How to fix a keyboard that doesn’t work? step by step guide

Keyboard errors, although they are not very common, can cause great inconvenience, and these can lead to it stopping working, in those cases, There are methods that can be applied to solve them.

In many circumstances the problem with the keyboard is that some keys don’t workand this leads to making certain mistakes and believing that the malfunction is due to a misconfiguration in the system.

However, you should know that it is not so, There are failures or damages that occur to it in some components that prevent the keys from working as they should. That is why in this tutorial we are going to explain step by step how you can diagnose these errors and how you can solve them.

What are the possible reasons why my keyboard no longer works?

There are different causes that generate failures in your keyboard or keyboard, each of them can be generated in different ways, but you should know that there are some methods that can be applied to prevent them from being generated, or worsen the current state of the device.

Among the causes are:

• Excess dirt: Dirt such as dust, hair, food residue, or other small solid elements can damage membranes and even component circuitry.
• Humidity: If your devices are in a place with high humidity, it can cause errors in the circuits, creating what is called sulfation, (which is basically oxidation of the electronic components or the circuitry thereof). This process directly interrupts or cuts off the flow of current, preventing the system from working properly.
• Wet the keyboard: In some cases, the incident occurs that a drink is spilled on them, for example, coffee, tea, water, etc. If there is luck in the first instance nothing fails, and just letting it dry solves it. But if it is a repeating event, this will damage the keyboard board.

Solutions or methods to avoid keyboard failures

Just as there are different causes that can damage a keyboard, there are also methods that can be used to help prevent this damage before it becomes critical and you have to perform a repair or in its seriousness change the device, since it cannot be repaired.

Among the solutions are:

• Avoid having your equipment in a place with a high concentration of dusteven eat on it, if you can’t help it, Performing maintenance from time to time will help prevent damage.
• Humidity it is a great enemy of electronic components, because it accelerates and causes sulfation. To avoid this, the ideal is to have the electronic elements away from places with high concentrations, or in ventilated places, in order to prevent it from concentrating in the same place. And as in the previous case, the best tool to avoid it is perform preventative maintenance.
• In case the keyboard got wet the best thing at that moment is to disconnect it or immediately turn off the device (this in case it happens on a laptop). In the case of a membrane keyboard, once it is disconnected, it is carefully opened until the circuit part is obtained, clean the area and wait for it to be completely dry. Once clean, check the state of the circuit and if no damage is observed, close it and test it.

How to repair the keys that do not work on our keyboard?

In case you already keyboard present failures and it is recognized that they are not due to a keyboard deconfigurationit remains only to carry out a repair of the circuit. This procedure is highly delicate, This is because if it is done carelessly without following the steps correctly, you can cause totally irreparable damage to your computer.

In case you are not sure, it is better to take it to a specialized technician and that he carry out all the necessary reparations.

Repair material and tools

Before starting the repair there is a list of items that you must have in order to perform this task:

• Digital multimeter: this element will allow verifying the state of electrical continuity of the circuit. Either by measuring its resistance or by measuring electrical continuity.

• Spade (stick) screwdriver and slotted (cross) screwdriver: this to be able to remove all the screws from the keyboard.

• Cleaning liquid for electronic components: This liquid is used specifically to clean electrical components, since after use it evaporates completely, which facilitates its drying. If this is not possible, acetone (nail polish cleaning liquid) or pure alcohol can be used.
• Cotton or cloth: This has to be totally clean to use it together with the cleaning liquid.
• Electrically conductive paint (Electric Paint): Otherwise, a graphite pencil or a mechanical pencil lead with a very soft hardness can be used.

• A needle and an extra fine brush: this only in case of acquiring the conductive paint.

Procedure and steps to repair a keyboard

The steps to correctly fix a keyboard are simple to execute, even so, you need to be very careful when doing them, because an error will cause irreparable damage.

• open the keyboard, for this use the mentioned screwdrivers to remove each screw in it, then open the case.
• Once opened, you must remove the keyboard membrane, remove it carefully, once this is done you will see that it is made up of various parts, the one that interests is the one with the printed circuit.

• Performs a complete cleaning of the membrane with the circuit cleaning liquid or with one of the alternatives and wait until it is completely dry before carrying out another task.
• Observe carefully and in detail the circuit, in order to discover segments that are damaged, sulfated or with dirt in it.

• After observing the damaged parts the continuity of the circuit will be checked using the multimeter and placing it to measure resistance or continuity, both are valid, it is only necessary to place it in some of the nodes.
• The measurement will be made from any node (circles with multiple connections) to the segment that has failed.

• To make sure that the error is there, in the place where the circuit damage is seen, the measurement is also made. The multimeter, as it does not present electrical continuity, will show a value of 1 (in case of measuring resistance) and in case of measuring continuity it will not give any beep or sound.
• Now we are going to repair the damaged segment, with conductive paint or graphite. If you’re using paint, use a needle for the circuit lines, as it’s important to keep them as thin as possible. It is important that you do not touch others, this will cause a short circuit if they join. Remember to use little paint.

How to check that the keyboard has been repaired?

For this it is necessary to use the multimeter again, you have to take into account that in case you are not an experienced user in electronics, or in the tool you are using, it is best to place it by measuring resistance, “Ohm”.

Thus we will observe which places have better electrical flow, the closer to zero the currently measured result is, the better.

• Now check the area with the multimeter, you will perform the same tests explained above. If everything is correct, it should give you a value other than 1, the closer it is to 0, the better the continuity of the circuit. Before checking, wait for the paint to dry completely.

• Now, reassemble the keyboard membrane. Once you have it ready, check the status by connecting it to your computer. If everything is correct, all keys should work.