XPost: alt.comp.hardware.pc-homebuilt

After having spilled way too many cups of coffee on my old keyboard, I
swapped it out for an AST keyboard (with a QC sticker from 2020).

Works fine except when it doesn't.
The USB seems to fall asleep.

When I reboot, the USB is asleep every time.
When I leave it running overnight (the CPU never sleeps as it used to not
wake up so I have sleeping & hibernation all turned off), it goes asleep.

Why?

To wake it up, every time, all I need to do is unplug & replug the USB.
But why?

I know it's asleep because I can type away with abandon & nothing happens.
I know it's awake because when I unplug/replug, I hear the familiar sound.

Is there a software wakeup command?

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XPost: alt.comp.hardware.pc-homebuilt

On Sun, 6/1/2025 7:32 AM, Randy Jones wrote:

After having spilled way too many cups of coffee on my old keyboard, I swapped it out for an AST keyboard (with a QC sticker from 2020).

Works fine except when it doesn't.
The USB seems to fall asleep.

When I reboot, the USB is asleep every time.
When I leave it running overnight (the CPU never sleeps as it used to not wake up so I have sleeping & hibernation all turned off), it goes asleep.

Why?

To wake it up, every time, all I need to do is unplug & replug the USB.
But why?

I know it's asleep because I can type away with abandon & nothing happens.
I know it's awake because when I unplug/replug, I hear the familiar sound.

Is there a software wakeup command?

It's most likely to be a bad hardware design. In some way.

You can look at this.

https://helpdesk.flexradio.com/hc/en-us/articles/204290929-How-to-Disable-Power-Management-for-USB-connected-Devices

"Selective Suspend"

Uwe has tried to restart a very tiny part of the USB hardware,
but this is not indicative of a general (even fix a keyboard) utility.
These storage type issues have seen more work, than other
kinds of USB hardware types.

https://www.uwe-sieber.de/drivetools_e.html

RestartSrDev V3.1 - restarts "Safely Removed" devices which have the "Code 21" or "Code 47" problem code

I think a bottom line observation, is if the computer has
PS/2 and you own a PS/2 capable keyboard, then that is going
to be more reliable than a raft of USB issues of one sort or
another. PS/2 is a really dumb interface, and "it works".

Paul

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XPost: alt.comp.hardware.pc-homebuilt

On 2025/6/1 18:50:12, Paul wrote:
[]

"Selective Suspend"

Uwe has tried to restart a very tiny part of the USB hardware,
but this is not indicative of a general (even fix a keyboard) utility.
These storage type issues have seen more work, than other
kinds of USB hardware types.

https://www.uwe-sieber.de/drivetools_e.html

RestartSrDev V3.1 - restarts "Safely Removed" devices which have the "Code 21" or "Code 47" problem code

(I wonder if that would have sorted out the problem I had with my
printer a few days ago? It ran out of paper, and Windows 10 knew that -
but when I put some more in, and the printer's own display panel
indicated it was happy [I even cycled its power - and, I think, the
laptop's], Windows still thought it was out of paper. [I was not alone,
when I searched.] I can't remember what I did to get it going again.)

I think a bottom line observation, is if the computer has
PS/2 and you own a PS/2 capable keyboard, then that is going
to be more reliable than a raft of USB issues of one sort or
another. PS/2 is a really dumb interface, and "it works".

Paul

And, it doesn't use up a USB port.
(It isn't hot-pluggable, though - it has to be present at boot.)
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/<1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf


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XPost: alt.comp.hardware.pc-homebuilt

On Sun, 6/8/2025 7:26 AM, J. P. Gilliver wrote:

On 2025/6/1 18:50:12, Paul wrote:
[]

    "Selective Suspend"

Uwe has tried to restart a very tiny part of the USB hardware,
but this is not indicative of a general (even fix a keyboard) utility.
These storage type issues have seen more work, than other
kinds of USB hardware types.

https://www.uwe-sieber.de/drivetools_e.html

    RestartSrDev V3.1 - restarts "Safely Removed" devices which have the "Code 21" or "Code 47" problem code

(I wonder if that would have sorted out the problem I had with my printer a few days ago? It ran out of paper, and Windows 10 knew that - but when I put some more in, and the printer's own display panel indicated it was happy [I even cycled its power -

and, I think, the laptop's], Windows still thought it was out of paper. [I was not alone, when I searched.] I can't remember what I did to get it going again.)

