Keyboard & Mouse not cooperating.......

[Gino]

Quick question………

Have a Windows 98 gateway and when booting up the keyboard and mouse are not seen by the computer. Kaput. So, I can’t do a thing to get onto the computer. I only use this computer for making music and other dumb things and have some old information on it. Now, everything is backed up…. but I don’t have any programs on other computers that can read it. Never thought of that scenario. Any ideas of how to get some really old files to work on software that won’t recognize them ??


Does any of this make sense ??

 

[cptcorn]

Can't you install that old software on a newer machine?

If you don't use the computer for much trash it get some cheapo thing to replace it... Don't put anything useful on there...

Anyways, on to the problem. What do you mean by gateway? When I hear that I'm thinking you're running it to assign IPs to other computers on the network.

 

[miguelon.lizarraga]

Gateway is the brand, like chevy is the brand of a car... It maybe the motherboard. Otherwise try to install the old software on another machine to read the files.

 

[WhiskeyDreamer]

have you tried a different mouse or keyboard?? sometimes that works....and the pc recognizes it...

 

[Gino]

The old software won't run on anything as new as any of our other machines in the shop or at home or anyone else's computers I know of. In fact, one or two of the programs have been discontinued. It's old stuff and the newer machines just laugh at it.

Tried the mouse and keyboard on a different machine and they worked fine.

The computer is on our network, but it runs all my crap stuff that I don't want hogged up on a working computer. It's on a by-pass box so I can use two computers at once on the same monitor.

When I'm editing or burning music CD's on it, I switch back and use my work computer. I don't use it for much of anything but old programs that won't work on new computers, cause I'm too cheap to get newer versions of this stuff. The problem is.... even if I got updates, most of this stuff won't work anyway because some of this stuff barely worked on Win 98. [It's stuff from 1989 to 95.] Some programs are even Win 3.1. I never thought this would be a problem... so I never got newer software, but kept backing all my files up.

We too, think it's the Mother Board. Where do you find stuff that old ??

 

[cptcorn]

lol.. Gateway computer... It's been a long day...

During the boot process does it recognize the keyboard? Can you hit del or f12 to get into the bios setup? If you can, that at least tells you windows is somehow messing it up. Try booting into safe mode.

 

[Wildpony]

Are you using PS2 or USB mouse/keyboard. I have a Gateway Laptop with Win 98 on it. Haven't had it on in a while, but I believe I had issues with usb mouse, but PS2 one worked fine.

 

[TheProfessor]

you can get a newer motherboard and put it in the computer as long as the hard drives you are using are compatible with it. Once you've installed the new motherboard, the operating system should boot up exactly the same unless the hard drives are really the problem...

 

[miguelon.lizarraga]

What's the make and model. I'll see if I can find it for you. Just need the model of the gateway.

 

[Gino]

These are the two screens I keep getting. The 'Num Lock' goes on as soon as it starts to boot and the keyboard and mouse are useless. That's why I think everything is fine.... if I could only get there.

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[TheProfessor]

have you tried opening the computer in safemode? if you are actually having virus or rootkit problems which may be deactivating your mouse and keyboard connection ports, safemode will only run the necessary processes for your computer to function. as the computer boots up hit F8 until you get a black screen with safemode as an option. if you got there, you know that your keyboard is at least sorta working, since it wouldnt have registered you hitting F8 unless it was

 

[Gino]

My keyboard is useless along with the mouse....... I can't click on anything while booting and I can't use any keyboard combination[]s for short cuts. I need to find a way to by-pass these things. I feel like i"m in some loop from the 'Twilight Zone'.... do-doo-do-doo..... do-doo-do-doo.....

 

[TheProfessor]

I just re-read your screen and it says something about bad sectors in disk one, so the problem is quite possibly with your hard drive being corrupted as opposed to you having a bad motherboard... its time to call the computer fix it guys... they may be able to take it apart and put different pieces into a working computer and find out which of your components is causing the problem...

 

[Gino]

I've had those bad spots for about two years now. I forget what they represent, but I don't think it was anything important..... I hope.

 

[miguelon.lizarraga]

Try the make and model on ebay.com i have found tons like that when I was repairing computer, back in the days, 2 years ago... LOL.

 

[TheProfessor]

here is what my ex, who is a computer tech guy for the last 8 years says:
"it sounds more likely to me that if you have bad sectors and the keyboard and mouse don't work that the motherboard is starting to go bad or the power supply or something and it's making it look like the HD has bad sectors and the keyboard and mouse is bad"

so take that conjecture with a grain of salt

 

[jiarby]

usb or ps2?


USB not widely supported in the early days of Win`98 (anyone remember OSR2?)... definitely use PS2 K & M....

AND...

drum roll please...




make sure they are plugged into the right ports.

I have seen it dozens of times... people just swapped the mouse for the kbd.


If that doesn't work then try new Kbd & Mouse.


You could have fried both at the same time.... but without zapping the mobo too??? seems unlikely.


I vote:
#1. Swapped the PS2 ports
#2. Using USB


Oh Yeah...

ONE time...

I ran into a stupid user that tried to MASH their kbd into the port when the pins were not aligned. They SMASHED one of the pins flat and it was grounding out when the others were plugged in. Another time a guy broke a pin off in the socket itself, but that was WAAY back in the AT days. Check yours.

 

[signage]

Gino is the computer beeping at all during start up?

Also how did you get into the Bios if the keyboard doesn't respond?

 

[jiarby]

yeah! wassup with that?

 

[choucove]

Given that you posted a picture of your computer entering into BIOS, it must then be assumed that at least before the OS begins to boot, the keyboard IS being recognized otherwise it would be impossible to access into your BIOS.

This means that it is within the operating system itself that the keyboard and mouse are not being recognized. So, if you are getting the message popping up that you are having bad sectors recognized in your system, and the computer suddenly becomes unresponsive (making it appear that the keyboard and mouse are no longer working) it is either that

1) you are using a USB mouse/keyboard that is not recognized in Win98, or
2) you DO have bad sectors in your hard drive, which means hard drive failure. This can especially cause your system to become unresponsive (again, appears the keyboard and mouse no longer are recognized) if the bad sectors are areas where the OS files could be located, making the system crash during the boot of the OS.

My suggestion, get a computer tech in to see if they can do a chkdisk or a better utility to search and fix bad sectors. If it's something those utilities can't fix and restore the data....it's pretty well dead. Move it and put the hard drive in any computer you want, the OS and hard drive would still be corrupted.