I have a Dell Precision 360, a few years old, but quite up to the job for what I need. PS/2 keyboard and mouse plugged in.

The machine was working fine when I used it yesterday, turned it off. Turned it back on tonight, and when it gets to the logon screen everything is fine until I enter the first character of my password (ie. first press of a key), that then locks up the mouse, and it appears no keybaord entry works either, although I can toggle capslock lights, etc.

Fortuantely I can remote desktop into the machine, but device manager is not showing any problems. Keybaord works fine during boot, and I can get into the bios, press f8, and even tried safemode, but still it locks up the PS/2 of stuff as soon as I have press a single key on the keyboard

Any ideas?

Try removing the keyboard in device manager and reboot? This is pretty much a wild stab in the dark....

that is my next plan.... just waiting for a 250MB .net framework 3.5 service pack to install.....

Thankfully I can remote desktop to the machine, otherwise I would be a bit stuck!

Done the delete from device manager for both keyboard and mouse. Before and after the delete there is an error for the keyboard:

This device cannot start. (Code 10)

Click Troubleshoot to start the troubleshooter for this device.

Faulty keyboard?

Has the keyboard and mouse connectors been swapped by mistake?

keyboard functions fine before windows boots. I'll try and borrow a spare keyboard from work, just incase. Was using kvm before hand, but I bypassed that just incase. Each is plugged into the correct socket....

Try and borrow a USB keyboard and turn on legacy device support on in the USB section of the BIOS.

Hopefully this will get you around it and the other one might start working after this.

borrowed a USB keyboard and mouse. Booted up windows, mouse works, no response from the keyboard when trying to type in my password - but at least the mouse does not lockup.

USB keyboard is working, as pressing f8 works, etc.

I heard about running sfc /scannow to replace system files, but it won't let me do it from a remote desktop session, saying I need to be an admin and logged onto the console. Pesky machine!

borrowed a USB keyboard and mouse. Booted up windows, mouse works, no response from the keyboard when trying to type in my password - but at least the mouse does not lockup.

USB keyboard is working, as pressing f8 works, etc.

I heard about running sfc /scannow to replace system files, but it won't let me do it from a remote desktop session, saying I need to be an admin and logged onto the console. Pesky machine!

does

mstsc -v:servername /F -console

work like it does on servers?

oooh.... did not know that /console works for win xp... I'll give that a whirl now!

/console does not seem to work on xp :-(

You may have a virus/keylogger. there are a few where the first symptoms are the keyboard acts strangely.

If you've proved the keyboard is OK, then I'd use an online scanner such as Housecall to scan for nasties.

I would also try a chkdsk

oooh.... did not know that /console works for win xp... I'll give that a whirl now!

it works, as in it's a valid switch, but is pointless in XP as there is no terminal services and ability for several people to log on simultaneously