either machine. A XT keyboard won't work on anything but a XT.

Ragnarok....you play CS?

It does appear to be a (fully functional) XT keyboard. I now have upwards of 5 pounds of useless metal.

Oh well. If someone sneaks into my room, that keyboard's the first thing I'm going for.

No, I don't play CS. It's probably some guy who thinks that "Ragnarok" is a cool name to kick butt with.

larva said:

It sounds to me like you don't have an AT keyboard, but an XT one. Aftermarket AT keyboard used to have an XT/AT switch on the bottom to allow them to work on either machine. A XT keyboard won't work on anything but a XT.

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Lol! I was going to say the same thing. I have two of them my brother left me, but I couldn't figure out why they weren't working. So I asked him if he was sure they were working when he gave them to me. Then he says...
"You mean the XT keyboards? You think I'd give you perfectly good useful hardware? You think I'm crazy?"

LOL! Am I the only one here who still has a functional 8086 in their room?? Uses a XT keyboard with AT/XT switch to allow for funcion on my 386.

I even had to bring it into school a few weeks ago because we found a (probably 8086) lying in some classroom and we had to power it up. None of the AT keyboards would work, so here comes my trusty XT

JigPu

Ragnarok, how do you feel about ED's remarks?
I tend to believe him, but I'm not even sure if he really wrote the article on the front page. I'm so used to hearing him say either "this product sucks" or "this product is acceptable, but you won't see a huge improvement unless your current computer is 2+ generations old" that it's hard to believe that a product can be that good.
Is it?

Originally posted by Christoph
...it's hard to believe that a product can be that good.

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Hm. Here, we're delving into definitions and opinions, so of course what gets me excited is going to be totally different from what floats your boat. This is right and proper, and is known as "individualism."

If I ever find a working AT keyboard someone throws out, I'll go dumpster diving, pick it up lovingly, take it home with me, and start typing away.

Should I ever need a new keyboard, and find this keyboard in a store priced comparitively with other boards, then I'd buy it in a heartbeat.

But what if it's more expensive? What if I don't really need a keyboard? Will I still go out and buy it?

Maybe. Maybe not. I think it's better than the keyboard I'm using now. I do a fair amount of typing on this 'board (no idle geek, I) and I can say with certainty that it feels better and responds better than Joe Shmoe's board. I guess it depends on how much extra you're willing to pay.

Personally, I would pay $10 extra for an AT board. I would go $20 if I had m4d b4nk, but no more than $20 over. Paying $100 for a keyboard is just nuts.