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14 Posts
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14379
Spilled liquid on my keyboard...
Hello dear beer-loving computerfreaks,
I decided not to wait for an official answer from the Dell Support people, since it seems a bit lost in cyberspace. So I've got on with the work and carefully removed all the keys, this goes as follows:
- you may want to remove your keyboard from the computer first, how to do this is described in your manual
- grow long fingernails and put them under a key and pop them out
- DO place them somewhere on your desk, on a safe spot, one where no more beer can be spilled or where you may accidentally sweep them away with your arm or hand, and DO keep them in order since you're going to have trouble placing them back. You think you know where they belong, until you're staring at an empty board with nothing but circuits.
- So there, now you see all these small white mechanisms. Most of them are easiest to remove when you lift them a bit with your finger in the middle of the mechanism, and then use a screwdriver or a pen to pop them out. Do this as follows: look at the back side of your board, and you'll see for every mechanism two larger white bits (larger than the rest, not *really* large), just push them while lifting the mechanism on the other side of the board and they'll pop out easily.
- The top ones are a bit harder to remove but you'll succeed in doing so too, but use your fingernails in this case.
- at the top left there's one plastic dud item which you'll have to remove with a very small screwdriver. Try not to damage the rubber buttons, since if you lose them, you'll lose function for a particular key.
- The next step is to lift the contact sheets. There are three of them, one with the top contacts, one to maintain a little distance between the two and one with the lower contacts. Now the beer stains will show you which ones to clean and if you're not certain, clean them all with a soft piece of moist cloth.
- Then reverse engineer all what you've done until now and if the beer didn't get a chance to corrode your contacts, it'll probably work again (in my case, there were four days between spilling and repair so you've got quite a lot of time).
- Some of the keys may have become a bit too sensitive, you can solve this problem by putting a bit of tape between the rubber button and the black sheet they're on. In this case you'll have to pull one of those rubber thingies off but that's not a problem.
Good luck
keep drinking :)
I decided not to wait for an official answer from the Dell Support people, since it seems a bit lost in cyberspace. So I've got on with the work and carefully removed all the keys, this goes as follows:
- you may want to remove your keyboard from the computer first, how to do this is described in your manual
- grow long fingernails and put them under a key and pop them out
- DO place them somewhere on your desk, on a safe spot, one where no more beer can be spilled or where you may accidentally sweep them away with your arm or hand, and DO keep them in order since you're going to have trouble placing them back. You think you know where they belong, until you're staring at an empty board with nothing but circuits.
- So there, now you see all these small white mechanisms. Most of them are easiest to remove when you lift them a bit with your finger in the middle of the mechanism, and then use a screwdriver or a pen to pop them out. Do this as follows: look at the back side of your board, and you'll see for every mechanism two larger white bits (larger than the rest, not *really* large), just push them while lifting the mechanism on the other side of the board and they'll pop out easily.
- The top ones are a bit harder to remove but you'll succeed in doing so too, but use your fingernails in this case.
- at the top left there's one plastic dud item which you'll have to remove with a very small screwdriver. Try not to damage the rubber buttons, since if you lose them, you'll lose function for a particular key.
- The next step is to lift the contact sheets. There are three of them, one with the top contacts, one to maintain a little distance between the two and one with the lower contacts. Now the beer stains will show you which ones to clean and if you're not certain, clean them all with a soft piece of moist cloth.
- Then reverse engineer all what you've done until now and if the beer didn't get a chance to corrode your contacts, it'll probably work again (in my case, there were four days between spilling and repair so you've got quite a lot of time).
- Some of the keys may have become a bit too sensitive, you can solve this problem by putting a bit of tape between the rubber button and the black sheet they're on. In this case you'll have to pull one of those rubber thingies off but that's not a problem.
Good luck
keep drinking :)
Message Edited by bluppfisk on 02-01-2004 07:40 PM
viper11885
791 Posts
0
January 17th, 2004 00:00
If you have the Complete Care, then you can just get it replaced by Dell at free of charge.
If you don't, then I don't think there is much to do. Be prepared to purchase another keyboard. But you could try pulling the keys out and then cleaning whatever mess got in there. Might clear things up a bit.
bluppfisk
14 Posts
0
January 18th, 2004 01:00
can I use water to clean it? (after pulling it out and holding it at a safe distance from my laptop of course)
dy4bolikal
9 Posts
0
January 18th, 2004 21:00
The same thing happened to me! I spilled alcoholic liquid on my laptop's keyboard, and now, I seem to be getting stuck keys everytime. I bought a Logitech keyboard to replace it, but for some reason it conflicts with the laptop keyboard because of the stuck keys.
So how would I go about "cleaning" the keyboard? How do I remove the keys?
seto_kaiba
222 Posts
0
January 19th, 2004 00:00
Well, the 5100 keyboard can actually be removed. Simply look for the teardown manual here in the Support website under Reference.
Peace!
bluppfisk
14 Posts
0
January 23rd, 2004 15:00
I decided not to wait for an official answer from the Dell Support people, since it seems a bit lost in cyberspace. So I've got on with the work and carefully removed all the keys, this goes as follows:
- you may want to remove your keyboard from the computer first, how to do this is described in your manual
- grow long fingernails and put them under a key and pop them out
- DO place them somewhere on your desk, on a safe spot, one where no more beer can be spilled or where you may accidentally sweep them away with your arm or hand, and DO keep them in order since you're going to have trouble placing them back. You think you know where they belong, until you're staring at an empty board with nothing but circuits.
- So there, now you see all these small white mechanisms. Most of them are easiest to remove when you lift them a bit with your finger in the middle of the mechanism, and then use a screwdriver or a pen to pop them out. Do this as follows: look at the back side of your board, and you'll see for every mechanism two larger white bits (larger than the rest, not *really* large), just push them while lifting the mechanism on the other side of the board and they'll pop out easily.
- The top ones are a bit harder to remove but you'll succeed in doing so too, but use your fingernails in this case.
- at the top left there's one plastic dud item which you'll have to remove with a very small screwdriver. Try not to damage the rubber buttons, since if you lose them, you'll lose function for a particular key.
- The next step is to lift the contact sheets. There are three of them, one with the top contacts, one to maintain a little distance between the two and one with the lower contacts. Now the beer stains will show you which ones to clean and if you're not certain, clean them all with a soft piece of moist cloth.
- Then reverse engineer all what you've done until now and if the beer didn't get a chance to corrode your contacts, it'll probably work again (in my case, there were four days between spilling and repair so you've got quite a lot of time).
- Some of the keys may have become a bit too sensitive, you can solve this problem by putting a bit of tape between the rubber button and the black sheet they're on. In this case you'll have to pull one of those rubber thingies off but that's not a problem.
Good luck
keep drinking :)