Thinkpads Forum

Answer: T60's keyboard receptacle uses a JAE AA01B-S040VA1 receptacle.

Anyone knows what is the keyboard's connector type used in the T60? Thanks.
http://i46.tinypic.com/2m2u9sj.jpg (148KB 600x601px)
http://i43.tinypic.com/6r6oaw.jpg (424KB 1534x1280px)

Admin edit: Removed inline images. Please keep them ~50KB and even then, post a *PIC* warning in the subject line.

Welcome to the forum.
In all the years since the T60 and the likes have come out, nobody has ever answered that question.
I doubt very much that anybody even knows...
Why would you want to know that anyway?


PS: rather than show these big pictures in your post, just edit that post and show us the links to them.

RealBlackStuff wrote:

PS: rather than show these big pictures in your post, just edit that post and show us the links to them.

agreed, it's not only polite to those browing on slow connections or mobile devices, it's also the forum rules. Post with pics cannot be large and the title of the post must have a picture warning to alert browsers.

Regarding your question, I don't think Lenovo nor IBM have ever released that info. I assume it's a standard part, just no idea which one or where to get one other then from a salvaged keyboard or board.

agreed, it's not only polite to those browing on slow connections or mobile devices, it's also the forum rules. Post with pics cannot be large and the title of the post must have a picture warning to alert browsers.

Sorry about that. I've been looking through the element14 catalogue and I think I've found the connector. It looks like a Molex SlimStack connector. I've been looking into these 2:
50 contacts, 0.5mm pitch spacing: http://au.element14.com/jsp/search/prod ... 5-00001621
40 contacts, 0.4mm pitch spacing: http://au.element14.com/jsp/search/prod ... 5-00001621

I would love to check my pitch spacing but the accuracy on my ruler wouldn't allow me to, nor have I got a caliper. Do you know why the keyboard ribbon connector have 44 pins while the motherboard connector only have 40 pins?

Regarding the question why would I want to know this anyway, I want to see if I can make a USB adapter for the T60. I already have a Thinkpad USB Keyboard so this is not a project to save money (it costs more to do this than buying the Thinkpad keyboard straight from Lenovo).

The "ThinkPad USB Keyboard with TrackPoint" has a small board inside that has this connector and converts it to USB. It uses the T400s/T410 keyboard but the connector is the same as in T60 keyboards.

I posted some pictures couple of years ago...
http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?f=11&t=86096

Is this what you need?

rampadc wrote: I would love to check my pitch spacing but the accuracy on my ruler wouldn't allow me to, nor have I got a caliper. Do you know why the keyboard ribbon connector have 44 pins while the motherboard connector only have 40 pins?

Just measure the distance between the first and last pin on a same row. Since there are 20 pins on a row, if the pitch is 0.4mm, the total distance would be (20 - 1) * 0.4 = 7.6mm, while a pitch of 0.5mm will give total length 9.5mm. You should be able to tell one from another with any millimeter ruler.

I don't know if I could find it easily, but I had a plastic (slide type) caliper that I purchased from a "dollar store" many years ago. It was perfect for getting non-critical measurements when I was in the automotive business, things like braketube size, fuel line, bolts, and was even accurate enough to tell if a crankshaft had been undersized or pistons oversized, all for $1


Plastic Caliper <---photo

Here <--- is a good place to begin your search

The receptacles arrived today in the mail, and neither of them fits the connector. The 50pin one has the correct size though. One end fits but the other well, doesn't because the connector has an extrusion that needs to be pushed in. I did a little more digging and found another Molex that looks a whole lot like my T60 receptacle. It has 40 pins, just like the one on the motherboard. http://www.digikey.com.au/product-detai ... ND/1025147 But they are out of stock. From Molex's website for the 54363 series, they only have 40pins, probably explains why the motherboard receptacle have 40 pins.

Anyhow, 54363-0489 (or similar, depending on whether it's active or not) seems to be what the Thinkpad T60 is using. Now I need to find somewhere to get it.

How about lifting it from a dead T60 system board?

Here's one for 10 bucks:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Lenovo-ThinkPad ... 53f5ebbcaf

Edit: Just saw that you're in Australia and this is from US eBay but maybe you can find a similar one locally?

I found a local one from RS Components for roughly $3.5 each. Lifting the keyboard receptacle is not an option since I'm using my T60 as a media server.

Link to part: http://australia.rs-online.com/web/p/pc ... s/7206498/

Yup, it's confirmed. The T60 uses a Molex SlimStack 54363-0489 with 40 pins and 0.5mm pitch spacing.

Edit: It doesn't.

Cool!

Let us know how your USB adapter project goes.

It will be a long time until I get to the prototyping stage. I have to learn more about microcontrollers and USB HID stuff, so are my exams coming soon, so don't expect anything yet. It won't be a dead project but it will take a long time.

rampadc wrote:I want to see if I can make a USB adapter for the T60.

