Mac OS X not recognizing usb ports (keyboard/mouse)

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Mac OS X not recognizing usb ports (keyboard/mouse)

I have recently acquired a iMac G3 M5521 blueberry and cannot get that usb keyboard and mouse to work. I can boot into open firmware and single-user mode and use the keyboard fine. But when I let the machine boot normally it errors and says "You need to restart your computer. Hold down the Power button for several seconds or press the Restart button." If I leave the keyboard and mouse disconnected, the computer will boot correctly. then once it boots correctly, i plug in the keyboard/mouse, the caps light blinks once and nothing. the computer is still running but it wont let me type a user name to log on. anybody have any ideas?

iMac G3 M 5521, Mac OS X (10.0.x)

Posted on Aug 3, 2008 3:42 AM

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Answer 1

Aug 3, 2008 10:10 AM in response to RicanBeans

Did you try both USB ports?

Try it with just the mouse or just the keyboard. One or the other may be bad.

If you have some other USB device, like a printer or USB hub, try it with something other than the keyboard or mouse plugged in.

If any device causes this problem, the USB ports may be faulty.

You can try resetting the PMU (power management)

http://mrjcd.com/junk/PMU.jpg

and resetting PRAM

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1379

Also, check the PRAM battery to make sure it is not dead or weak. It looks like this one

http://eshop.macsales.com/item-specials/Newer%20Technology/BAA36VPRAM/

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Answer 2

RicanBeans Author

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Aug 4, 2008 4:42 AM in response to Kenichi Watanabe

The battery is good. These are the following steps i took.

-> I unplugged the comptuer, reseted the PMU.
-> I pressed the power button on the keyboard, booted to open-firmware. I typed reset-nvram, then reset-all. the computer rebooted.
-> I then used the combo cmd-opt-p-r to reset the pram. rebooted.

the computer still boots to the apple logo with the loading circle and then locks and says to reboot my computer. or i let it boot without the usb keyboard plugged in, but it wont recognize the keyboard after it boots. ive reset everything and the usb ports work, otherwise i could not use the command hot keys. its almost as if the kernel is freaking out when its loading the usb drivers (im a windows guy, sorry if its not called drivers). i can boot to single-user mode, and the keyboard works. i dont know what i can do with single user mode. im guessing its apple's "safe-mode" equivalent.

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Answer 3

Aug 4, 2008 8:44 AM in response to RicanBeans

If you can boot from a Mac OS X installation disc, do so. Insert the disc and hold down the C key during startup. Are there any keyboard issues when booting from another system?

If there are no issues, you may want to just re-install the OS. There is probably some issue with the current system. Since the Mac is new to you, if you don't mind erasing the data, you can click on the Options button in Installer and use the +Erase and Install+ option to give the iMac a fresh start.

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