[PLUG-TALK] Hardware Question: Cursor In Constant Motion
Rich Shepard
rshepard at appl-ecosys.com
Mon Oct 29 22:05:36 UTC 2007
On Mon, 29 Oct 2007, Keith Lofstrom wrote:
> So ... it worked once upon a time (?) with Knoppix 3.6, and does not now,
> and worked with an earlier version of Ubuntu, and does not now, and the
> keyboard failed once before.
Keith,
It worked with Slackware and Xubuntu, including the current version, until
Saturday morning.
> First, try looking at the CMOS BIOS settings
OK.
> Next, try pulling the keyboard, blowing out any garbage, then reseating
> the flex connector. Sometimes it is a bad connection.
OK.
> If that doesn't work, the chip that does the keyboard control, on the
> laptop main board, may have gone flaky. You may need a new laptop, and
> your old laptop is now your new firewall with builtin text screen and
> keybouard and battery backup.
No, it will go to Free Geek -- minus the brand-new 70G/7200 RPM hard
drive.
> One fellow that has been helpful for Thinkpad problems is John Callahan
> (john at callahan.net or ebay at tpads-plus.com ) near Charlotte in N.C. He
> fixes lots of Thinkpads, and knows lots of symptoms and cures. You may end
> up sending the unit to him.
Good to know. I did the keyboard replacement here, and Northwest Computer
Support did the LCD screen replacement.
> But I'm pretty close to stumped here. The earlier keyboard failure is
> worrysome, and the same things that break keyboards also break
> trackpoints.
Well, the unit was about 6 years old then, so I don't ascribe major
concerns about the keyboard failing after that length of pretty steady use.
I'll do more cleaning and checking.
Thanks very much,
Rich
--
Richard B. Shepard, Ph.D. | The Environmental Permitting
Applied Ecosystem Services, Inc. | Accelerators(TM)
<http://www.appl-ecosys.com> Voice: 503-667-4517 Fax: 503-667-8863
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