Apple Pro Keyboard with Mac OS 9?

Question

I recently was given an Apple Pro keyboard model A1048. I've found that the specs state it will only work with X 10.2 or later.
Well I plugged it into my Mac OS 9.2.2 system just to see what would happen. Mostly the keyboard worked fine. But there are a few keys that don't work:
F16
Vol up
Vol down
Disk eject
and a couple of others in the group of keys on the upper right of the keyboard.
Is there any hope of finding software that will make the keyboard fully operational with 9.2.2?
Gary

Answer 1

Allan Eckert wrote:
Hi Gary;
That is one of the major restrictions with remaining on a outdated version of an operating system so much of the newer equipment just will not work because no one is supporting it any longer. So unless you have an absolute requirement to remain on OS 9 which is no longer supported, I would suggest that you look into migrating over to something a bit newer.
Sorry for jumping in here. But I just have to mention that I've been using OS9 since it first came, and I'm not getting rid of it. It's customised to pitch-perfection for my personal use, e.g. a lot of the extensions have been chucked out.
It's stable like a rock (and has been for several years) and its responsiveness is INSTANT -- the OS as well as the programs I use. Menues and dialogue boxes appear instantly. Text appears as I type. Most documents in most programs scroll in perfect synchrony with my finger movements on the mouse, irrespective of document size or the presence/absence of images and and tables (Photoshop is a bit slow with large files). The cursor ends up where I move the mouse, and not half-a-centimeter on the side, under, or wherever.
I have NONE of that as regular features in Tiger. Some programs work fine, others don't. The OS itself is noticeably more sluggish than OS9. I suggest you try the two systems side by side some day. You'll be surprised at OS9's superiority in terms of responsiveness. Sometime in the future, I hope to be able to tweak Tiger to OS9 standards. Fingers crossed.
Still, Tiger is beautiful, useful, more up-to-date, and no doiubt technically more well-adjusted to modern times, and thus it's also my main OS. However, that's mostly because new versions of programs require it, my printer does't have OS9 drivers, and more and more web pages require OSX browser. (Although the web works fine in OS9, at least for the most part, e.g. youtube, but secure banking doesn't.)
Personally, I'm a bit offended (perhaps a too strong word) when I ses suggestions (however well-intended) to migrate away from OS9, as if OS9 users don't know what they're doing. I boot regularly into OS9, almost daily, full well knowing what I do, and doing so because it offers me advantages that Tiger can't give to me.
The versions of MS Word (5.1), Photoshop (4/5), FileMaker (5), etc., that I use in OS9 have all the bells and whistles I need. I use them for professional purposes. They work smoother and quicker than any of the more recent versions, even though there are functions that are obviously technically more pleasing in later versions.
The only thing that's become a real problem is Unicode, which my OS9 programs don't support. Hence I have to do a bit of editing in Tiger versions of, say, Word, before I can disseminate a word file to others. But I don't mind. The time I save by having a smooth work flow in OS9 is worth it.
Sorry for the rant.