There have been many complaints about keyboards. I have one too, but it is NOT the keyboard, and it is not the USB voltage.
Someone from Element14, I need you.
I bought, as a peripheral for my RPi-B, a 89-key mini-keyboard by Gearhead, Model KB1700U, E14/Newark Stock Number 43W5953.
First, to assure myself that there is nothing wrong with this keyboard, I plugged it into an USB port on my desktop PC. Called up Notepad, tested the keys, and it worked fine. Press the Caps Lock and the little CL pilot light comes on. hey, allll right.
Plug it into my RPi and many keys are not mapped correctly, the ampersand (@) and the quote (") are exchanged, the caps Lock is inoperative, many more keys are incorrectly displayed. Some symbols probably do not exist on a US keyboard, like £.
After I stopped crying, I read in the "Raspberry Pi User Guide" (Upton [not Kate] and Halfacree are the authors) that when you start adding USB peripherals to the RPi, there may be a voltage problem that causes an error in the interpretation of the character typed. They recommended an independently powered USB Hub.
So I bought a Powered USB Hub. Made absolutely no difference. The @ appears on sreen as ", and vice versa.
The real problem is that the Configuration Screen offers up a long table of keyboards. I don't know if this is true, but in a book needing extensive editing, "Getting Started with Raspberry Pi" by Richardson & Wallace, the Configuration Screen asks you to choose from a very long, "robust list of generic keyboards with a UK-Style mapping layout" (paraphrased). Huh? I am in the US. The British £ shows up instead of my $. "Therein lies the rub!" or @Therein lies the rub!@
Will someone from Element14/Newark (or anyone that knows the answer to this) explain to me, how should a US-bought keyboard be set up in the configuration screen. If it can not, then it should not be sold as a specific peripheral for the Raspberry Pi. I wrote twice to Gearhead to ask which keyboard in the list would work to map their keyboard and got no response.
That is it. Low voltage is not responsible.
Anyone out there know? I can not be the only US resident to be in this situation. The solution, if available, should be prominently posted (or included in the keyboard box) if there is one that works.
Chuck