I think a bottom line observation, is if the computer has
PS/2 and you own a PS/2 capable keyboard, then that is going
to be more reliable than a raft of USB issues of one sort or
another. PS/2 is a really dumb interface, and "it works".

   Paul

And, it doesn't use up a USB port.
(It isn't hot-pluggable, though - it has to be present at boot.)

Usually for printers, there is a status dialog somewhere, which
is the Windows spool server, and giving that a flick ought to have
been enough. I do have a printer now, but I use it once a year
(to print off taxes) :-) I tend to forget the details. And I don't
think stuffing paper in the printer and making LCD happy, was enough.
And that was on a long USB cable to the kitchen table (room for
temporary printing there).

Paul

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XPost: alt.comp.hardware.pc-homebuilt

On 2025/6/8 14:40:7, Paul wrote:

On Sun, 6/8/2025 7:26 AM, J. P. Gilliver wrote:

[]

(I wonder if that would have sorted out the problem I had with my printer a few days ago? It ran out of paper, and Windows 10 knew that - but when I put some more in, and the printer's own display panel indicated it was happy [I even cycled its power -

and, I think, the laptop's], Windows still thought it was out of paper. [I was not alone, when I searched.] I can't remember what I did to get it going again.)
[]

Usually for printers, there is a status dialog somewhere, which
is the Windows spool server, and giving that a flick ought to have
been enough. I do have a printer now, but I use it once a year
(to print off taxes) :-) I tend to forget the details. And I don't
think stuffing paper in the printer and making LCD happy, was enough.
And that was on a long USB cable to the kitchen table (room for
temporary printing there).

Paul

I found a status _column_ in the printers area, but getting the (W10) PC
to _refresh_ that. Finding the thing that showed pending documents for
the printer - and deleting them - didn't work. Others mentioned the
spooler, but I was never sure where that was.

I too print sufficiently rarely (though more than once a year) that I
gave up on the money pit that is inkjet printing; a laser printer will
work fine even if not used for months, and won't occasionally clean
itself thus using up ink. I actually got an ex-professional one (Samsung
775) for £25; it's about a two-foot cube that I now possibly couldn't
lift. (The toner cart.s cost more than that, but with the amount of
printing I do, all but black will last me years each.)
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/<1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf


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XPost: alt.comp.hardware.pc-homebuilt

On Mon, 6/9/2025 6:37 AM, J. P. Gilliver wrote:

On 2025/6/8 14:40:7, Paul wrote:

On Sun, 6/8/2025 7:26 AM, J. P. Gilliver wrote:

[]

(I wonder if that would have sorted out the problem I had with my printer a few days ago? It ran out of paper, and Windows 10 knew that - but when I put some more in, and the printer's own display panel indicated it was happy [I even cycled its power

- and, I think, the laptop's], Windows still thought it was out of paper. [I was not alone, when I searched.] I can't remember what I did to get it going again.)

[]

Usually for printers, there is a status dialog somewhere, which
is the Windows spool server, and giving that a flick ought to have
been enough. I do have a printer now, but I use it once a year
(to print off taxes) :-) I tend to forget the details. And I don't
think stuffing paper in the printer and making LCD happy, was enough.
And that was on a long USB cable to the kitchen table (room for
temporary printing there).

    Paul

I found a status _column_ in the printers area, but getting the (W10) PC to _refresh_ that. Finding the thing that showed pending documents for the printer - and deleting them - didn't work. Others mentioned the spooler, but I was never sure where that

was.

