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apple keyboard with windows XP

macOSX-tastic

macOSX-tastic

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Jan 9, 2005
853
3
At the Airport. UK
hi all,

although i am afraid to say it, i am a windows user as much as a mac user (although i use mainly macs). my dell keyboard recently broke and i want to use a new apple keyboard with it instead of a PC one, mainly because of quality.

i know that this has been covered in the forums before, but i need a bit more convincing.
is an apple keyboard able to function fully with windows XP?
will the USB ports work?
are there any drivers needed/error messages that people have encountered?

sorry to be persistent, but i am going to london tomorrow and shall be spending some time in regent street.

thanks

tastic
 
as long as your USB ports are in working order you should have no problems at all short of the windows start menu key missing off the apple keyboard.

a keyboard is a keyboard. USB is UNIVERSAL serial bus.... so why should you have issues?
 
I hooked my Apple keyboard to my Win XP PC and the little found new hardware popped up and told me it was a Apple Pro Keboard and worked fine
 
Do you get to use real shortcuts (Command+etc.) or do you have to use Control?
 
LOL i was thinkin about the SAME thing yesterday night!
you sort of beat me to post the thread
 
Plug n Play?

You guys got XP to recognize it right away? I've never had a problem using my Apple keyboard and mouse before (on Win98 and Win2000), but at my current job, I have XP, and it wouldn't recognize the keyboard. I had to get a little piece of shareware to get it to work.

For the original poster - you can also use your Apple Mouse!!! I've actually converted two of my coworkers (we're all Wintel at work) to Apple Mice because they loved mine so much!!!
 
jsalzer said:
You guys got XP to recognize it right away? I've never had a problem using my Apple keyboard and mouse before (on Win98 and Win2000), but at my current job, I have XP, and it wouldn't recognize the keyboard. I had to get a little piece of shareware to get it to work.

For the original poster - you can also use your Apple Mouse!!! I've actually converted two of my coworkers (we're all Wintel at work) to Apple Mice because they loved mine so much!!!
Click to expand...

Yeah My XP box popped up and told me it was their and then it also came up and said it was a generic USB hub and the USB ports on the keyboard worked as well.But I have heard stories about the Bluetooth keyboard not working well with XP.
 
i have used apple keyboards with windows and linux before and they work great, i have yet to find a keyboard i like more than the apple pro keyboard, allot of gamers use them now.
 
i use a apple pro keyboard at work on my wintel box. The command key does the same as the windows key, and all other keys just seem to work. I am usign windows 2003 server.
 
A few months back I connected the keyboard that came with my eMac (Would this be considered the "Pro" keyboard?) to my Win2k PC. Not only did it recognize it and automaticlly start working, but the eject and volume keys worked just as they are supposed to.

NICE.
 
The current USB Apple keyboard works just fine for me in Windows XP.

control -> control
option (alt) -> alt
command -> windows

The three volume keys work just fine. I don't recall if the eject key worked or not. All the other keys worked as expected. There is a piece of shareware called AppleK Pro that allows you to use all of the typical Mac shortcuts such as command-s, command-w, screenshot combos, etc... Very cool!
 
jsalzer said:
For the original poster - you can also use your Apple Mouse!!! I've actually converted two of my coworkers (we're all Wintel at work) to Apple Mice because they loved mine so much!!!
Click to expand...

They don't miss the right button and the scrollwheel? I feel limited by the single button even on a mac.
 
Mouseys

Omen88 said:
They don't miss the right button and the scrollwheel? I feel limited by the single button even on a mac.
Click to expand...

Actually, it was the scrollwheel that had one of them wanting a different mouse - in FileMaker, she kept accidentally hitting it and moving to a different record (very dangerous during data entry).

Besides, once you get my in-person explanation about how a one-button mouse is the superior way to interface with your computer (be it Mac or Windows), you can't resist. I'm like a master preacher when it comes to my mouseys. :)
 
This may be a bit OT but I have both a mac and a pc at work. I was using the pc through RDC (until I got VPC 7) so that I could use my Cinema Display and Mac keyboard for both. For the longest time I could not get the number pad to work. That is until I figuired out that you need to press the "Clear" key first. I guess this acts like the "Num Lock" on a PC key board.
 
