My brother in Christ, I also used this
And I’m 17
My keyboard still uses a PS/2 port via adapter. 1986 Model M, still clicky.
This reminds me when a mouse was an option not a requirement
“do you know what ps/2 ports are?”
“holy cow, PlayStation 2? you must be AT LEAST 25!”
[dying inside intensifies]
IBM sure made naming pretty confusing aren’t they?
Ps/2 ports predated the PlayStation 2 by years. Sony made naming confusing in this case.
Remember when Star Wars Shadows of the Empire came out on PC and apparently, it’s been awhile so maybe I’m not remembering correctly, but you needed a special card for your keyboard to play it?
You guys had keyboards?
I said the real two genders.
There where three. The full din keyboard plug, serial for your mouse and that unholy thing on the back of your sound blaster on which you could connect a joystick.
Somewhere in my giant box of cables I have an adapter for attaching MIDI cables to the joystick port. When I actually used a MIDI keyboard with it, I had… variable success.
The first time I had a MIDI keyboard that just worked, it used USB as transport. (And it has worked great since. I think it’s the only USB Mini plug device device I still regularly use.)
Crazy thing is, MIDI is absolutely ancient. You’d imagine it’d work fine on the gameports, but nope. Legacy PC ports are cursed. Except audio jacks and serial ports, and VGA if you’re really into screwing things in place.
That’s a midi port
Years of cheaply made plastic membrane keyboards. I tried gaming on a membrane recently, and it was traumatizing.
Anybody else here play Oregon Trail on a teletype terminal? The school had 2 terminals in a small basement room that a few of us nerds could get access to for and hour or two a week, We would try to learn Basic, (with no one to teach us), and play Oregon Trail and get yelled at for going through some much thermal paper…
The computer mouse I still use today has a ball in it
I have a 286 which connects through a COM (serial) port. Its mouse also has a ball since solid state lasers hadn’t been invented
I’m very glad those mouses are maintainable and seem to last forever
When was the last time you cleaned it out?
Earlier this week it stopped going up and down, only side to side. Had to clean some crap off the x-axis wheel.
Good stuff, was imagining a 30 year old mouse with 30 year old crud! 🤮
Me too. As a toolmaker and engineer, space mice were a thing. But they were stupidly expensive and still are. I was unwilling to spend the money for one. So I use a ball mouse and I still do for when I need to do serious CAD work these days-- designing my next model steam engine.
I still have my old PC with AT keyboard connector and serial port for mouse.
lol PS/2 ports are the newer ones. There were larger AT ports and ADB ports in addition to the 25-pin(!) LPT port (printer mostly) and COM ports (random peripherals including early mice, pre ps/2)
These aren’t old. I had one in the early 2010s, it was handed down by a relative because my parents were poor.
I’m Gen Z
Bitch
please.
(Kidding, you’re not a bitch and this isn’t a contest. But if it was…)
I think the coleco vision had that.
I don’t recognize this… Is it some sort of RF switch for connecting a computer or game system to a TV while still passing through the antenna signal? Why does it have two cables coming out the side?
Yes, back when you could use a tube tv as a monitor over RF.
e: mine still works, and I’ve connected my ancient equipment to my newer flat televisions with it.
Yes, it’s for an old game console or computer.
There were two common ways to connect to the TV, and this box supports both: Coaxial (still around of course) and that flat ribbon cable, which ends in two separate U shaped clips. The screws on the bottom are for the clips on the ribbon cable from the physical antenna likely mounted on the roof.
I’m from Australia and I don’t think I ever saw a flat ribbon cable there. The RF cables in Australia mostly use Belling-Lee connectors (that you just push in) rather than F-type like in the USA (that you screw in), and that’s been a standard since the 1920s, so I don’t think there’s anything that predates it in Australia.
Australia does use F connectors for cable internet, but that’s mostly a legacy network now.
We had 300 ohm ribbon back when we had VHF TV. When we went to UHF in the '90s we also changed to coaxial cable
Coaxial cable works better at higher frequencies than 300 ohm, but needs shielding. 300 ohm doesn’t need shielding as any wave that hits it hits phase and anti-phase at the same time and has no effect
Then you’re not as old as me. 300 ohm ribbon was pretty common in Australia, especially on crappy bunny antennas. You’d need a 300/75 ohm matching balun before feeding it into the TV.
Ah, sorry I hadn’t even considered that it would be different in other places (just times) - I’m in the US, and those flat ones were present here at least as late as the 1980s and likely 1990s.
Cable Internet is very common in the US, in fact the most common kind. (2nd is DSL) So the F connectors (didn’t know that name) are everywhere. Also still used for actual antenna connections.
I am not sure if I have ever seen a Belling-Lee, but RCA used to be extremely common here until HDMI took over that role. (In fact RCA is what is on the switch box above to connect to the ‘computer’)
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I got that reference. Fuck, I’m old.
Please explain? I get that the chubby bird is speaking assembly, but I’m sure there’s more to it than that?
PS2 keyboards use interrupts rather than polling in USB, meaning every time a key is pressed the CPU stops what its doing to process it.
And having to pick your IRQ when installing anything into your machine, and the weird bugs that could happen if you mucked it up.
I’m wondering, is it still the case for mobos with Super IO?
Super IO does still use interrupts as far as I know. The PS/2 protocol is interrupt-driven, so it’s not possible to use a PS/2 keyboard or mouse without interrupts.
I didn’t know the PS2 had a keyboard
I know you’re probably being facetious… but the PS/2 port is what’s shown in the OP image.
that said the Playstation 2 had USB ports, you could just plug a regular keyboard into it
Cool! I had no idea it was deeper than just a physical interface change.
Keyboard slows down the CPU because it gets priority over whatever the CPU is working on so the keyboard could cause your system to lag.
Back then all we had was single core CPUs.
Markiplier farquad hybrid deep fried meme
Old enough
Yeah a 9 pin dsub. Still used widely in industry applications and other Fields. Edit: just saw that these were used for mouse or keyboard input, wth. This is truly old.
“hey guys–”
JOYSTICK PORT!
“not what I’m called.”
