[Tenacious Dyl]

I got an old (1992) apple "ajustable" keyboard. As in, both the left and right half of it rotate out, or stay inward, as a normal keyboard. I don't like it folded out, but it sure is ghetto :-P

I would love to hook it up as an external keyboard, im getting sick of the one i use right now. Is there a way to rig it up with soldering and business to get its 'serial' (old circular) port into a usb port?

I know there are adapters out there for this.. but they are actually fairly expensive. Help me out!!

Thanks.

[angelmb]

Originally posted by Tenacious Dyl:
I got an old (1992) apple "ajustable" keyboard. As in, both the left and right half of it rotate out, or stay inward, as a normal keyboard. I don't like it folded out, but it sure is ghetto :-P

I would love to hook it up as an external keyboard, im getting sick of the one i use right now. Is there a way to rig it up with soldering and business to get its 'serial' (old circular) port into a usb port?

I know there are adapters out there for this.. but they are actually fairly expensive. Help me out!!

Thanks.

That is a really nice keyboard, but it is ADB, not serial if I am not wrong. B&W G3 PowerMac includes an ADB port you could use, I mean, if you had a B&W G3

[Komisar]

I think ur better off going to radio shack and buying an adapter i mean u can find a cheeap one on ebay or something

[Tenacious Dyl]

I looked it up, yes is it ADB (Apple desktop bus or something like that). I don't ahve the money to go and get one online or radioshack. Im asking is there a way to just rewire one end of a cord to a spare male usb cord i have around, and plug that in?

I'm using a 12 inch 1ghz, aluminum pbook.

[Macrat]

Umm, no. Putting a usb plug on the end of an adb cable doesn't make it usb. We're talking like the difference between firewire and usb. You can get a adb>usb adapter and have it work that way, but that would cost a little bit of money.

BTW, I also have an adjustable keyboard, though it's missing the short adb cable between the keyboard and numeric keypad.

[thetman]

im working on something similar but easier. i am trying to take the old beige mouse with /adb and turn it into and optical usb. im also going to keep original colors (paint usb cable beige). so far i have cut out all inards of old mouse. i have realized that to do this properly i will need a laptop mouse with a small led board, but have the ability to use a longer usb cable. i am still looking for a cheap ultra small laptop mouse. maybe ill look again at work tom

[finboy]

Originally posted by Tenacious Dyl:
I got an old (1992) apple "ajustable" keyboard. As in, both the left and right half of it rotate out, or stay inward, as a normal keyboard. I don't like it folded out, but it sure is ghetto :-P

I would love to hook it up as an external keyboard, im getting sick of the one i use right now. Is there a way to rig it up with soldering and business to get its 'serial' (old circular) port into a usb port?

I know there are adapters out there for this.. but they are actually fairly expensive. Help me out!!

Thanks.

Griffin iMate adapts ADB to USB, but the keyboard may need a special driver to work with even ADB. Can't remember.

[cpt kangarooski]

iMates are surely not that pricey. $25 or so, I should hope. But it's about the only way it'll work. I use one for my Apple Extended Keyboard II.

I also am trying to do something like that (put an optical USB mouse guts in) with the first ADB mouse. Let me know how it goes.

[Tenacious Dyl]

hrmmm thanks for the info guys!

My friend has a serial circular port mouse (but not adb) and he has a "converter" to usb.. but its just a male usb, female serial circle and wires soldered in between. I was hoping I could do this.

The iMate is a bit expensive for me I am afraid. Currently with school and other things going on, I'm only able to work 8-16 hours a week, which pretty much pays a few bills. Maybe they will get cheaper.

I also would love to get the old apple mouse and gut it out and replace it with optical parts... seems like some fun

Take Care and Thanks,
Dylan

[Waragainstsleep]

You need the pin settings for USB (online) and ADB (probably not online). Then you will know if it can be done.
Since ADB belongs almost exclusively to Apple, you are unlikely to find details posted anywhere. Maybe you can persuade one of the people who manufactures adapters to share the data sheet with you.

USB:
http://www.connectworld.net/usb.html

[anthology123]

I think you are confusing round serial with PS/2. There are plenty of cheap adapters out there that will convert an IBM PC PS/2 port to USB, but there are none that will cheaply convert ADB to USB. I think ADB was a little smarter than PS/2, even though they looked the same, they are not. ADB circuits were more complex and could do things PS/2 could not. The iMate does have a driver that works in OSX and OS9. Sounds like you don't want to spend more than $10 to make this work. I don't think you can do that. Look up ads on mac sites, you could find someone trying to unload an iMate. I use one myself to use an ADB trackball, but I also have an Apple Adjustable KB, I'll try that, too.

[Link]

ADB was actually sorta like a precursor to USB, as they act much the same.. you can get an adaptor for it:

http://www.devdepot.com/aladdin-list.html?cref=642

[Tenacious Dyl]

I've known about the whole ADB -> USB adpater (iMate by Griffin) for awhile. Another company that I forget the name of makes a similar device but it has two ADB ports instead of one. I was just hoping this could be home done.

I looked at the innards of the iMate and looks like its not very very complicated. Only a few rewirings, a transistor or some power step-down. Only problem is what appears to just be a black chipset on a few, but not all iMates.

I'll probably end up buying an iMate

[tooki]

The iMate's not very complicated because basically the whole converter is in one chip.

Regardless, it's the only way to go. You're not going to be able to modify the keyboard, and even if you could, it would cost far more to do that than to get an iMate.

As for drivers... every classic Mac OS version since the Adjustable Keyboard was released contains the necessary drivers (which are only there to enable the 4 non-standard buttons it has: volume up/down, mute, and record). I don't know if OS X supports it or not.

tooki

[rag on a muffin]

does anyone know if the imate works with the wacom tablets well? this would be useful if it was.