sofakng wrote on 2021-06-20, 00:49:

Does anybody know what this female DB9 port is on the back of my IBM PC 350: […]
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Does anybody know what this female DB9 port is on the back of my IBM PC 350:

It looks like a second serial port but it's female (instead of male, like the port on the right). It also has an icon below that looks like an IR emitter?

Can this port be used as a secondary serial port with the right cable?

Also, what can the USB ports be used for with DOS?

Assuming yours is a type 6587, the leftmost port should be for IR (see page 31 21st page of linked PDF which is numbered page 11)

http://ps-2.kev009.com/pccbbs/commercial_desk … op/s78h5083.pdf

Ahhh, thanks for that manual. I was looking at a different one for the IBM PC 350.

What a waste ... the infrared port is pretty useful and I was hoping for a second serial port.

Are the USB ports also somewhat of a waste for DOS? (I was hoping for maybe a USB mouse?)

sofakng wrote on 2021-06-20, 01:13:

Ahhh, thanks for that manual. I was looking at a different one for the IBM PC 350.

What a waste ... the infrared port is pretty useful and I was hoping for a second serial port.

Are the USB ports also somewhat of a waste for DOS? (I was hoping for maybe a USB mouse?)

If the BIOS has PS/2 emulation functionality for USB connected mice and keyboards (and you enable it), using a USB mouse under DOS is as simple as loading a PS/2 mouse driver . Depending on the quality of said emulation, you may have issue in some games .

Thanks ... I couldn't find any BIOS settings and my USB keyboard doesn't work.

This PC came with a Pentium 166 so would these have been intended for Windows 3.1 or Windows 95 perhaps?

sofakng wrote on 2021-06-21, 20:32:

Thanks ... I couldn't find any BIOS settings and my USB keyboard doesn't work.

This PC came with a Pentium 166 so would these have been intended for Windows 3.1 or Windows 95 perhaps?

Sorry, but I am not sure I understand what you mean by "these have been intended for Windows 3.1 or Windows 95 perhaps" .

When USB mice/keyboards starting becoming popular, motherboard/system manufacturers started implementing PS/2 emulation functionality for USB connected keyboards and mice . Without such emulation functionality, any OS that does not explicitly have support USB HID (Human Interface Devices) such as mice keyboards will not work with a USB mouse or keyboard .

DOS has no native support for USB HID, nor does Windows 3.1 . Windows 9x does (USB support was not present in early Windows 95 releases and requires an update) . Also, on motherboards whose BIOS is not USB HID aware, even accessing CMOS setup using a USB keyboard will not work .

There are ways around this for DOS, but they use a lot of conventional memory. I have no idea if that applies to Windows 3.1 . See http://bretjohnson.us/

darry wrote on 2021-06-21, 21:44:

Sorry, but I am not sure I understand what you mean by "these have been intended for Windows 3.1 or Windows 95 perhaps" .

Sorry for the confusion. I'm trying to understand why this machine has USB ports if they don't allow keyboard/mouse (PS/2 emulation) under DOS or in the BIOS setup.

darry wrote on 2021-06-21, 21:44:

Without such emulation functionality, any OS that does not explicitly have support USB HID (Human Interface Devices) such as mice keyboards will not work with a USB mouse or keyboard .

It looks like this doesn't have the emulation functionality. If I plug-in a USB keyboard it errors with a "Keyboard error" during POST and I can't use the keyboard in the BIOS setup.

darry wrote on 2021-06-21, 21:44:

DOS has no native support for USB HID, nor does Windows 3.1 . Windows 9x does (USB support was not present in early Windows 95 releases and requires an update) . Also, on motherboards whose BIOS is not USB HID aware, even accessing CMOS setup using a USB keyboard will not work .

OK - That's what I was referring to. Perhaps this system came with Windows 95 which is why the motherboard has USB ports?

darry wrote on 2021-06-21, 21:44:

There are ways around this for DOS, but they use a lot of conventional memory. I have no idea if that applies to Windows 3.1 . See http://bretjohnson.us/

Thanks! I've seen that but it hasn't been updated since 2010 but I'll give it a look and see if can be helpful.

Thanks again so much for the help!

sofakng wrote on 2021-06-21, 23:23:

darry wrote on 2021-06-21, 21:44:

Sorry, but I am not sure I understand what you mean by "these have been intended for Windows 3.1 or Windows 95 perhaps" .

Sorry for the confusion. I'm trying to understand why this machine has USB ports if they don't allow keyboard/mouse (PS/2 emulation) under DOS or in the BIOS setup.

It wasn't really a "thing" until later under PC98 standard I think as an attempt to discard legacy ports, and later super 7 boards may have also supported it.

USB keyboard/mouse was much later than USB ports. To give you an idea in 1999 my PII 400 had standard PS/2 keyboard/mouse, a D15 joystick and a parallel scanner. Those USB ports didn't get used for years. I was a fairly standard computer user. I'm sure USB devices existed, but there was no real advantage to them. I still use PS/2 keyboard/mouse. Why change?

Yes, period correct use for a late 96, 1997 or 1998 machine is to ignore the existence of USB ports entirely 🤣

Don't think I ever saw a Pentium ship with anything earlier then Win95.
You have to remember Pentiums were crazy expensive in '95 and majority of people were still buying 486's
1996 and onwards prices had become "reasonable" Win95 had gained USB support and like USB scanners had started becoming available.

Yes, maybe scanners were the most attractive early use case. Typically ppl would have a printer before a scanner, and that would already be on your parallel port, so it meant faffing around with passthroughs or switchboxes or installing another parallel port to use a parallel scanner. Then late, late 90s we were seeing webcams and sync cables for PDAs and 1st gen MP3 players, and the flash drive didn't turn up until the 2000s.

Edit: SCSI scanners existed, but SCSI was never really a consumer thing.