Can't pair apple wireless keyboard in Windows

HI Andy,

Go here. Bluetooth: How to set up your Apple Wireless Keyboard Might be some helpful information there.







Carolyn 🙂

' Er... I'm afraid my input isn't going to be particularly positive...
' To my knowledge the wireless (BT) mouse and keyboard both are useless in Windows. Don't ask me why - they are both using Bluetooth after all - probably pecific to driver support... Essentially both devices - though they are detectable and pairable - cannot be used in Windows.

' I would love to be proven wrong of course - I have both devices myself and love to use them when booted into MacOS, and would dearly love to continue using them on my MBP when booted into Windows - but, well, yeah... I don't think I can or will be proven wrong because this just happens to be the state of things to the best of my knowledge!

~Menageryl
-Jack of All Trades, Master of Some!-

Carolyn Samit wrote:
HI Andy,

Go here. Bluetooth: How to set up your Apple Wireless Keyboard Might be some helpful information there.

Carolyn 🙂

Wow. You provided such USELESS information! He is having a problem pairing in WINDOWS under Boot Camp. Your link explains how to do it under Mac OS X.

I could not pair my alum wireless keyboard under Windows XP Pro either. When trying to enter passkey, Windows immediately said time expired as I was typing in the numbers. I paired the Mighty Mouse until I restarted, then it would not connect. Then it gets worse. While trying to uncheck the box to disable the warning about allowing bluetooth devices to connect, the control panel would not save changes and crashed with Not Responding. Tried uninstalling the driver and reinstalling. No luck. Now Bluetooth is disabled in Windows, claims error 43. Even worse, Bluetooth is now gone from Mac OS X! Under System Profiler, it says No Info Found for Bluetooth!

So I was able to get Bluetooth back on the Mac and on the Windows side. Shutting down the Mac was the only way. Bluetooth is working again on the Mac side. I had deleted the Bluetooth drivers on Windows since Windows shut down the Bluetooth. Rebooting to Windows triggered the Microsoft and Apple drivers to be re-installed and re-enable Bluetooth.

The Mighty Mouse pairs without a problem. The aluminum keyboard will not pair. It remains in pairing mode and will not recognize any pairing password, nor will it pair with no password. Errors result with unable to communicate with the device.

What is worse is that when you reboot to Mac, you have no Bluetooth. You have to shut down again and restart, then Bluetooth returns, and of course the keyboard must be repaired on the Mac side. So basically Bluetooth on Windows is a negative. Can't be done, nor can you switch back and forth. Anyone that can figure it out, please let me know. I am running WinXP Pro SP3 on the Boot Camp side.

It is nice and fast. The main purpose of installing Windows was to play old Mac games that will no longer run, either on Intel or PowerPC/Mac OS X, but are Windows Hybrid discs. So they should play under XP at full speed even though they are outdated on the Mac side.

' Peter, I'm sorry to say this, but it sounds like you specifically either have a genuine hardware problem, or your Windows installation is sicker than most. You should never see the sort of symptoms you're talking about in a normal, healthy system!!!

' However, the bad / sad fact of the matter is that, even were you not in the position you're in, you couldn't use either keyboard or mouse when in Windows!
' I am able to (and have done - my Vista system is still configured successfully with 'em - I haven't removed them despite them being useless!) propperly pair both devices on Vista without much of a challenge - pretty standard fair actually... But that's all a smokescreen. Despite this - and despite being able to actually query each device over bluetooth for the services they provide and so on - they still cannot be actually used!!! No matter what, there is never any response from the OS to input or actions on either keyboard or mouse.

' <Shrugs> What can I tell ya. It does sound like Peter needs to move onto solving his bluetooth problem though anyways - in case this causes trouble for him (you) at some later date with devices that actually would be useful!

' Later!
~Menageryl
-Jack of All Trades, Master of Some!-

Message was edited by: Menageryl

The solution was simple. Shut down the Mac and restart it and Bluetooth is back on once again in both Mac and Windows. I deleted the Windows drivers and when I relaunched in Windows, the Microsoft and Apple Bluetooth drivers were re-installed on the fly. So Bluetooth works in both Mac and Windows. However, I still cannot pair the aluminum keyboard under Windows. It finds the keyboard, but won't recognize any passkey entered on the keyboard. If I choose no passkey option, Windows claims to see it, but nothing can be typed. When you close and re-open the Bluetooth Control Panel, the keyboard is gone. The Mighty Mouse works great. No problem pairing that.

I don't plan on using Windows often. I got XP Pro for $80 on eBay so it was a great deal. My purpose for Windows was to run older Mac games that no longer run, either because they are written for PowerPC/Mac OS X, or they are PowerPC/Mac OS 9. In either case, the particular games are Windows hybrids. So even though they won't run under the Mac OS, they should run just fine under Windows. Games such as Riven (on DVD), Myst III, Myst IV, and Myst V, all which are Windows Hybrids.

So I can just grab a USB keyboard when needed.

I can confirmed that apple wireless keyboard and mouse are working fine with vista x64 and x32. Choose let window choose passkey for keyboard connection and "0000" for mouse.

Hi, I had a similar problems to this - and the following worked for me.

Un-pair the keyboard in Mac OS10.

Run BootCamp and Launch Windows.

Pair the keyboard in Windows (let Windows set the password)

Your keyboard should now work, plus it'll work when you start up in Mac mode too (don't ask me why - it just does)

Worked for me - I'm happy, hope your happy too!

Paul

That didn't work for me. Tried the trick of un-pairing the kb in OS X, then booting in Windows Vista Ultimate. As usual, the Apple wireless mouse was recognized instantly but the keyboard was not.

I instituted a Bluetooth search, it found the Apple wireless kb, NEXT brought the message "Connecting with wireless kb" but it never connected. Just sat there with that spinning grapefruit.

**** thing is, until I updated Vista Ultimate with Service Pack 1 and 2, I had no problem working with the Apple wireless devices. One suspects that an updated driver was in the package that shouldn't have been, or some other software needs to be updated.

Since there were also 35! Vista Ultimate software updates in the 6 weeks since I last updated, there's no way to begin to find the newly installed program that screwed up the wireless kb in Win VU.