Solution for sharing a keyboard & mouse between USB & ADB?

[eric]

I currently have my modern windows pc where I play games/do work on my desk, and next to it I have my Q700 for vintage dev/play.

Currently I have a AEKII with a drakeware ADB2USB for connecting to the PC, and do a swap when I boot up my Mac (but then cant go back to the PC till I shutdown the Mac so I don't hot swap the ADB.

I'm trying to find a solution where I can swap back and forth at will. I don't NEED to use the AEKII.

Was thinking about a Wombat, but it doesn't support Bluetooth dongles - but does support HID dongles - this is probably the only solution that would work with the ADB mouse.

Anyone done this or have other recommendations?

 

[Drake]

I currently have my modern windows pc where I play games/do work on my desk, and next to it I have my Q700 for vintage dev/play.

Currently I have a AEKII with a drakeware ADB2USB for connecting to the PC, and do a swap when I boot up my Mac (but then cant go back to the PC till I shutdown the Mac so I don't hot swap the ADB.

I'm trying to find a solution where I can swap back and forth at will. I don't NEED to use the AEKII.

Was thinking about a Wombat, but it doesn't support Bluetooth dongles - but does support HID dongles - this is probably the only solution that would work with the ADB mouse.

Anyone done this or have other recommendations?

This has me thinking as to why hot swapping is D A N G E R. Looking at the pinout of ADB I am wondering that maybe there is a solution simply with the 5v line in. what is the behavior of the keyboards controller during powerup and how can we make a circuit to safely simulate that when hot swapping, flip a switch, wake up the controller and feed the appropriate data+/- and 5v.

Does the Apple only look for a keyboard during power up?

 

[Patrick]

the software supports hot swapping but hardware does not. People have and i'm sure still do hotswap their ADB devices. there is just a chance. you could cause a short and fry something.
But yeah. you can plug in keyboards / mouse / joysticks. and they work. as long as you were lucky enough to not cause a short during the process.


...


too erics question. another option might be to use something like VNC.
i used to use synergy but its no longer foss and you have to pay for it. also, i doubt it supports classic mac.

about a decade ago i used it so that it allowed me to use the keyboard and mouse plugged into a windows XP computer, and i could drag the mouse to the edge and it would then be like i was controlling keyboard and mouse on a Linux computer(xwindows specifically). It used VNC as the backend. it was pretty neat.

maybe there is some hack-y way to do a DIY kinda thing. where you activate a VNC (or another remote desktop app) but just hide the window on your modern computer.
idk. sorry. prolly not a great answer.

 

[eric]

I'd thought about using VNC, i'll try it, but would rather use something physical.

I would be nice to have a modern adb switch, but I'm not sure the requirements (and I have too many side projects already)

I think my best bet would be to find a keyboard with a physical switch between Bluetooth & HID receiver/usb + a wombat.

 

[Drake]

I'd thought about using VNC, i'll try it, but would rather use something physical.

I would be nice to have a modern adb switch, but I'm not sure the requirements (and I have too many side projects already)

I think my best bet would be to find a keyboard with a physical switch between Bluetooth & HID receiver/usb + a wombat.

@Stephen Do I recall you working on some sort of ADB switch a year or so back? maybe completely irrelevant

 

[Patrick]

So ADP uses s-video cables. So you could use a "s-video switcher". which might be easier to find.
i haven't actually tried this myself. this is just what i found online. That the cables are basically the same. (that is, they both use the same cable standard.)

 

[Stephen]

@Stephen Do I recall you working on some sort of ADB switch a year or so back? maybe completely irrelevant

Yes, but my preliminary testing highlighted that I had produced costly trash.

 

[This Does Not Compute]

Just an idea, maybe do the switching with USB? You're already able to convert the AEK to USB, so plug that into a USB switchbox/KVM. One output on the switch can go to the PC, then the other can go into a Wombat to convert to ADB. And since the Wombat appears to be powered externally, it *might* keep ADB "alive" on the Q700 so it doesn't realize that the keyboard actually gets disconnected.

 

[retr01]

I use USB KVM. Each of my vintage Macs has its Wombats. Switches very well.

 

[eric]

So something like:

  ┌──────┐                ┌───────┐
  │      │                │       │
  │  PC  ├─USB─┐    ┌─ADB─┤ Q700  │
  │      │     │    │     │       │
  └──────┘     │ ┌──┴───┐ └───────┘
               │ │Wombat│
               │ └──┬───┘
               ▼    ▼
              ┌─────┐
              │ USB │
              │ KVM │
              └──┬──┘
                 ▼
             ┌───────────┐
             │ DrakeWare │
             └───┬───────┘
                 │   ┌───────┐
                 └─► │AEK II │
                     └───────┘

Any recommendations on a USB KVM that is KB/Mouse only?

 

[Drake]

   __________
  | computer |
   ----------
       |
       |
    ------
   | o  o |
    (  V )
       |
   ---------
       |
      / \

       |
  -----------
 |   you     |
  -----------

you could just use one of your kids as an automated in-between? put them to work.

 

[retr01]

I have this one through Amazon, which works well for my setup. Most good USB-only KVM will do. My keyboard and mouse are wireless USB, and I plug in the dongle and the included USB cables from the KVM to respective computers/wombats. Works well.

 

[retr01]

This is another possibility if you need to share with more computers/wombats/drakewares. I know not enough people are rating this, but I believe this can work very well, too.

 

[eric]

Got the wombat and I am able to manually move the Drakeware USB from it to the modern PC and back. I did have to add a second ADB port (scavenged from a Classic bombed board) to the wombat for the mouse - the speed of the mouse via the drakeware was slow and I couldn't adjust it. Havent picked up a USB switcher yet, so many bad reviews on them I'll wait a bit.