NumLock

Col. Panic said:
For the longest time I could not get the number pad to work. That is until I figuired out that you need to press the "Clear" key first. I guess this acts like the "Num Lock" on a PC key board.
Click to expand...

You know - I still can't figure that one out. When would you *not* want your number pad to be turned on? Weird Windows people.

I've also never understood why Windows keyboards use the word "Enter" for both the carriage return and the enter. Even Microsoft's products treat the two differently. Why give them the same name? It also makes it tough to write directions. Instead of "Press Enter", I have to specify, "Press the Enter button on your number pad." Windows Freaks. ;)
 
jsalzer said:
You know - I still can't figure that one out. When would you *not* want your number pad to be turned on? Weird Windows people.

I've also never understood why Windows keyboards use the word "Enter" for both the carriage return and the enter. Even Microsoft's products treat the two differently. Why give them the same name? It also makes it tough to write directions. Instead of "Press Enter", I have to specify, "Press the Enter button on your number pad." Windows Freaks. ;)
Click to expand...

Windows comes default with Num Lock turned ON... so they do want the number pad... and the second comment... I don't know what you mean, but Enter on the keyboard and enter on the num pad do the exact same thing...
 
Enter

dotdotdot said:
Windows comes default with Num Lock turned ON... so they do want the number pad... and the second comment... I don't know what you mean, but Enter on the keyboard and enter on the num pad do the exact same thing...
Click to expand...

I've had computers at work that default to NumLock OFF each time you boot up. And even when it's ON, you're bound to accidentally knock it off and spend 30 seconds baffled trying to figure out why the numbers you're typing aren't there.

As for Enter - open up Excel. Type something into a cell and then press "Enter". Type something into that cell and then hit the other "Enter". One accepts the data and acts as a Carriage Return. The other simply accepts the data.

AppleWorks also treats them differently. In Word Processing, the one acts as a carriage return, while the other inserts a page break.

I think Word treats them the same, though.
 
dotdotdot said:
and the second comment... I don't know what you mean, but Enter on the keyboard and enter on the num pad do the exact same thing...
Click to expand...

Not all the time. For example: In QuarkXPress the "Return" key gives you a hard return in a text box. Then "Enter" key bumps you to the start of the next linked text box. Two entirely different but useful functions.

I do not have XPress on a PC but if it functions the same then both keys having the same name would be confusing.
 
jsalzer said:
I've had computers at work that default to NumLock OFF each time you boot up. And even when it's ON, you're bound to accidentally knock it off and spend 30 seconds baffled trying to figure out why the numbers you're typing aren't there.
Click to expand...

numLock is a setting in the BIOS, not Windows itself. Tokk me a while to find it when the wife got her hunk 'o' junk, opps, I mean Dell.
 
joetronic said:
numLock is a setting in the BIOS, not Windows itself. Tokk me a while to find it when the wife got her hunk 'o' junk, opps, I mean Dell.
Click to expand...

Actually it is kind of a bios setting and a Windows setting. I had my computer at home set up to dual boot to Windows XP and Red Hat 8. The bios was set to have num-lock on and Windows recognized that. When Red Hat would boot the num-lock was always off. I never could find a way to set the num-lock on in Red Hat. Also there is a way to have Windows boot with num-lock off or on, but the setting is somewhere in the registry.
 
TDM21 said:
Actually it is kind of a bios setting and a Windows setting. I had my computer at home set up to dual boot to Windows XP and Red Hat 8. The bios was set to have num-lock on and Windows recognized that. When Red Hat would boot the num-lock was always off. I never could find a way to set the num-lock on in Red Hat. Also there is a way to have Windows boot with num-lock off or on, but the setting is somewhere in the registry.
Click to expand...

Oh yeah, I had that problem with a old version of suse.

If I remember correctly, RedHat 8 didn't have that setting. I use RH 7.3KTSP and I can only find a setting under KDE. I'm sure it there, but it's hiding.
 
If you were to use an apple keyboard, if you have several language's on the pc would the kyeboard be able to recognize the other input and can you choose different languages too so that you can use other letters :confused:
 
jsalzer said:
You know - I still can't figure that one out. When would you *not* want your number pad to be turned on? Weird Windows people.
Click to expand...

With Num. lock off, the number keys works as a directional pad.
 
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