May 31, 2026
Keys, chaos, and a battery mystery
Mysteries of the Griffin iMate
A beloved old Apple keyboard got a glow-up, then its weird adapter caused instant chaos
TLDR: A restored 1990 Apple keyboard was supposed to get an easy modern comeback, but its Griffin iMate adapter failed almost immediately. In the comments, readers roasted the old accessory, hyped a battery-free rival, and tossed in a blunt "Dupe" for extra drama.
This started as a wholesome nostalgia story: one legendary old Apple keyboard from 1990, rescued from cupboard exile, scrubbed free of decades of grime, and prepped for a glamorous second life. Instead, the real plot twist was the little adapter meant to connect it to a modern computer. The Griffin iMate — a once-fancy bridge between old Apple gear and newer machines — basically showed up, introduced itself, and then immediately had a meltdown. Cue the sadness, confusion, and a lot of side-eye for late-1990s gadget design.
But as always, the comments turned a repair diary into a mini soap opera. One camp quickly jumped in with a rival recommendation: the Wombat ADB-USB converter, pitched like the sensible new partner who "requires no battery" and just gets on with the job. That "no battery" detail became the big eyebrow-raiser, because nothing says mysterious vintage tech drama like discovering your tiny adapter may secretly depend on a battery to function properly. Another commenter delivered the coldest possible internet energy with a one-word grenade: "Dupe" — the classic online accusation that this story had already been posted before.
So the community mood was a perfect mix of retro admiration, gadget snobbery, and comment-section drive-by shade. People loved the keyboard, roasted the flaky adapter, and treated the alternative converter like the hero entering in act three.
Key Points
- •The article focuses on restoring a 1990 Apple Extended Keyboard II that had been stored for years after originally being acquired with a Macintosh IIsi.
- •The author cleaned and reassembled the keyboard, using an iFixit teardown as a guide, and found the aging plastic remained intact.
- •Because the keyboard uses Apple Desktop Bus, it requires an ADB-to-USB solution to work with modern computers.
- •The author chose a prebuilt Griffin Technology iMate adapter instead of building a custom converter based on TMK, MicroPython, Rust, or RISC-V hardware.
- •When tested on a Linux laptop, the Griffin iMate briefly enumerated as USB HID keyboard and mouse devices before entering a repeated USB reset loop and failing.