Keyboard issues since teardown.

Hi There,

I was wondering whether you Alienware guru's would be able to help me, I have trawled the internet but found not definitive answers, so this is my last hope.

I recently had one of my 7970m gfx cards die on me so I stripped down my laptop, and removed the card at fault, and put everything back together, being careful when replacing every cable and ribbon! Especially the keyboard connection.

The machine fired back up and I finally had display output, and all was right in the world again until I came to login, when I tried to login it would not let me saying my password was incorrect, after some investigation I discovered that when I pressed certain keys I would get something along these lines:

t would give me tg
f would give fv

So I thought off the bat check the connection make sure it has not worked itself loose while I was placing back and securing it.

I found that the cable had worked itself loose and I had fixed back in and made the sure the plastic clips were down safe and sound and this time all was secure.

But unfortuntely the issue remained, while I did not think anything I would have done caused any damage to the cable/ribbon or connection point I decided to order another keyboard, I got a dell genuine part and refitted the keyboard but had the same issue, so I know it is now not the keyboard!

Is there anything else you guru's could suggest it could be causing this.

Many Thanks in Advance

 

There is another member of our forum that experienced similar weirdness with his Alienware that even survived multiple keyboard and motherboard replacements. He finally gave up on trying to fix it and parted out the machine on eBay. His was the only example I am aware of, but now it sounds like you have a similar problem. Since it is so rare, I don't know what to tell you. Besides what you have already done, here is what I would do in search of a solution...

• Try an external USB keyboard and see if that works OK, just to rule out a problem with all keyboards.
  
  
• Try doing a clean install of Windows using a different HDD (or make an image of your current installation you can easily go back to to save time). Do this to rule out some sort of goofy OS/keyboard driver corruption.
  
  
• Triple-check the ribbon cable connections and look closely with a flashlight and magnifying glass to be sure there is no debris stuffed down in the bottom of the ribbon cable slots in an area that is difficult to see. Examine the ribbon cable socket carefully to be sure all of the contacts look good and nothing is bridging across them.

 

Hi Mr Fox,

Many thanks for your prompt response, I have indeed done the first 2 and inserting a USB keyboard works perfectly and at present I do not use it for mobile gaming so I am able to use it on my desk with little issue.

The third I will most certainly do this weekend as I have not attempted this as yet, and hopefully it will yield the desired result.

As I would like to keep using it, as I would like to upgrade my 7970m to Nvidia 780m. Quick question in regards to this do I have to have a unlocked BIOS for this, and modded drivers to use the 780m or is it inherently supported with the r2?

I have seen conflicting information in regards to this!

 

Not much but just a tip - use the unlocked BIOS it's a top class benefit for that machine, If I were you I'd get the svl7 BIOS installed on day1, rest assured.

 

Thanks Ashtrix for the tip, I have never done this on the laptop since I bought it back in 2012.

Would I be correct in assuming this what I need to download and flash the bios with to bring it up to A11 and unlocked?
https://www.techinferno.com/index.php?/files/file/93-a11-unlocked-bios-m18xr2-by-swick1981-svl7/

 

Hey man, I had this same issue on my M18x R1. I tried 2 different keyboards and made sure the connections were solid. Nothing worked unfortunately. I sold it as is, but a usb keyboard worked like a charm. Sorry

 

Glad to help. 780M is plug and play, but you have to use drivers with an INF mod. That part is easy to do.

 

Yeah that is what I am worried is going to be the case! However it works with the keyboard and I seldom travel with it due to the weight

That is good to know, I am batting around what to do as the graphics card really needs beefing up in order for it to stay as a current gaming rig, and as I spent a shed load of money on it I would like to keep it running at a decent spec gfx wise. So may even consider one 970 or 980m which I know will require unlocked bios and modified drivers.

One of my friends asked if I had considered the following instead of doing an internal GPU update:

http://www.banggood.com/Mini-PCI-E-...al-Independent-Video-Card-Dock-p-1011222.html

However i am not entirely sure how good these are with the latest cards and whether the Mini PCI-E would keep up with the latest cards, alongside that does the alienware m18x r2 even have a spare Mini PCI-E slot? As looking about I cannot seem to find an answer or see if anyone has attempted the above with the r2

Mr Fox or any other guru had any experience with doing this, and is it really worth it as opposed to upgrading internally?

 

That's the new BIOS mod based off svl7's old unlocked sBIOS for Maxwell compatiability with Windows 7 legacy boot instead of full UEFI boot. I'd say you can opt for that but I don't know the status (how does it perform ? etc), you can find more info on the sticky thread here. Or you can try the older Svl7 M18x R2 Unlocked BIOS. @Mr. Fox should know more information on this.