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Don_HH2K's Blog

Don tryeth, Don hacketh, and Don gaveth up.
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Tuesday, 13 May, 2008

PS/2 signal converter

Having uncomfortably finished three term papers earlier this month, I decided to buy a PS/2 to USB signal converter so that I could use my IBM Model M keyboard with my notebook.

PS/2 to USB Signal Converter

(Yes, I colored in my Model M's cable such that it's PC97-compliant. =D)

This turned out to be somewhat difficult, for two reasons. First, the Model M is based around en entire Motorola 6805 CPU rather than the standard-issue Intel 8048 microcontroller. Rumor has it that the keyboard was designed as such to facilitate a hardware terminal emulator, though I've never been able to confirm this. As a result, the Model M draws significantly more power than a regular keyboard, and thus I found various reports of the keyboard not being able to power up using some cheaper cables. Second, I wanted the signal converter implemented in hardware, rather than in software, so that I could use it as if it were a plain old PS/2 keyboard in any OS.

posted @ Tuesday, 13 May, 2008 2:02 AM | Feedback (3) | Filed Under [ Gadgets ]