Very interesting! Perhaps you would like to join our discussion about using the Arduino as a keyboard controller, and for interfacing with the TrackPoint. My dream is to have a better keyboard than the USB one offered by Lenovo. I want a keyboard that is more compact, that has relatively big Ctrl and Alt keys, and where TrackPoint sensitivity can be controlled in hardware.

Today I hooked the keyboard into an Arduino to try to get a change in voltage of any pins, but I can't. So I guess I can't confirm yet that this Molex receptacle can be used for the T60

rampadc wrote:Today I hooked the keyboard into an Arduino to try to get a change in voltage of any pins, but I can't. So I guess I can't confirm yet that this Molex receptacle can be used for the T60

Have you read up about how keyboard matrices work yet? http://pcbheaven.com/wikipages/How_Key_Matrices_Works/

Yup, still not working. I'm going to sand the ribbon to expose the copper trace and do some beep connection tests.

Other than that, I've found the JAE AA01B-S040VA1 to be the new candidate as the T60 receptacle. However I have yet to find any datasheets. Not AA01A, it has to be AA01B. If anyone has the datasheet of AA01B-S040VA1, or knows where to get it from, please tell me. Currently I'm sending e-mails to all any sellers I can find.

Today I sanded the keyboard ribbon cable to test for connections. Connections were made.

Turns out I was using a bad keyboard. Replace the keyboard and I've mapped out the keyboard matrix and got the trackpoint to work with a few Arduino sketches.

Keep us updated! I've followed this thread since you started it, as I've been looking to do the same thing for a long time. I've got several dead T40's lying around that I'd love to take the screen off of, and use the bottom half as a keyboard for my desktop PC.

I've got several dead T40's lying around that I'd love to take the screen off of, and use the bottom half as a keyboard for my desktop PC

I'm not sure how using the bottom half as a keyboard would work. There is no way you can get the processed data from whichever chip is handling the keyboard.

Looking at eBay photos of the T40 keyboard, we don't have the same connector. I dug up some T40 schematics and find that your receptacle might be a JAE KX14_40K5D1 (datasheet: http://octopart.com/datasheet/kx14-40k5 ... 5667-45457), which has been obsolete for a long time. Sift through Element14 catalogue and see if you can spot a similar connector. Answers in StackExchangeis very helpful. Or, you can just lift the receptacle off the keyboard. Since you have a several dead ones, it probably won't matter.

My T60 keyboard has 40 pins, composed of 24 pins for the keyboard matrix pins, 1 pin for Power button, 1 pin for the Fn key (it's outside the matrix), about 4 or 10 for ground, depending on whether you're counting the 4 outer metal contacts for holding down the receptacle, and 4 for the trackpoint, excluding ground, which is Vcc, DATA, CLOCK and RESET. The trackpoint is already generating PS/2 signals. This means you can rip out the trackpoint, hook it up to the computer using an active PS/2 to USB converter or a microcontroller with some PS/2 decoding going on inside to use it.

The schematics of your T40 suggests that all our pinouts is the same so the matrix is probably the same too.

What I am doing next is to have a long and unpleasant read on USB HID and TI MSP430's USB development guide. The MSP430 microcontrollers with USB supports more than 1 interface per USB device so a keyboard and mouse on a single USB is possible.

Oh well, I'll just use the dead T61p then.

What I was thinking, was to somehow find out how the "Thinkpad USB Keyboard with Trackpoint" converts the signal to USB, since it's the same connector used.
I then wanna remove the mobo and old components of the T61p body (or maybe T61p keyboard in T40 body, as it's alot smaller in size), and then do all the wiiring stuff inside, having only a USB cable coming out the back of it. Then I'll put up all the panels in their place, so it'll act as a seperate USB keyboard.

Quick update. Lots of bad news.

Bad news 1: Work cuts my hour so this is going to be a bit slow.
Bad news 2: JAE distributor from Singapore replied to my question regarding AA01B-S040VA1-R3000 (T60's actual receptacle >95% sure). Apparently they only sell these in large quantity to "specific customers" so in this case, Lenovo or IBM.
Bad news 3: I've found out why some keyboards work with the Molex 54363-0489 receptacle. It's because the plug doesn't actually fit into the receptacle, you have to break the plastic spacers in the plug. So Molex may work, depends on how you break the plastic or if you get lucky.
Bad news 4: There are Chinese sellers selling the AA01B but they require a minimum order quantity of 50 or 100 and paying $100 to $200 is sincerely not worth my money. With work cutting my hours, I can't spend money like I used to. One of them sent me a photo of their stock. It does really look like our beloved T60's receptacle But I would have to buy 50 pieces and dear money, it costs $205 total (bad idea).

Other than that, I should be able to continue working on this with a working keyboard connecting to a Molex receptacle again soon. I'm waiting for my Olimex MSP430 USB development board to arrive.

Not sure if there are still people subscribing to this thread, but I got the USB adapter to work. Link to thread: http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?f=29&t=111457