Our Excellent iBook G4 12" Keyboard Adventure.

It started with cereal and milk spilled all over the iBook G4 keyboard.

After drying out the laptop in an upsided-down "tent" configuration overnight with warm-not hot-air from a heater fan, I found that the [1], [q],[ a], [z], [option], the left Apple command key, and the [delete] key in the upper right no longer functioned.

We visited the local Apple store help bar, and the "genius" there was discouraging about repair attempts. He tried to steer us toward getting a new laptop by pointing out that there may be more damage than just to the keyboard.

Time out. I don't spend thousands of dollars on "may be."

But he did take the keyboard off to look under it, which showed me how to do that.

When we got home, I plugged a USB keyboard into the iBook G4. (Genius could easily have done that in the time he spent trying to argue me into getting a new MacBook with four times the something or other.*) The iBook ran just fine with the USB keyboard. This doesn't completely eliminate deeper trouble, but came close enough for me to invest some time in repair instead of replace. Some time on the web produced instructions to detach the keyboard:

manuals.info.apple.com/en/ iBook_G4_(Mid2005)_keyboard_DIY.pdf

The instructions are not perfect; they don't show the "Airport Extreme" module, which has to be pulled out gently (there's a plastic tab for that purpose) along with the metal shield that covers the keyboard connection.

A website entitled "Zen and the art of iBook keyboard maintenance" was also helpful, though that particular project went well beyond my sexagenarian ambition. See:

geektechnique.org/index.php?id=160

At this stage, if I could have borrowed a working iBook G4 12" keyboard, I could have plugged that in and verified that the keyboard and the keyboard alone was the problem. We considered using Gayle's iBook G4 14" keyboard for that purpose; it doesn't quite fit the physical space on the 12", but it looks like the connector and pin assignments might be the same. However, I couldn't determine from the web whether there were electronic or software differences as well as physical ones between the 12" and 14" keyboards such that plugging one into the other might result in damage to the computer, keyboard, or both. We didn't want to take that chance.

With the website help, I removed the 12" iBook G4 keyboard, disassembled it, and cleaned it gently, carefully and completely. After one gets the keys and flexible plastic key holders off, there are three layers: a plastic sheet with little dimples that lie under the keys, a circuit trace sheet with dots that lie under the dimples, and a metal plate which contains the hardware for attaching the keys (which is why one has to take all the keys off to disassemble the keyboard). In normal operation, a key presses down on a dimple which transmits the pressure to the dot which creates a connection.

Apparently, milk between the last two layers can eliminate this function permanently--I don't understand this process completely but no amount of cleaning and drying would restore the function of those keys on my old keyboard. The cleaning didn't do any additional harm, but the same keys continued not to function. By the way, to save time when testing functionality, one can plug in the keyboard sans keys and keyholders and press gently down on the dimples. It helps to be a touch typist, of course.

Convinced that the keyboard was bad and beyond my ability to repair it in a reasonable amount of time, I ordered an iBook G4 keyboard from ebay on Monday for less than $50 including shipping. It arrived Thursday and was in the computer less than an hour after I picked up the mail. The iBook G4 now works perfectly. That sure beats a couple of thousand in new hardware and software.

GDN -11 Oct 2007

*Genius doggedly touted the new Macbook's video editing ability. I don't do that, at least not yet, but I do use TK! Solver models to do most of my astronomy and science fiction worldbuilding, and while TK! Solver runs on classic it doesn't run on System X--and the latest Macs don't run classic. Genius suggested getting the Windows version TK! Solver and running it on Soft Windows ($$$). I've ported TK! Solver models from Macs to Windows; the process is nontrivial and I have a LOT of models. So that idea was a non-starter.

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