Last night I replaced the keyboard in Marie’s laptop. I did that because she slopped coffee on the original and half the keys stopped working. Nothing went up in smoke and she could still do things with the mouse, so I figured it had not leaked through the keyboard and onto the motherboard or into other touchy stuff inside.
I ordered a replacement a couple of days ago. I noticed that some were half the price of this one, but were billed as “without frame”.
“What is a ‘frame’” I asked the screen. It did not answer. It never does, but I tend to ask it things anyway.
I read comments on some of the ‘without frame’ models and found one by a fellow who explained it, because he had mistakenly ordered one without a frame and was disappointed by his lack of attention and wondered why anyone would sell a frame-less keyboard to begin with since frames are not really transferable. The frame (as it turns out) is the black plastic grid around and between the keys. Frameless keyboards function just the same but show a bare circuit board between keys and have deeper grooves for your doughnut crumbs to get stuck in. He explained the process he used to break the frame loose from his old keyboard and tack-weld it onto the new one with a soldering iron, but it is tricky and time consuming. I made sure I bought one WITH a frame.
I also looked up some keyboard replacement guides for Marie’s model of laptop. I like to find at least three and see that they agree on the process. It looked to be much easier than replacing the keyboard on mine was: pop out the battery, remove one screw and pry off the bay cover, remove one screw inside the bay, flip it over and pry the top edge of the keyboard loose, slide it up to disengage tabs along the bottom edge, turn it over and disconnect the ribbon cable. Piece of cake!
And it almost was.
The vids showed a connector on the end of the ribbon cable: gently pry it loose with a knife and remove, slide the connector on the new ribbon back in…gently. I removed the old keyboard before looking carefully at the new one. The ribbon connector came apart: a gray plastic bit did not seem to have been attached to the ribbon at all. Uh-oh…
Long story short (you’re welcome) it was not connected to the ribbon: wasn’t supposed to be. It was part of the socket and was supposed to be flipped up to release the bare ribbon, then flipped back down to grip the new ribbon against a set of teeth underneath – not pried off. This part is about the size of a flat toothpick and half as long. It took me forever to figure out what it was and how it worked – and get it reassembled using my clumsy, stumpy fingers. Especially since my left hand does not work especially well anymore. But I finally figured it out, got it reassembled, and installed the new keyboard.
I put the bay cover back on and discovered that instead of prying it off like they did in the videos I was supposed to have removed the screw and slid the bay cover down 1/4 inch to disengage tabs then lift it clear: no snaps no prying. A far superior system, it’s a shame no one seems to have known about it. Some of those tabs are now broken off. Oops. I put the battery back in place, turned the computer over again and powered it up.
Once it booted I brought up the word processor and started pressing alpha-numeric keys to see that they all worked.
Nothing.
Or, almost nothing. The top row: the function keys that turn wireless on and off, mute the sound, control volume, and perform track functions for the music programs worked fine. Everything else: dead.
I sat back and sighed, thinking dark thoughts, considering once again the advantages of going Luddite.
After a few moments, I tried it again…just to be sure: q w e r t y u i o p [ ] \ 7 8 9 + Whoa! it’s working!
I tested all the keys again and they all worked perfectly now. Marie asked me why they worked now and not before: I had no idea. I tossed her my best-guess: “Maybe the keyboard had not initialized yet on the first try.” That sounded lame to me because as far as I know there are no chips in a keyboard, no driver needed that isn’t already there, no hand-shaking to be done.
Maybe I’m wrong about that. Or maybe God doesn’t want me to become Luddite.
Either way, the computer is working now and Marie is happy. That is what’s important.
