Random keyboard freeze

Update to the above. The freeze also appears as continuous repeating of the last key pressed prior to lockup and the usb mouse still operates whilst the problem exists. Although it appears like a keyboard failure replacement of the original keyboard with a brand new Microsoft keyboard has had no effect the problem still occurs. A full Dell Support Centre PC checkup brings up no faults.

Have you tried using a different rear USB port for the keyboard?

After it freezes, what happens if you unplug and move the keyboard to a different USB port?

Ron

      Thanks for your reply, the problem occurred again last night whilst typing information into a uk.gov website using Mozilla Firefox 5.0 and changing the USB connection from one of the rear sockets to a front socket allowed me to regain control of the keyboard. Does this mean that I have a faulty USB socket or the pcb it is connected to is faulty or is it a software problem?

   Having moved the keyboard USB plug to a different rear USB socket (immediately next to the previously used faulty socket) and put the mouse USB plug into the one previously occupied by the keyboard the problem has recurred, whilst typing this reply on Windows Live Messenger, again overcome by switching to a front mounted USB socket.

   Uninstalling OpenOffice and installing Libre Office in its place has had no effect.

   My mouse still works during an episode of the problem but either the keyboard becomes completely unresponsive or the last key pressed repeats continuously typing into whatever application I was using at the time. The only way to get control again is to either reboot via the Start button on the task bar or unplug the keyboard USB connector from the computer and, after a few seconds wait, plug it into a different USB socket.

   Any further information would be very welcome.

Hard to say if it's hardware or software at the moment, but you seem to have ruled out the keyboard, itself.

Disconnect all USB devices, except mouse and keyboard. Open Device Manager and expand the list under USB. Double-click on each USB root hub, one at a time, and go to Power Management tab. Uncheck the box "Allow PC to turn off this device..." for each root hub. Then exit and reboot.

If that doesn't help (or if all those boxes were already unchecked), manually set a System Restore point, just to be safe. Then open Device Manager, right-click and Uninstall all USB Root Hubs.  When you uninstall the root hubs driving the mouse and keyboard, you'll have to do a hard reboot, because both of those will stop working. So you might want to see which root hubs they're connected to and save those for last.  When you reboot, Windows should reinstall the USB drivers.

If you still have problems, consider the power hungry USB devices connected to the PC. If you have a a lot of them, try disconnecting all but the few essential ones (eg, keep the printer). If that fixes it, it's possible USB is just being overloaded so the PC ignores the keyboard to protect itself from the overload. In this case, an externally powered USB hub with its own power brick might solve the problem, by connecting power hungry devices through the hub to a rear USB port.

Ron