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Late 2008 MBP keyboard intermittently not responding, sometimes acting on its own

post #1 of 2
12/18/12 at 8:32am
Thread Starter 

Hello,

 

I rather suspect that I'm facing a breakdown of some hardware component, but thought I'd ask here before handing it in for repair just in case someone has experience with similar problems or have reason to think that it may be possible to fix without eliciting the aid of a computer repair firm.

 

Symptoms (the symptoms are not constant but will alternate between the 4 listed below):

  1. Keyboard is completely dead. Doesn't respond to anything I do.
  2. Some keys work, but don't do what they're supposed to do. Pressing one key will cause the keyboard viewer to show five or six different keys being activated.
  3. Keyboard viewer shows keys activating and deactivating despite no keys being pressed.
  4. Everything works as it should (as it does right now; I'm typing this on the computer).

 

Attempts made to fix the problem:

  1. Restart the computer.
  2. Resets (SMC and PRAM, I believe they're called - apparently that helped another MBP owner with a similar problem).
  3. Restart in Safe Mode (unsuccessful. I believe that the computer didn't register the keys that needs to be pressed down in order for the OS to enter Safe Mode. For the same reason, I have been unable to do another SMC or PRAM reset.)

 

Additional comments:

I believe moving the computer affects the symptoms, which I suppose further points to a problem with the hardware...

 

Computer:

MacBook Pro, 15-inch, Late 2008

Mac OS X Lion 10.7.5 (11G63)

 

Cheers,

Nils

 
 
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post #2 of 2
12/21/12 at 1:09pm

I would suspect one or more of the following things, in this order:

 

  1. Loose cable connecting from keyboard to logic board ... and easiest to fix (just re-seat the cable into its connector), so hopefully it's this.
  2. Bad cable from keyboard to logic board (or failing cable).  I'm not sure if you can just get a replacement cable, though.  I think the cable might be part of the keyboard part, so you might have to get a whole new keyboard to get a new cable ... but again, I'm not sure.
  3. Bad connector on logic board (or failing connector.)  This will require either logic board repair or replacement.  It's probably the most expensive option (short of buying a whole new laptop as a replacement) so hopefully it's not this.
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