I'm a dumbass....

[kalisphoenix]

So my wife and I went out and bought a Microsoft "Optical Desktop" (Keyboard + Wireless Mouse, with a fingerprint reader -- hey, it was on sale) for the Sawtooth she's getting in the mail tomorrow or so.

I brought it home and hooked it up to my iMac. The "WTF kind of keyboard is this? Press the buttons next to the shift keys" dialogue pops up.

The problem is that after a fraction of a second, the keyboard seems to "interrupt" whatever pointing device I am using... whether it is the MS mouse, my mighty mouse, or the numberpad keys.

Anyone have any experience with a problem like this? Will a reboot fix it (haven't gotten a chance to reboot since I'm moving around about .5TB of files right now and can't interrupt it)? Are we just going to have to return them?

 

[teckman]

Use Mac's main USB ports

Have tried using the mouses at the main ports, if your mouses were hooked to the keyboard? If this is the case that fixes it up, you might want to invest in a powered USB hub.

 

[kalisphoenix]

Have tried using the mouses at the main ports, if your mouses were hooked to the keyboard? If this is the case that fixes it up, you might want to invest in a powered USB hub.

The Microsoft keyboard doesn't have USB ports.... but you remind me that I had problems with this Mac when I first got it. The keyboard and mouse sometimes wouldn't work when it woke from sleep, and would sometimes stop working randomly. It was fixed by an OS update, but there was some speculation that the ports were not supplying sufficient power to the peripherals.

So I wonder if the MS keyboard could require a non-standard amount of port power, or if the iMac doesn't supply enough power.... the fingerprint reader might drain just enough power. Any thoughts?

 

[mkrishnan]

Mmm, can you explain more what you mean by "interrupting" the pointing device? Do you mean that the mouse pointer onscreen freezes? What is the design of this system? Do the mouse and keyboard plug in separately, or does the mouse feed its wireless input to the keyboard so that only one USB port is needed?

 

[2nyRiggz]

"I'm a dumbass"............well okay if you say so...who I'm I to disagree.





Bless

 

[kalisphoenix]

"I'm a dumbass"............well okay if you say so...who I'm I to disagree.

We are all dumbasses in the eyes of the Lord, Brother 2nyRiggz.

To answer your question, mkrishnan, I should first apologize. I meant to describe the symptoms exactly, but my titular dumbassitude stepped in or I was distracted or something

What I mean by "interrupt" is that the mouse cursor flies back up to the upper left-hand corner a few times a second. It's very frustrating and keeps me from being able to click on anything at all. It begins right after I click the "Continue" button on the "WTF is this keyboard" dialogue. If I ignore that, then it occurs after a few seconds or after I press a key (any key) on the keyboard.

The keyboard works fine after the dialogue is completed, but of course the cursor is completely uncontrollable. Exposé, volume, and brightness buttons work perfectly. The keyboard just apparently makes the mouse unusable :?

Thanks for your help!

 

[teckman]

Guesswork

T
So I wonder if the MS keyboard could require a non-standard amount of port power, or if the iMac doesn't supply enough power.... the fingerprint reader might drain just enough power. Any thoughts?

I would imagine, that is the situation if you had the MS mouse connected to the MS keyboard and the mouse having the reader could drain to much power
from one main USB port. But the missing link to my imagination is answered by your previuos post. The mouse with the reader is connected elsewhere.
You could check I suppose. There is the System Profiler located in the Utilities folder in the Applications window thru the Finder window. Sorta deep in the bowels of the system. This would let you know of whatever you hook up to the USB ports. This lets you know how much bus power is being use by the device and other curiosities. Under the listing of bus power is I believe is max power.
To get to the listing in System Profiler, there is an arrow next to the Hardware heading in the column list on the left. Click on the USB item and out pops a listing of tables for USB devices on your Mac. Click on line item to check each USB device. You might need to hit the Refresh option under the View menu in the System Profiler menu bar if you decide to plug in devices alternately to check their profile. I think it is 500 mA power is max for the main bus ports and by my guesswork there is 250 mA power for each bus in the Mac keyboard or at MS one. So when you hook up a mouse to a USB keyboard port with more than its rating you might have intermiten mousing problems something like what your Mac is getting. The MS mouse with reader is probably using more than 250mA power and you need to plug it to one of the main ports at the Mac.

 

[kalisphoenix]

Hmm, I'll check the power drain... good tip.

The keyboard has the fingerprint reader, not the mouse

 

[kalisphoenix]

It draws 500 mA, according to System Profiler. A reboot later and nothing changed. It is recognized, both in System Profiler and as a general input device, but of course the fact that it apparently disrupts all mousin' action really harms its usefulness

 

[teckman]

I think I have cornered my imagination. Now I know where that reader is for sure. Seems the USB buses are OK. Since you now mention how the MS mouse flickers on the screen this reminded me how my Mac mouse flickered on screen without the mouse drivers. It is possible it is missing the MS mouse drivers for the Mac. MS could have the drivers. There is the possiblity of a driver for this and driver for that, seems everything needs drivers nowadays!!! You might google for drivers if it needs one.

 

[kalisphoenix]

I think I have cornered my imagination. Now I know where that reader is for sure. Seems the USB buses are OK. Since you now mention how the MS mouse flickers on the screen this reminded me how my Mac mouse flickered on screen without the mouse drivers. It is possible it is missing the MS mouse drivers for the Mac. MS could have the drivers. There is the possiblity of a driver for this and driver for that, seems everything needs drivers nowadays!!! You might google for drivers if it needs one.

It's not just the MS mouse, but also my Mighty Mouse and the number pad cursor (when I enabled it in Universal Access). Sadly, there are no OS X drivers for this set, either.

 

[comptech2002]

Microsoft Keyboard Set

Does it say on the box its compatable with osx mac ? I was looking on the microsoft hardware website at the downloads section some of the hardware has drivers and some of the hardware doesnt have drivers for osx. Maybe you can return the microsoft keyboard and mouse and get a compatible set made by microsoft for osx ? I have had luck with wired logitech keyboards and mouse for osx.

Chris

 

[kalisphoenix]

Does it say on the box its compatable with osx mac ? I was looking on the microsoft hardware website at the downloads section some of the hardware has drivers and some of the hardware doesnt have drivers for osx. Maybe you can return the microsoft keyboard and mouse and get a compatible set made by microsoft for osx ? I have had luck with wired logitech keyboards and mouse for osx.

Chris

Yeah, I think that's what we're going to do :/ It's a shame because it's a very nice (and expensive) set, and we got it for I think about 50% off.

 

[teckman]

Yeah, I think that's what we're going to do :/ It's a shame because it's a very nice (and expensive) set, and we got it for I think about 50% off.

Before you actually return the nice(and expensive) set there is at least one thing you could do. That is rush an email to Microsoft and tell them you could use drivers to have the set compatible with your Mac. Microsoft can't actually read your mind about the situation. I'm sure they will appreciate your thoughts. It might not be much but it keep them working for $$, you know!!!!