Author Topic: FC200R Troubleshooting (Read 5175 times)

xelos · « **on:** Fri, 31 December 2010, 20:07:30 »

I recently purchased a Leopold FC200R and I'm some issues with it.

The keyboard works fine most of the times but sometimes when I press the backspace key or the enter key in quick succession I hear a several beeps and the backspace key and enter key becomes borked and whenever I press those keys it spams random string of letters and numbers instead of the corresponding key. Same issue occurs with or without the ps/2 converter. I was able to replicate this on another OS installed in another partition but I was unable to replicate it on another rig, which makes me suspect it's a problem with my mobo but when I test with my old rubberdome POS the issue does not occur.

Tested on Windows 7 x64, WinXP x64 and WinXP x32 (worked fine on winxp x32)

xelos · « **Reply #1 on:** Fri, 31 December 2010, 21:10:45 »

Sorry for the slow reply, been doing some more extensive testing and now I'm quite sure the keyboard itself is defective because the issue occurs intermittently (albeit less often) on several rigs and its ALWAYS the same keys that cause the problem. Do you think its the controller?

theferenc · « **Reply #2 on:** Fri, 31 December 2010, 21:17:53 »

Where did you order it from? Contact the seller, get a replacement sent out. Assuming you live in a country with consumer protection laws, and you ordered it from such a country as well.

xelos · « **Reply #3 on:** Fri, 31 December 2010, 21:23:13 »

I asked a family member to buy this board for me while he was in Korea and he purchased directly from Leopold. Will contact them today and hopefully they'll send me a replacement board as I've only been using it for 3 days.z

Damn I'm pissed off, waited a month to receive it and now I have to send it away and wait some more. My hulk quota is imminent

xelos · « **Reply #4 on:** Fri, 31 December 2010, 23:14:02 »

Is it strange that the issue only happens after rapidly pressing certain keys or is that a normal symtom for a faulty board? Cheers

sixty · « **Reply #5 on:** Sat, 01 January 2011, 11:19:23 »

Just tried this on mine. Can't reproduce the error. I guess you got a faulty board.

xelos · « **Reply #6 on:** Sat, 01 January 2011, 18:57:19 »

Guys at Leopold said they'd be in touch in a few days so will update this thread when they get back to me.

The keyboards working fine atm so I guess I need to be careful not to spam the keys till replacement arrives :S

Mini-Update:
Managed to narrow down the cause of the problem using http://www.microsoft.com/appliedsciences/content/projects/KeyboardGhostingDemo.aspx

It seems that the PAUSE button input becomes stuck (which is strange because I never use that key) and the issue sorts it self out once I unstick it. Queue twilight zone theme

xelos · « **Reply #7 on:** Sun, 02 January 2011, 00:48:31 »

Mini-Update 2:

I managed to find quite a few other people on the Leopold community board and kbdmania with similar issues with recently purchased boards. As a precaution I would advise against buying Leopold boards atm if you're overseas as getting **** RMAed is such a huge hassle.

This is not an isolated problem it seems.

BlueRain · « **Reply #8 on:** Sun, 02 January 2011, 00:58:12 »

ruh-roh... that doesn't sound like an endorsement...

More Noppoo Mini Choc!

wendell · « **Reply #9 on:** Mon, 03 January 2011, 23:25:04 »

I just got mine and so far haven't been able to reproduce the problem you describe. I'll try on various machines. What other problems have you heard of?

iMav · « **Reply #10 on:** Mon, 03 January 2011, 23:36:02 »

I have the Archiss variant of this 'board. Will see if I can replicate as well.

For Majestouch's sake, I hope this is cleared up before he starts selling them. There are a lot of people waiting for EK to start stocking these and it would really suck to see this problem cause heartache to EK customers.

xelos · « **Reply #11 on:** Tue, 04 January 2011, 00:05:51 »

Another common issues that Korean users report are situation where a keystroke is repeated twice when typing quickly and uneven keycap spacing. My 'board is fine in that respect though, just my backspace, / and enter key acting up on occasion.

Another common complaint is the loudness of the space bar and shift keys but I think they're merely whining.

wendell · « **Reply #12 on:** Tue, 04 January 2011, 01:17:03 »

Quote from: xelos;272757

Another common issues that Korean users report are situation where a keystroke is repeated twice when typing quickly

I notice that the activation point is actually just past the tactile point. I can ride the activation point without going over the bump or bottoming out. There is no sound or feel directly at the activation point. I wonder if this problem described is the result riding the point while trying to type without bottoming out.

Quote

and uneven keycap spacing.

I got out my ruler and...OMG!!!...there is a variance of about +/- 0.5mm in the spacing between keycaps. Dang, that totally destroys it for me.

Quote

just my backspace, / and enter key acting up on occasion.

Will continue to stress test.

Quote

Another common complaint is the loudness of the space bar and shift keys but I think they're merely whining.

Agree with you there. I have complained about spacebars before and I don't find this one bad at all.

xelos · « **Reply #13 on:** Tue, 04 January 2011, 01:36:10 »

Quote from: wendell

I got out my ruler and...OMG!!!...there is a variance of about +/- 0.5mm in the spacing between keycaps. Dang, that totally destroys it for me.

To be fair though the batch of keyboards that did come with the uneven keys did look pretty shoddy.

The second pic doesn't look too bad but the 3 and 4 keycap would annoy the hell out of me if I happened to glance at it

xelos · « **Reply #14 on:** Tue, 04 January 2011, 02:02:28 »

Quote from: wendell;272785

I notice that the activation point is actually just past the tactile point. I can ride the activation point without going over the bump or bottoming out. There is no sound or feel directly at the activation point. I wonder if this problem described is the result riding the point while trying to type without bottoming out..

Apparently this issue can occurs on all 3 switch types and even on the FC200R lite which has white Alps switches. Can't find the original thread atm but I think I found the info on a thread at http://www.coolenjoy.net/

wendell · « **Reply #15 on:** Tue, 04 January 2011, 12:56:13 »

Quote from: xelos;272794

The second pic doesn't look too bad but the 3 and 4 keycap would annoy the hell out of me if I happened to glance at it

OK. Mine doesn't show any spacing irregularity to the degree that yours does.

My contatct in Korea reported that the person at Leopold gave the impression that this purchase came from a dwindling stock. So what EK eventually imports would likely be a new production run.

I am starting to notice double registers with keystrokes. It's nearly always with pinky keys. It seems to happen when I'm typing very lightly. If I'm releasing the key too slowly, it may rebound on the tactile point and register again. This would seem to be a matter of adjusting to the switches. Anyone have similar issues with other Cherry switch keyboards? A simple solution would be to increase the repeat time.

wendell · « **Reply #16 on:** Mon, 17 January 2011, 19:11:52 »

After another week with the FC200R on both Windows and Linux, I haven't had any problems that can attributed to the manufacture.

I do still have some trouble with double-striking, but that's just a matter of adjusting to the switches. For a while, I had the Leopold alongside a Fujitsu with 72g switches. Going back and forth between those two did not work at all. The tactile feedback of the Cherry Browns is much lighter than I expected. I like them, but I do find it takes me a while to acclimate.

On another thread, someone complained of the FC200R sliding on the desk. I've been placing mine on a mousepad. That prevents sliding and greatly cuts down on the sound.

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Author Topic: FC200R Troubleshooting (Read 5175 times)