splendid things - laptop keyboard
This will sound like nothing to more computer hardware oriented folks, but I am so pleased (because I am very much not computer hardware oriented) I will have to post this under the 'splann' tag.
Splann is Cornish for splendid, and I talked about using it for things I thought were splendid in this post: https://skryblans.com/splann-is-splendid/
I use an old Thinkpad T-495 laptop as my sofa-bound computer. Can't be doing with a phone or a tablet computer, with their assorted sawn-off apps and touchscreen keyboards. I want a computer that works just like my proper computer, with the full programs and a real keyboard, but smaller, so that I can use it on my lap on the sofa. So a small laptop seemed a good fit.
Over the last few weeks, maybe a couple of months, I had noticed it occasionally missing a letter from my typing. At first I thought it was me, then I realised it was a single letter.
The A had gone WOL.
But it was only sometimes. Sometimes it responded to many, increasingly frustrated presses to try to get one a. Other times I got multiple a's from one press. Annoyingly, the A was the only key giving problems.
I jet-aired the keyboard. I lifted the key off to check for foreign objects stopping it press down properly (if you can call custard cream crumbs foreign). I used a soft brush to make sure I'd dislodged everything I could.
No joy. Erratic a's haaunted me.
Or sometimes hunted me.
In normal modern consumer-land, this would have been a good excuse to buy a newer replacement laptop. After all, this laptop, getting on a bit, was now 'faulty'. But it was a small fault. A tiny fault. The laptop was already over-specced for what I need it for really, and I found it fine otherwise. Surely I could do something better and less wasteful about it?
A replacement keyboard maybe? Perhaps I could manage to do that?
I looked into it.
I'll give Lenovo kudos here. One input of the serial number (for a laptop made in 2019) into their support web page and you get the spec of your laptop, together with the part numbers of all its components. Plus there are guides, both written with pictures, or a video if you prefer, of how to do the replacement (for anything that you're meant to be able to replace).
This pleases me in this 'throw it away and buy something new' age. It was also one of the reasons I had gone for a used Thinkpad laptop in the first place. I buy most of my tech older and used... I'm old and used, I'm alright-ish, why shouldn't my tech be? Some creaky bits compared to the newer stuff sure, but still serviceable, if a little slower. (Yes, we're still talking about the tech.)
This morning, I followed the guide and managed to replace the keyboard with the one I sourced on eBay a few days ago. It all works properly now. Which, having sourced it on eBay, is another thing to thank deity for.
And that's a splann thing. Something simple (me managing to fit a replacement keyboard to my laptop without bloodshed, and it working when I've finished) that made me think yep, that's a splann thing today. It made me smile.
post link for sharing: https://skryblans.com/splendid-things-laptop-keyboard
Email Me or Contact via Letterbird
If you got this far, you may as well click the star below on your way out.