Keyboard Drivers: Making Keyboards Possible

A keyboard is the main device used to input things into a personal computer. The keyboard allows the user to perform many different tasks, including data input, menu access, game playing, web surfing, and much more. A typewriter keyboard and a PC keyboard are very similar, but the keyboard has some extra keys for use with a personal computer.

The Classification of Keyboard Keys

Keyboard keys can be classified as four different types, alphabet or typing keys, numeric keys, control keys, and function keys. Alphabet keys consist of all the letters in the alphabet, numeric keys are the same seventeen keys used on a calculator, the control keys include the arrows, home key, insert key, end key, delete key, the page up key, the page down key, the control key, the alternate key, and the escape key. Function keys are keys which are normally shortcuts to functions on the menu, like refresh, help, find, save, and others.

The placement of the keys will depend on the type of keyboard purchased, and who manufactured that specific keyboard. The keyboard is usually named after the row of letters, and some keyboard types include Qwerty, ABCDE, Dvorak, XpeRT, and AZERTY. The same principle is used for a PC keyboard as for a typewriter keyboard. The original layout, including Qwerty, is followed with a few function keys added in. Before, transferring data between a keyboard and a PC would take a long time, because the first keyboards were based on keypunches or a teletype machine.

To fix this problem with keyboards, technology called video display terminals, or VDT, was used along with technology concerning cathode ray tubes. For the first time, computer users could see a visual image of what was being typed, and this made the process much easier, as well as making any editing, deleting, and creating of text quicker and more convenient.

Specialized Keyboards and Drivers

Some keyboards are specially made and contain extra keys for specific functions. This group of keyboards can include Multimedia keyboards, which have extra keys to access music directly,the Internet, and other programs that are very common. Some control button options, like mute and volume control, may also be available on certain keyboards. Gaming keyboards are specifically designed with additional function keys that are intended to make gaming much easier. Virtual keyboards consist of a full-size visual image of a QWERTY keyboard, and this image is projected onto a surface. When a key is touched in the image on this type of keyboard, a unique signal is created which is linked to the specific key touched. This type of keyboard is also known as a projection keyboard.

The keyboards that are most commonly used currently are membrane or dome switch keyboards. When a key is pressed, the rubber dome underneath the key is pushed down, which in turn forces the conductive contact on the bottom of the dome to touch the conductive lines of the circuit, which is located beneath keys on the keyboard. This circuit creates the matrix of the keys, which is a circuit grid that allows each circuit to break at a point below the specific key. Pressing a key completes the circuit, and the corresponding electrical impulse is sent straight to the processor. Identification of the key is performed by the processor with the help of the key matrix, because the processor compares the character map in ROM with the key matrix circuit location. The correct number or letter is then shown on the screen.

Top manufacturers of keyboards include many names, some of which are Creative, DCT Factory, Kensington, Logitech, Microsoft, AOpen , Focus enhancements, Gefen Systems, Nortech Engineering, Inc., Shenzhen Lucallan Electronics CO. Ltd, Redmond Cable Corporation, Saitek, and TelePrint Systems Inc.

The number of keyboard drivers available is in the hundreds, possibly the thousands. Each keyboard manufacturer and type will have specific keyboard drivers that may need to be installed for the keyboard to work on a PC. It is common for many systems today to automatically detect hardware settings and drivers without extra installation, but if the keyboard uses USB or Firewire, or is a specialized keyboard type, however, it may be necessary to install keyboard drivers before the keyboard will function correctly.