Electronics > Beginners
One USB device on two PC's? - HELP NEEDED
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Xephlon:
Hey there,

Recently I have encountered an issue with a personal project where I need to connect a keyboard to two PC's. I am tempted to fabricate a Female to 2 Male USB Y-splitter, however I am not very confident with electronics and I am worried that either the two 5V outputs from the PC's will fry my keyboard, or the data signal from the keyboard will decay when being split and will not input correct values. I have found keyboard switches to switch between two PC's, however I want simultaneous inputs. Sorry if this is a rather irrelevant topic for this forum, however I hope you guys can give some advice and tips about the 5V outputs and the data signals.

Many thanks to all who read & respond,
Josh
ataradov:
It is impossible to share the same USB device between the two computers. USB stack is stateful, there is an actual enumeration process that is going on, you can't have the same device be enumerated on two hosts.

This will not make any sense electrically too.
0culus:
You need a KVM switch, a/k/a Keyboard, Video, Mouse switch. One enables you to share a monitor, keyboard, and a mouse between at least 2 computers. You do have to switch it back and forth, but it's still way more convenient than having duplicate peripherals on the bench.
boffin:

--- Quote from: Xephlon on October 31, 2019, 09:04:48 pm ---Hey there,

Recently I have encountered an issue with a personal project where I need to connect a keyboard to two PC's. I am tempted to fabricate a Female to 2 Male USB Y-splitter, however I am not very confident with electronics and I am worried that either the two 5V outputs from the PC's will fry my keyboard, or the data signal from the keyboard will decay when being split and will not input correct values. I have found keyboard switches to switch between two PC's, however I want simultaneous inputs. Sorry if this is a rather irrelevant topic for this forum, however I hope you guys can give some advice and tips about the 5V outputs and the data signals.

Many thanks to all who read & respond,

--- End quote ---

You can buy little switches like that.  I have one connected to my (shared) printer/scanner so it's connected to either my or my wife's computer.
0culus:
The bottom line is that ataradov is right; I don't know of any way to do simultaneous inputs to two computers.
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