What is it?

This is a single listing covering one of a variety of products with a common theme. They allow a keyboard from a vintage 8-bit computer to be used as a USB keyboard on a desktop PC, laptop or with a Raspberry Pi or other embedded system.

Why did you make it?

I started making these about 15 years ago, as a way to give life to the empty cases and keyboards or machines that were beyond repair, and were being used as spares to keep other machines going.

I stopped making these about 5 years ago when it appeared that too many people were buying working (or at least repairable) computers to convert. That made me sad, so I stopped selling them.

Since then, people keep asking for them, so I have brought them back. But please use these responsibly and do not take working computers out of circulation. Or at least if you must, make sure to pass the boards onto someone who can make use of them. If you are in the UK, I am happy to accept any boards you have, outside of the UK it does not make sense due to shipping costs and import duties.

What makes it special?

These boards are custom designed with the correct keyboard connectors on, so they are plug and play.

The keyboard mappings are stored in the microcontroller firmware, so you just plug the keyboard into one side and a USB cable into the other and start typing and the keys come out with the nearest key that is available on a standard USB keyboard.

Options

To make things easier to manage, I have listed all of the versions I current have available on here.

I used to offer a choice of desktop mappings, mappings for emulators and a version with a mode switch to select between those. Not all versions support that, so that option is "where supported".

Some I still have boards built up from the old days. Some I will have to build specially, so those prices are higher than they used to be.

I am bound to have forgotten several of the ones I have built in the past, so if you don't see the one you are looking for please ask. I don't plan to actively develop these, but if you have a request for a system not shown, let me know and I will work out a price for development.

The following boards are available:

• Acorn Archimedes A3000/A3010/A3020
• Acorn Electron
• normal desktop use
• with keyword expansion for Risc OS Pico
• Amiga 500
• Keyboard with dual joystick - External USB connection
• Keyboard with dual joystick - Internal USB connection
• Keyboard with dual joystick - Internal USB connection with RCA photo audio pass through
• Amiga 600
• Amiga 1200
• Amstrad CPC464 - they type with green and white membranes (not wired keyboards)
• Amstrad CPC6128 - membrane version
• Atari ST
• for keyboard without joystick ports
• for keyboard with joystick ports
• BBC Micro
• With piezo to make the power on noise
• With driver for original speaker to make the power on noise
• Commodore 16
• Commodore 64
• Keyboard only
• Keyboard + Dual joystick
• Commodore PET
• Standard 20 way keyboard connector for chicket / graphics / business keyboards
• Standard 20 way keyboards plus SK D connector
• Commodore plus/4
• Dragon 32
• Oric 1 / Oric Atmos
• QL
• TI99/4A
• ZX Spectrum Rubber Key / ZX Spectrum +
• ZX Spectrum grey +2
• ZX Spectrum black +2
• ZX81
• ZX81 membrane in a ZX81 case
• ZX81 membrane separate use (reversed connections to the membrane)
• Arcade joystick
• 4 directions + 8 fire buttons
• 4 directions + 8 fire buttons + 64 keys (main keyboard keys)

What is included

• A single USB Keyboard controller for the system selected
• Mounting pillars
• USB A-B lead (usually black 2M/6ft lead, let me know if you have a different preference and I will see what I can do)

What is included

• No case, keyboards or membranes are included, only the controller boards, pillars and USB lead

What it does not do

• They do not give you a reason to gut a working computer. Please do not do this.
• They do not allow you to use a USB keyboard as an input on a vintage computer - this is the other way around.
• They do not support the PS/2 protocol. It is USB only.
• It will probably not work with with most of the FPGA based emulators like the MiSTer because of that.
• They do not support remapping of keys. The maps are fixed, although you can use standard operating system keyboard remapping tools to change things if you don't like them.