Do modern systems - say within the past 10 years - still operate in this way when a PS/2 keyboard is plugged in (yes, some motherboards still do have PS/2 ports, bizarrely)? Or have modern CPU architectures, microcode, and updates to the x86 instruction set removed it?
Does it still work this way when you plug a USB keyboard into a PS/2 port via an adapter (I'd imagine yes, but I don't actually know)
PS/2 still works the same as it always has. No changes there. It's not really possible to change how PS/2 operates because it wouldn't be backwards compatible with old keyboards or software.
Legacy stuff sticks around for a while and generally doesn't change, since it needs to retain backwards compatibility. Modern x86 processors also still have a "real mode" with 1MB RAM max, like what the 286 versions of DOS and Windows 3.0 used to use.
You can buy industrial PCs and motherboards today that not only have a PS/2 port, but also other legacy stuff like parallel and serial ports, ISA slots, etc. There's actually motherboards that have ISA, PCI, and PCIe all on the same board. There's 25+ year old machinery that's still in use and extremely expensive to replace, so it's not uncommon to have new computers with legacy connectors/ports in industrial environments.
Enthusiast motherboards still have the ps/2 ports as well. Usually because the usb controller is the first thing to stop working when the bclk gets too high or you're going sub 0 cooling.
Apparently some enthusiasts still use PS/2 keyboards because they have slightly faster response times / lower latency, and better support for n-key rollover.
The absolute lowest level of computers haven't changed much, we still fuck around with interrupts. However, USB peripherals are a LOT more complicated than this, and if I'm not mistaken they're polled by the connection master
CPU: hey keyboard do you have anything for me?
CPU: hey keyboard do you have anything for me?
CPU: hey keyboard do you have anything for me?
CPU: hey keyboard do you have anything for me?
CPU: hey keyboard do you have anything for me?
CPU: hey keyboard do you have anything for me?
CPU: hey keyboard do you have anything for me?
CPU: hey keyboard do you have anything for me?
Keyboard: E
CPU: hey keyboard do you have anything for me?
CPU: hey keyboard do you have anything for me?
CPU: hey keyboard do you have anything for me?
CPU: hey keyboard do you have anything for me?
..
Ah, yes the good ol days of punch cards, switch boards, mechanical operators and electron tubes, when will the youngins learn that their fancy transistors are for pussies
I always appreciated Dunes idea of a mentat, basically an accountant trained from birth and juiced up on brain steroids to have equal computing ability to a high level AI. Usually when I think of the way human conciousness may evolve and trancend its current capabilities my mind goes right to the psychadellic-bro conciousness expansion and non-localized astral projection stuff, its interesting to consider there are other potential paths to augmenting human conciousness and what other boundaries could be pushed.
Modern USB keyboards need to be asked what's being pressed by the CPU multiple times a second, but old PS/2 keyboards will actually interrupt the CPU to send the key press command
It's kind of a tradition among the r*ddit refugees from s*bs like linuxmemes and linuxmasterrace. Posting things that aren't strictly linux-related, but would still be appreciated in general by computer nerds.
