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JohnO4

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JohnO4

20 Posts

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May 14th, 2004 17:00

Extra characters while typing

My 600M has an annoying habit where I get extra characterrs asa I'm typing. See what I mean? Sometimes I get doubles, and sometimes a character is repeated as seen in the previous sentence..."asa" Seems to be mostly the left side of the keyboard.

This is a huge time waster. How would I troubleshoot this to determine the cause? I've got the Windows keyboard settings at their slowest repeat rate.

 

-John O

  • chall5

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    Posted May 15th, 2004 07:00

    I havee tthe same prroblem as you caan seee on my Latitude CPx J.  I boughtt aa new keyboarrd aand its sttill doing itt, getting very annoyed with itt, is tthis sspecific to Latitudes or is it a Dell problem accrross aall theeir laptops cos if so I won't be buying aanother !  I have alsso rreebuiltt my OS from the ground up, no changee

    Anyonee got any suggs as to how to fix it ?  Sincee I have tried a replaceemnt keeyboarrd and it still does it it leads mee to belieeve the problem liees elsewhere

    reegards

    Chris

  • JohnO4

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    Posted May 17th, 2004 11:00

    The key symptom is when I get an extra character after I type another, for instance

    "as" becomes "asa"

    I'm pretty sure that's not the keyboard, but I can't find a Windows or bios setting that matters. Plus, the problem comes and goes. So far this morning I've had NO repeating characters. I've been using laptops for over 14 years, and this is the first one with this problem. I never have this trouble on my desktops, unless my fingers slip.

    -John

  • chall5

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    Posted May 17th, 2004 12:00

    Whats the official Dell line  on this ?  I  can't  think oof anything else to try, verey annoying  especially when  I have forked out for a new keyboard and its almost worse !
  • JohnO4

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    Posted May 17th, 2004 12:00

    I haven't called Tech Support yet. This is probably an intermittant keyboard controller issue, which means motherboard. I'm guessing there's somee other trigger too...there it goes.

    BTW, I've had that same typo: verey.

    Using an external keyb would definitely help point to the root of the probleem. Unfortunately, this Latitude doesn't have a PS/2 connector, and I don't have a USB keyboard. (Wonder if a Mac USB keyboard will work...)

  • DELL-BobT

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    Posted May 19th, 2004 15:00

    John and other users:

    Thank you for using the Dell Community Forum.

    Please look at the solution posted as item #4 on the Keyboard / Pointing Devices FAQ.

  • JohnO4

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    Posted May 28th, 2004 13:00

    I tried all the steps, and it still adds extra characters.

    I tried a USB keyboard, but all I could locate was one for a Mac, and the lack of a Delete key was worse than the original problem. :-)

     

    -John O

  • chall5

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    Posted May 28th, 2004 14:00

    I bought a replacement Latitude CPx keyboard on eBay, installed it and the problem was worse !!!

    Finally I bought a black Dell serial external keyboard on eBay for £5.50 and it works fine (my workstation just takes up a bit more space now)

    None of the 'stock' try this fixes worked for me, not impressed to be honest, will consider other brands when I need a new laptop

    Chris

  • JohnO4

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    Posted June 1st, 2004 11:00

    Well Chris, I'm not giving up on this machine just yet over a wacky keyboard, but I'm definitely going to pursue this and get it replaceed with a new one.

    -John

  • jekagan

    1 Rookie

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    Posted June 17th, 2004 02:00

    HA!!!  I was beginning to think I was crazy until I see that other users are experiencing this same problem.  I too have replaced my keyboard, and initially the problem was gone, but now it is back again.  ARGH!

     

    Just for point of reference, I am running Windows 2000 on my CPx H.  What OSes is this problem occuring with?

     

    - Justin

  • JohnO4

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    Posted June 17th, 2004 11:00

    Win XP in my case.