Yosemite keyboard not working

My apple wired keyboard has also stopped working with Yosemite. I plugged a USB drive into the keyboard and my imac popped up saying remove the item that is using too much power. When I did that, it just stopped working completely.

I tried resetting the PRAM with no luck. Restarting did nothing and even taking the power cable out for 15 minutes did nothing.

I've found a work around by using a USB extension cable but I don't feel like that's a good enough solution.

Hopefully there will be a solid fix soon.

Same issues for me.

Keyboard doesn't work on wake or initial setup using a Thunderbolt display.

Works fine directly off MBP.

Plug in - unplug no effect.

Extension cable for keyboard works.

So a bit of fiddling needed upon wake...

I too am waiting for this (weird) issue to get fixed.

Hi,

i have a similar problem. Keyboard does not work with de "dot" key or the "9".

I have a switcher for screen / key / Mouse. When I switch to PC and Back all runs fine for a couple of minutes.

Keyboard etc. worked w/o problem under 10.9x.. very annoying issue.

Rocket scientist !! This happened to me too, but used your suggestion. Plugged my iPhone into the usb port on wired keyboard. That did the trick. Thanks to all for you help!

same issue with my wired keyboard plugged into cinema display. I unplugged the keyboard and plugged back in - simple fix for me but have to do this every am since "upgrading" to Yosemite when I plug my macbook air into my cinema display. Also my mac mail is completely hosed - crashes the computer after ten minutes due to memory pressure - but that's on another thread. 😟

A slight variant of this trick worked for me: I plugged in an iPad to the keyboard's USB port. Voila!

I was a total skeptic. This cockamaime workaround discovered by awhit613 DOES work. I have dealt with this Apple USB keyboard lack of responsiveness issue in the past, and always; it took an OS X update to solve the problem long-term. Perhaps irrelevant to this this discussion I use a late 2013 MBP that I connect to a 27" thunderbolt display. There are 3 USB 2.0 and 1 firewire peripheral connected to the display and a USB 3.0 4-way router on the floor behind my desk. So the MPB has three wires going in/out of it: AC power adapter, one USB and one Thunderbolt. As soon as I installed Yosemite, the keyboard stopped responding to include caps lock light, but everything else was fine. Multiple re-starts.. no-go. I shut down and booted the laptop *without* any USB or thunderbolt connections, then only inserted the Apple USB keyboard and power cord. Again, no response. Tried this multiple times in fact, with and without power cord. Just now, I tried awhite613's idea to plug into an old PC we use to play movies. Keyboard worked fine. Then I plugged it into my MBP right after booting it up -- with ALL peripherals attached as described above. No problem at all -- it worked fine. This is clearly a firmware/software issue. I want to note that this EXACT same problem persisted in late 2013 -- it required no less than five calls to Apple Care in addition to swapping out the Apple USB keyboard -- all of which did nothing to solve the unresponsiveness problem until an OS X update. So infuriating!! ..I'm back to square one again.

I've been having the same problem with my keyboard becoming totally unresponsive, but it's intermittent. Sometimes it works on startup, sometimes it doesn't. I'm using a late 2012 Mac Mini. I do not have the problems some have reported with certain keys not working. The "unplug/plug back in" method only works some of the time. The work around that consistently works is unplugging the usb keyboard from the mac I'm using it on, plug it into ANY other computer to "turn it back on", and then plug it back into the mac I want to use. Major pain in the butt, so I keep an small old PC laptop on my desk so it's handy, Apple really needs to fix this NOW because it's just one of a zillion problems that are making Yosemite unusable in a real world environment. It's TOO glitchy and UNSTABLE to use for anything of importance.

Had no problems at all during beta on several different Macs. Since upgrading to the new release, Ive had nothing but trouble trouble trouble with network connectivity, keyboards unresponsive, usb devices being "forgotten" in the middle of use, software glitches with Apple and non-Apple apps, wake/sleep problems, weird startup glitches. I've completely "clean" reinstalled onto brand new SSD's and even tried reinstalling onto new SATA disks, the problem seems to be Yosemite is just not ready for public consumption and is still loaded with bugs and problems that may be months away from getting fixed. Even on macs where I've kept "everything Apple" and isolated from my other network machines, there are problems, so even a "clean" "all-Apple" installation doesn't work properly. Never experienced such a horrible upgrade on any equipment or operating system in over 30 years. Maybe Yosemite works on the brand new hardware Apple is rolling out, but it doesn't work well enough to get by on their older equipment. If it wasn't such a hassle to revert, I'd go back to Mavericks. At this point, only people who are in a position to "experiment" should be using Yosemite, and I would not recommend that anyone who relies on their computer for important work to upgrade until Yosemite is a viable, working OS. Right now, for far too many of us, it's no where near ready. IT IS STILL VERY MUCH A BETA PRODUCT and should not have been released yet.

I did what some of the other said worked for them. Luckily I have a Mac Book Pro and took my keyboard and pluged it into it. When I repulged it into my iMac it magically worked.

I will update with any problems with the keys. So far so good.

Send Apple feedback. They won't answer, but at least will know there is a problem. If enough people send feedback, it may get the problem solved sooner.

Feedback

My wired Apple keyboard stopped working after the Yosemite update. I plugged it into another computer like other people have done and it worked for about two weeks. Stopped working last week and I haven't been able to get it working since (works with Windows 8 fine). Typing this on an Apple wireless keyboard which I just happened to have sitting around but I miss the number pad and the extra room...keeping fingers crossed they are making the wired keyboard stop working on purpose, to force people to upgrade to a full-size wireless keyboard with number pad they are about to announce (wishful thinking) 😉

I am now having this same issue with the dead wired keyboard after "upgrading" to Yosemite.

It effects Boot Camp as well, so when I reboot to Option into windows, once Windows begins booting I can not sign in to Windows. I have to plug the keyboard into my MacBook and then back into the iMac. Standard Dell keyboard does not have this issue. This really needs to be fixed.

matildabe speaks the truth. The "plug the keyboard into another computer, then back into the computer that it's unresponsive to" worked for about two weeks after I installed Yosemite (when the problem began)... but not after the 10.10.1 software update the other day. Now it's just completely unresponsive on this computer (though again, works fine on other computers). I was on the phone w/ Apple for over three hours about this on the morning following the software update. My understanding is that they are advising OS X software engineers about this terrible issue. I found it amusing that when I called and referenced this very thread, it had 3,701 views. By the end of the call, this thread had 4,200 views!!! Mind you, I did the update as soon as it appeared on my computer, hoping the update was going to fix the keyboard problem, which emerged after installing Yosemite weeks ago. As Murphy's Law would have it, the update only made the problem worse. Maddening!!!!

I also had the issue of not being able to use the keyboard keys to adjust the volume on my MacBook Air, either on the built-in keyboard, or bluetooth. I was able to solve the problem by going to System Preferences > Sound. Select Output. Options are listed below "Select a device for sound output." Choose "Internal Speakers." Worked for me! BTW, the other sound output options listed were other Apple devices in the building with AirPlay, and the external monitor I have connected to my laptop.

Same issue. I chose not to drag my keyboard around so I called AppleCare. Talked to Zack and he walked me thru a fix which consisted of

power down

power up then press

command, option, P and R at the same time

after the 2nd chime release

password came up and I was able to type it in