5430US Problem with the USB Keyboard

I have a Compaq 5430US running Windows XP and I'm having problems with my
Multimedia USB Keyboard model# KUS0060 with smart card reader. I had to rig
the keyboard to work and I'm wondering if it will give me problems down the
road. Here's the story.

My main hard drive failed so I bought a new one, formatted it, used the
quick restore CD to reinstall everything, reset the BIOS to default, and
then ran all Windows XP and available Compaq updates (including the one for
the keyboard). Then I connected the keyboard and XP went through the process
of "detected Compaq USB keyboard" "detected smart card reader" and so forth
but at the end of the install when it goes back to the keyboard I get the
following error message "Cannot create a file when that file already exists"
and in the hardware profile I get an exclamation point by the keyboard and
an error saying that the drivers did not load. Everything else works
(multimedia keys, smart card reader) except for the actual keyboard itself.
I tried everything that an online Compaq support agent suggested and nothing
worked, and then I tried every other trick that I personally knew and I
still ended up with the error message every time. I finally went into the
hardware profile and chose install from a specific location and chose a
generic keyboard (even choosing the Compaq USB from here got me the same
error message) and everything finally seemed to work. I shut the system
down and rebooted several times and everything seemed to hold but I'm just
wondering if I should expect problems down the road? (it's not my system, I
repaired it for a friend)

I've got a 5430 US and I had the same odd keyboard errors as you. We
reformatted and reinstalled using the restore CDs, but the keyboard
didn't work afterwords.

Our solution: a new keyboard.

The problem keyboard is working hapily on another computer in the house
(with the smart card visa reader thing disabled in the device manager)

Another weird keyboard error with this computer. It had a dell
keyboard (Black ps2, no fancy multimedia keys) working just fine for
months. Then one day it just refused to POST. I pulled the PC out of
the desk and took it to my bench and plugged in a different keyboard.
The PC POSTed fine. I played around a bit and hooked the machine back
up. No POST. After playing around I figured out it was the keyboard.
I put another Dell KB on it and it worked fine. To this day I can plug
that one Dell KB into it and it will refuse to POST, but the same KB
works on any other computer.