A tale of two Osbornes

From: Lawrence Walker <lgwalker_at_mts.net>
Date: Wed Nov 20 00:28:00 2002

 Definitely a bummer. I hope I don't find something similar when I
open mine up. And of course the k-b is integral to the portable and
likely hard to come by. I have an old sewing-machine Compaq
plasma screen portable that I was able to replace the missing
cover/k-b with a desktop one but it spoils the portable thing about it.
 Good luck.
Lawrence

> Hi Lawrence:
>
> I expected a keyboard problem, since the owner said it had a stuck key.
> Sure enough, the boot screen would flash as if you were holding down an
> incorrect key.
>
> When I opened it up, the row and column flex connectors were plainly
> visible. Also, the keyboard pinout is in the tech ref (which is online,
> if you don't already have it).
>
> I peeled a corner of the flex circuit up off the aluminum plate, and
> could see metallization crossovers where the shorts likely exist. I
> could punch a hole at the crossover to break the short, but then I would
> need to jumper the cut traces. And this does not look like a solder job
> -- liquid conductive ink perhaps? There could be shorts in the middle
> of the key array too. The keyswitches are plastic, with posts that
> protrude through the mounting plate, and then melted into place.
>
> All in all a nasty thing to even think about repairing. Perhaps I am on
> the wrong track (no pun intended), but I pulled the two flex connectors
> out, so the ribbon cable is not connected -- I can measure many shorts
> right at the flex terminals. All of the melted-in-place keyswitches
> would need to be removed to asses the situation properly. Bummer.
>
> At least I have a new keyboard I can plug in. I have not opened that
> one up, so I don't know if it is different.
>
> gil
>
>
> > Uh-Oh ! I picked up a beige Osborne 1 last summer. It's in my
> >lengthening To-Do queue. I booted it at the time but it had a problem
> >not recognising the keyboard. I simply figured it was likely a cable
> >fault. Now I wonder if there may be larger problems with the keyboard.
> >What was your methodology to check the k-b ? I don't want to open mine
> >up now to do a visual inspection, lest I be captured by the "fix-it"
> >bug and neglect more pressing tasks.
>
>
>
> ;-----------------------------------------------------------
> ; vaux electronics, inc. 480-354-5556
> ; http://www.vauxelectronics.com (fax: 480-354-5558)
> ;-----------------------------------------------------------


lgwalker_at_mts.net
bigwalk_ca_at_yahoo.com
Received on Wed Nov 20 2002 - 00:28:00 GMT

This archive was generated by hypermail 2.3.0 : Fri Oct 10 2014 - 23:35:27 BST