keyboard not responding...help

[hulagu]

My keyboard is not responding in OSX But is working fine when I boot from OS9. First strange thing that happened was the clock in the menu bar disappeared then reappeared, when trying to change the settings in the systems preferences there was no response, then the keyboard went as well. Is this a virus?? or did I delete something by mistake?

please help...

[nixgeek]

What Macintosh computer do you have, and which exact version of OS X are you running? Is this a USB keyboard or an ADB keyboard (found on older Macs before USB)? Please provide some more information on your setup. Thanks.

[hulagu]

Its a G4 running OSX 10.3.9 and the new style usb keyboard, please note the mouse is working.

[nixgeek]

Which model G4? It's possible that you need a firmware upgrade. Check the link below for a chart that tells you which firmware is required for a certain Mac to run OS X.

http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=86117

An example: my father has a Power Mac G5 1.6 GHz and was running 10.3.3. I upgraded him using the Combo Updater for 10.3.9 and unplugged everything except the keyboard and the mouse. After performing the upgrade, I noticed that I couldn't open any .dmg disk image files (I would get an error every time I tried). I did everything I could think of (Single User Mode repair disk, repair permissions, etc.) and nothing would fix it. Then Software Update popped up and it showed a firmware upgrade for the Power Mac G5. I had forgotten that I needed to apply that to my father's computer. After it installed, disk images started mounting again without any problems.

Of course, for your G4 you have to do it from within OS 9 since that was the main current OS available for that system at the time (the G5 can't boot into OS 9 and it's OS has been OS X since it was released). After you perform the firmware (if your Macintosh needs it), check to see if it's resolved the problem.

Also, have you tried plugging the keyboard to another USB port? Do you have the keyboard connected to a USB hub? If so, that might also be the problem. The keyboard and the mouse have to be connected directly to the Mac itself (although the mouse can be connected to the keyboard if the keyboard has USB ports).