USB problems

[tripstone]

I have a Gateway Astro...just the other day the keyboard and mouse stopped functioning...this Astro has only USB ports...no serial and no ps/2 ports and furthermore, no room for them...it has four usb ports...two on the back...two on the side (its an all-in-one style puter)...the usb ports have -5vdac coming through them and when I brought the keyboard and mouse to college...they both are functioning properly...my computer teacher said that it could be a fuse blown...where the hell that would be...I have no clue...people have been telling me that the problem could lie in bad device drivers or whatever and there is no way that I can get into it to check...anyone have any clue??? thanks for your help in advance...

[Therealmaster]

Originally posted by tripstone
I have a Gateway Astro...just the other day the keyboard and mouse stopped functioning...this Astro has only USB ports...no serial and no ps/2 ports and furthermore, no room for them...it has four usb ports...two on the back...two on the side (its an all-in-one style puter)...the usb ports have -5vdac coming through them and when I brought the keyboard and mouse to college...they both are functioning properly...my computer teacher said that it could be a fuse blown...where the hell that would be...I have no clue...people have been telling me that the problem could lie in bad device drivers or whatever and there is no way that I can get into it to check...anyone have any clue??? thanks for your help in advance...

this may or may not be a dumb answer ....so here goes nothing. Belkin make USB to serial,ps2 devices so.....if its mucked up device drivers or something similar......then you should be able to get a different keyboard use the belkin usb to serial/ps2 convertor to connect it and try that way...as for a fuse.....it may have been a power surge. are you SURE that they run with an DAC (Digital to Analogue Convertor) did you check the usb ports after the k/b and mouse stopped working or are you quoting figures? if none of these work then try opening up the case and having a look for any melted components???

its definitely a very tricky problem, but i'll have a think and see if i can come up with something more for you.

[casper3699]

Does you CMOS see the USB? Something simalar happened to me but I found out that I had the Devices in the wrong order and the USB was disabled in the CMOS.

Hope that helped

Belkin make USB to serial,ps2 devices so.....if its mucked up device drivers or something similar......then you should be able to get a different keyboard use the belkin usb to serial/ps2 convertor to connect it and try that way...

Not trying to be mean but he said there was no ps/2 or serial ports

[tripstone]

no...not quoting figures...actual readings I recieved when I checked the port connection pins(not sure the technical term for them) with my handy dandy multimeter...i also checked for polarity in the wires...came up with mostly dead readings...no...cmos does not recognize the usb either...thats why I believe it to be a hardware problem...operating system boots up just fine...no interaction between the keyboard and computer....so I cannot check any drivers or anything (i've had quite a few number of people tell me that is what I should do...but I can't use the keyboard)...I guess i could place the harddrive in another puter...i will try that today...but then I have the problem of making the Operating System use different peripherals than I use on my puter...well...I know its hard to figure my problem out when you cannot physically be here...but anything you can think of...no matter how dumb you think it may be...please let me know...I'll let you know if I have tried it or if it can be tried...thanks everyone for all the help...you guys are awesome...

[Therealmaster]

Not trying to be mean but he said there was no ps/2 or serial ports [/B][/QUOTE]

i know, what i was suggesting was he try a usb to ps/2 CONVERTOR so that he could try a ps/2 mouse. (apologies for shouting) casper 3699 does have a point though, if it isn't recognised by your CMOS chip then you are having prblems. have you tried to add any new hardware recently, opened up your box, if so check your manual and see if there are any jumper settings related to usb etc. i really cant think of much more....i would suggest that you check in your bios....if you had a k/b to get in with. anyway hope that this helps

[RiOtEr]

have u tried getting new drivers for ur usb i think they might be up to 1.1 mabey i cant remeber if that doesnt work try that usb to ps/2 converter

[tripstone]

as i mentioned before...i believed it to be a hardware problem...many people have been suggesting that it could be a driver problem...and to update the driver...but how would i have been able too? ...anyways...thank you all for your patience and kind help...but I found the problem...my girfriend had hooked up the printer into a (what i thought was dead) usb port in the back...turns out when she hooked the plug in she had inadvertantly bent a pin to touch metal at the top of the port resulting in the puter sensing a ground and shutting down all the usb ports...i unbent the wire...removed the cmos battrery for a few minutes...replaced it...and rebooted...low and behold...I can now get into the computer....i also upgraded from 64 megs to 128 megs and my puter runs pretty sweet...well...for a gateway astro anyways....thank you everyone for your help...im out