Windows XP does not work with any keyboard?

[cameronjones]

I'm having a very odd problem - out of nowhere (IE no hardware changes
precipitated the problem) no keyboard works in my Windows XP system.

I've tried two keyboards, one of which is USB and the other is PS2.
I've tried restoring the system to before the time of the problem. The
interesting thing is that typing on the keyboard does cause the system
speaker to beep with every key, including the Num Lock, shift etc keys.
Every key on the keyboard causes a system beep. I've unplugged the
keyboards and rebooted, and I've removed them in the device manager.
On reboot they are detected by windows but the same problem remains
after detection.

The keyboard works fine until Windows loads, and they work on other
computers, so to me, clearly this is a Windows issue. I would go ahead
and do a repair install of XP, but the copy I have has SP1, whereas the
system is at XP2, and I don't know if that will be possible or will
cause problems. This is an office system so it needs to be running
asap.

I think that's all the info I have to give, please offer and ideas.

Thanks!

 

[Malke]

I'm having a very odd problem - out of nowhere (IE no hardware changes
precipitated the problem) no keyboard works in my Windows XP system.

I've tried two keyboards, one of which is USB and the other is PS2.
I've tried restoring the system to before the time of the problem.
The interesting thing is that typing on the keyboard does cause the
system speaker to beep with every key, including the Num Lock, shift
etc keys.
Every key on the keyboard causes a system beep. I've unplugged the
keyboards and rebooted, and I've removed them in the device manager.
On reboot they are detected by windows but the same problem remains
after detection.

The keyboard works fine until Windows loads, and they work on other
computers, so to me, clearly this is a Windows issue. I would go
ahead and do a repair install of XP, but the copy I have has SP1,
whereas the system is at XP2, and I don't know if that will be
possible or will
cause problems. This is an office system so it needs to be running
asap.

Have you tried a System Restore to when the computer worked properly?
Start>Programs>Accessories>System Tools>System Restore
"Restore my computer to an earlier time"

You will need to slipstream SP2 into your XPSP1 installation disk. I
like Autostreamer, but there are others. This is very easy to do and
here are links:

http://www.simplyguides.net/guides/using_autostreamer/using_autostreamer.html
- AutoStreamer
http://www.msfn.org/articles.php?action=show&showarticle=49
http://www.windows-help.net/windowsxp/winxp-sp2-bootcd.html
http://www.theeldergeek.com/slipstreamed_xpsp2_cd.htm
http://www.webtree.ca/windowsxp/slipstream.htm

Do you have any specialized keyboard software running? Anything that
creates macros? Does the issue occur in Safe Mode? If not, then you've
narrowed it down to something running in Regular Mode that perhaps got
updated and is resident. Try clean-boot troubleshooting:

Clean boot in Windows XP - http://support.microsoft.com/kb/310353
Clean-boot advanced troubleshooting in Windows XP -
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/316434
and How to Troubleshoot By Using the Msconfig Utility in Windows XP -
http://support.microsoft.com/?id=310560

Malke

 

[cameronjones]

I already tried the restore as stated in my original post. There is no
special keyboard software running to my knowledge, and from what I've
read, I don't need to have SP2 slipstreamed onto my repair CD for it to
work.

Thanks

 

[cameronjones]

Oh and yes, it does happen in safe mode as well.

 

[cameronjones]

Problem solved by repair install, and now I'm up to SP2 again. Thanks
for your efforts

 

[paulmd]

Oh and yes, it does happen in safe mode as well.

Sounds Virus-like, t'me. Or it could be a nasty driver issue.