I actually wanted a PS2 port because it works with interrupts rather than polling but they aren’t really included anymore.
I feel like they don’t make boards for people like me who want small boards with a super niche port.
When a MoDT Mini-ITX board comes out with a PS2 port I will buy that instantly
I’m this old
Shit. I know what this is. Goddammit.
An elegant port for a more civilized time
Nothing civilized about no hot plugging. Had to restart the whole damn computer, if the cable was loose or out at startup.
I loved the PCs that had Ctrl + up as a shortcut to flip the monitor orientation. I think it was a Dell thing?
My favourite prank was to flip the screen upside down then unplug the keyboard. Good luck saving your work fuck face
Ok Satan
I wanna say there’s a Windows hotkey for that now.
Maybe, but it’s just not the same if you can plug your keyboard back in and fix it. CURSE YOU USB
skill issue
I’m pretty sure it doesn’t hot plug for anyone. Yes, even the very skilled.
I remember a time when they weren’t colour coded…
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
still is
/i3gang
I tried to explain these ports to a salesperson at micro center, and they have me the dull cow stare.
I was looking at some PC’s at Best Buy and a salesman came up to try and give me the hard sell. I asked if I could buy the PC without Windows on it for a discount.
“How would you use your computer without Windows on it?”
“I’m going to install Linux”
“What’s that?”
“It’s an operating system”
Blank stare
“Like Windows or OS X…”
Blank Stare
Sigh “I already have a copy of Windows at home”
“Oh! Well I don’t think you can do that, no.”
To be honest, I think that was probably to appropriate response. Information about ps/2 is not really relevant to them or any customer that they are going to help
“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?
Not really? I mean it was a whole thing. OS/2, PS/2, I think maybe some PC/2? I can’t remember. Anyway it was all branded together.
Ps/2 ports predated the PlayStation 2 by years. Sony made naming confusing in this case.
How can ports of a game predate the platform itself? That makes zero sense.
(/s)
My brother in Christ, I also used this
And I’m 17
old
I’m fine., thanks.
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
It’s supposed to be, but it’s really just a joystick port.
That’s how most people used it, yeah. But it’s meant to be a midi port which is why it’s on sound cards.
It often worked poorly as such though. While it worked great as a joystick port. I drew my own conclusions.
Tbf most things worked poorly back then. I constantly had to pop my 386 open and jiggle the ram to get it to boot
That’s… not typical though.
The computer mouse I still use today has a ball in it
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! 🤮
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
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.
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…
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)
