Hi,
The "power to USB ports when PC is off" is quite common. I think this is intended for soft power on where a key on the keyboard can be pressed to turn the whole PC on. Some PCs have a setting in the BIOS where you can disable this also.

Just thought I'd post to say that I seem to have solved my barcode scanning problems.

I tried another make of barcode scanner and it all worked perfectly. The scanner which worked is a Unitech MS-265-1, the scanner which doesn't work is a CipherLabs 1000-K for the record.

Thanks for all the ...

Still have not resolved my barcode input problems - however the link I'm enclosing include details of interfacing a PS/2 Keyboard, and LCD directly with a single PC Serial port for use as a "terminal" - which is exactly what I'm trying to do.

The module the page describes actually seems pretty ...

Hi Bladerunner,

That looks pretty good - thanks for the pointer. However on first look it doesn't seem to support a full PC keyboard - which is what I need. I'll have a look at all the various info. they seem to have on that site.

Thanks again

Hi guys,
Thanks for all the postive comments!

Bladerunner - the reason I want the keyboard and LCD combined into one input into the PC is because I eventually want 1 PC to control possibily 4 screens/keyboard/barcode scanners at one time. I'm working on a system to control jobs in a workshop and ...

Hi Bladerrunner - thanks very much for your comments.

To answer the question - yes, if I connect the scanner to a normal PC and then scan the barcode with the focus on Word or Notepad then the characters of the barcode are "typed" into the application. There is no driver loaded or required for this ...

OK, having tried very hard to get this barcode thing to work I've now managed to capture the "keycodes" generated when a barcode is scanned. The unit is returning a consistent list of codes so there must be a connection.

The barcode number is 5018677033943
The actual keycodes returned are (in ...

I find that at a minimum you'd need to send Clear Screen code first, then send a new-line code after each line of text - as you know the length of each line (ie. the number of characters which will fit) on each line you can pad out with leading spaces if you want stuff centered, etc.

The docs that ...

Thanks for the info Tom.

HI Tom,

Thanks for that. However my barcode scanner has a keyboard connector on the end of its lead and can be conencted to a PC Keyboard socket - so it effectively is a keyboard as far as the connecting device is concerened.

I was disappointed that this unit is discontinued as it seems to be the ...

Relzool - if you knew someone with a little programming experience they could probably do this quite easily for you?

Hi,

When you connect the LCD to your system you send the information you want it to display as text characters via your serial port (or USB emulated serial port in the case of a USB connected device).

I don't know of a way you can directly take information from a webpage and automatically send it ...

Not sure how well this will come out - but if I scan a barcode with the following number in it "5018677033943" I get the result in my comms program "5

Hi,
I have the LCD control software from the website - but my module, the LK404-AT isn't in the list of supported LCDs within the program? When the program starts and I try to connect it says my module is type 0x31 and suggests I select this type from the list - but it isn't there.

I'm also ...

Hi,
I have the LK404-AT unit - 40x4 lines with AT keyboard connector on the rear.
Background is I have removed the large AT socket from the circuit-board (as it makes the module too deep to fit in the box I want to use!) and have connected the solder points to an external PS/2 style keyboard socket ...