I too print sufficiently rarely (though more than once a year) that I gave up on the money pit that is inkjet printing; a laser printer will work fine even if not used for months, and won't occasionally clean itself thus using up ink. I actually got an

ex-professional one (Samsung 775) for £25; it's about a two-foot cube that I now possibly couldn't lift. (The toner cart.s cost more than that, but with the amount of printing I do, all but black will last me years each.)

https://superuser.com/questions/1725000/force-windows-to-check-for-printer-status

net stop spooler
net start spooler

Apparently that will cause the print queue to update.

The spooler is a streaming server that "serves pages"
to the printer. The printer status dialog, would normally
show the overview of what is going on (whether a document
has been processed yet, whether the print job is stuck).
The spooler should be able to stream prints to multiple
printers at the same time, using FIFO queues for each
printer, and status for each queue.

In the case of print protocols that resort to sending pixmaps
to printers (no PCL or PS), those can be data-intensive. If you had
enough of them running in parallel. Some inkjets don't
like that representation, as the inkjet may stop because
it doesn't have enough RAM to do things that way, and
it processes a page in "chunks".

When Microsoft made a "printing framework", it changed PostScript
emissions from "intelligent" vector type representations,
to pixmaps. I was not impressed when I started seeing this.
That is not he best way of doing things, on cheap printers.
Like on laser printers, they really like to hold the whole
page in memory, in case the print mechanism has no means of
"stopping, for buffering". Whereas inkjet printers are
"stop-able". The head can finish a line and wait at the side,
until more data is buffered up.

Paul

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XPost: alt.comp.hardware.pc-homebuilt

On 2025/6/9 14:49:17, Paul wrote:

On Mon, 6/9/2025 6:37 AM, J. P. Gilliver wrote:

[]

I found a status _column_ in the printers area, but getting the (W10) PC to _refresh_ that. Finding the thing that showed pending documents for the printer - and deleting them - didn't work. Others mentioned the spooler, but I was never sure where

that was.
[]

https://superuser.com/questions/1725000/force-windows-to-check-for-printer-status

net stop spooler
net start spooler

Apparently that will cause the print queue to update.

Thanks; I'll give that a try - assuming I can remember it next time I
get the problem (which may be months, years, or never; I'd not had it before!).>

The spooler is a streaming server that "serves pages"
to the printer. The printer status dialog, would normally
show the overview of what is going on (whether a document
has been processed yet, whether the print job is stuck).

Is that the thing I was looking at, which shows (for a given printer)
which documents are pending, which you can delete, restart, etc.? (Which
didn't clear the problem.)
[]
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/<1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf


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XPost: alt.comp.hardware.pc-homebuilt

On Thu, 6/12/2025 11:57 AM, J. P. Gilliver wrote:

On 2025/6/9 14:49:17, Paul wrote:

On Mon, 6/9/2025 6:37 AM, J. P. Gilliver wrote:

[]

I found a status _column_ in the printers area, but getting the (W10) PC to _refresh_ that. Finding the thing that showed pending documents for the printer - and deleting them - didn't work. Others mentioned the spooler, but I was never sure where

that was.

[]

https://superuser.com/questions/1725000/force-windows-to-check-for-printer-status

net stop spooler
net start spooler

Apparently that will cause the print queue to update.

Thanks; I'll give that a try - assuming I can remember it next time I get the problem (which may be months, years, or never; I'd not had it before!).>

The spooler is a streaming server that "serves pages"
to the printer. The printer status dialog, would normally
show the overview of what is going on (whether a document
has been processed yet, whether the print job is stuck).

Is that the thing I was looking at, which shows (for a given printer) which documents are pending, which you can delete, restart, etc.? (Which didn't clear the problem.)
[]

Restarting the spooler is one way to give it a kick.

I don't know what's wrong with yours.

But fixing the paper input on mine, doesn't always
result in continuation of a job.

Paul

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