USB Ports on wired keyboards useless

Hi! Same problem....

What I don't understand is how I have been using this "Apple Keyboard with Numeric Keypad" which includes 2 USB 2.0 ports (see http://store.apple.com/us/product/MB110LL/A?fnode=MTY1NDA1Mg&mco=MTA4Mzc4ODA ) to charge my iPod and iPhone for the past few years. As soon as I upgraded to 10.6.4 the USB ports have become useless. I used to be able to plug nearly any usb device into the keyboard ports and it would function normally, but after upgrading i can't even plug in a simple flash drive without this error popping up:

"A USB device needs more power. A USB device can't draw enough power to operate properly. If the device came with a power cord, plug it into an electrical outlet. Otherwise, connect the device to a USB port on your computer."

The weirdest part about, though, is that even when I plug in my iPod, my mac will not recognize it (and I get the same error message), but my iPod says on its screen that it is charging. So, obviously it is getting enough power from the USB ports on the keyboard.

It really is a kicker though, when you only have 3 USB ports on your mac and one is used by a printer, another by a backup hard drive, and the last by a keyboard which is supposed to give you an additional two USB ports, which then do not work for anything at all. I honestly have no idea why it would work perfectly before the update, but then not at all afterwards. I think it may be related to how the iPad cannot charge through the keyboard, but it should not affect my other USB devices!

Keyboard ports are notoriously underrated. Not only that, they use the slower USB1.1 transfer protocol which makes everything connected to it transfer data slowly.

Keyboard ports are notoriously underrated. Not only that, they use the slower USB1.1 transfer protocol which makes everything connected to it transfer data slowly.

That is true for older Macs and keyboards, but the aluminum keyboard's USB ports are 2.0, and if used with one of newer Macs, one of the keyboard ports can provide full USB power (500ma). When the Mac detects the keyboard on one of its USB ports, it raises the current limit on that port to more than 500ma so that there will be 500ma available on one of the keyboard ports.

I have heard of several users no longer being able to use some card readers after this latest update. I do not know why this happens but the only fix seems to be to roll the system software back to the prior version.

I wish we could flag this discussion as "Very Important"; the USB ports on my wired keyboard have been practically useless since I ran a system update on August 18th. System Profiler shows the keyboard ports are now getting only 100 mA. Nothing is working—not even a simple USB flash drive.

I've never notice this problem, possibly because I don't usually hook devices directly to the keyboard ports: I hook one or more powered USB hubs to the ports instead. As the hubs are powered, it doesn't matter what power levels come off the keyboard. Or anything else, for that matter.

He learns something new every day.

Thanks!

I'm having the same problem with a brand new Apple Keyboard with Numeric Keypad. System Profiler also shows this:

Current Available (mA): 100
Current Required (mA): 20