My new indigo/onyx/iris4D PS/2 keyboard & mouse converter

nuclear

Member
Jun 3, 2020
21
31
13
nuclear.mutantstargoat.com
Hey all,
I designed a new keyboard/mouse converter for the indigo (and I assume it should also work with the onyx and iris4d or even older computers). Here's a video showing it off and talking about how it works:

All the design files and firmware source code is available on github: https://github.com/jtsiomb/sgikbd
And I've also started making a project page for it on my website here: http://nuclear.mutantstargoat.com/hw/sgikbd/

I will update the page soon with more detailed build instructions, BOM, links to components and so on.

Everyone can make one for themselves or to sell to others, it's all free hardware/software under the GPLv3 (or later).

Let me know what you think.
 

Elf

Storybook / Retired, ex-staff
Feb 4, 2019
792
252
63
Mountain West (US)
Excellent work, and in record time too; it was great seeing that go from "I need this" to completed prototype in such a short time :)

As something that actually works it sure beats my 80% complete one! This was the board I put together but I never finished the software:
1659758747312.png
 
  • Wow
Reactions: TruHobbyist

nuclear

Member
Jun 3, 2020
21
31
13
nuclear.mutantstargoat.com
Thanks!

Elf: Your design looks very compact. Do you have schematics somewhere? I would be hard-pressed to assemble something like that with BGA and QFN components, since I don't have a hot air station, but it does look interesting. Tons of bypass caps :)

The main reason I managed to finish mine so fast, is that I took the PS/2 interfacing and keyboard code from a previous project I did a few years ago, which was adding a PS/2 keyboard port to the Amiga 500. So I only had to change the scancode translation tables, and implement the mouse part.
 

Elf

Storybook / Retired, ex-staff
Feb 4, 2019
792
252
63
Mountain West (US)
Thanks! For building the boards I usually reflow in an oven, only using hot air for rework if necessary (but usually not). I do tend to go overboard on EMI/RFI stuff with Pi networks on all the DC in and out :p

I can dig up the schematics although they're buried in a Windows VM somewhere, I will try to remember :)
 

steeph

New member
Feb 21, 2021
6
2
3
Germany
Thank you for building and sharing this! I was about to order parts to build the old PIC converter. But I love that we have a better one now, including the sources for the software.

If anybody happens to build too many of them and would like to sell one to be, please let me know. :)
 

nuclear

Member
Jun 3, 2020
21
31
13
nuclear.mutantstargoat.com
Project update:

I designed a 3D printable case for the board:
sgikbd_case_cad.png


The OpenSCAD source file is in the github repo. The next release will include pre-exported STL files in the tarball, but I need to tackle a couple of bugs in the firmware before I make a new release.

There are a couple of issues with some of the mice I tried; some of them do not transmit data packets on middle click, and a couple do not work at all. I'll probably have to rewrite the mouse handling code to make it more robust.
 

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